Best type of democracy?

[Schrödinger's Cat]

I think this depends on the situation, but do you have a preferred method of democracy? Plurality (1 person, 1 vote - most votes win) is mostly in vogue when talking about contemporary democracy, but there's also cumulative democracy (list the options in order of preference), consensual (everyone must agree, or at the very least not object to going forward), majority (must get 50%+1) and many more.

[Die Neue Zeit]

1) Why is this in the History forum?
2) First, the democratic principle of universal suffrage must be expanded from its current purpose of propping up parliamentarism to a level that forms the basis of participatory democracy. Second, there should be no elections whatsoever in terms of voting for people. The democratic principle of universal suffrage must be combined not with the current oligarchic principle of personnel selection, but with the democratic principle of personnel selection: sortition (http://www.nesc.ac.uk/action/esi/download.cfm?index=2972).

[Schrödinger's Cat]

Drat. Like a teenager about to have sex, I missed. :laugh:


2) First, the democratic principle of universal suffrage must be expanded from its current purpose of propping up parliamentarism to a level that forms the basis of participatory democracy. Second, there should be no elections whatsoever in terms of voting for people. The democratic principle of universal suffrage must be combined not with the current oligarchic principle of personnel selection, but with the democratic principle of personnel selection: sortition (http://www.nesc.ac.uk/action/esi/download.cfm?index=2972).

I was more or less talking about direct democracy matters, not demarchy (sortition).

[AnthArmo]

Consensus democracy, its the only way people can come to a perfect agreement. If two heads are better than one, then 5 billion would be incredible :lol:

I think that with today's technology that Consensus Democracy could be perfectly implemented on a mass scale.

[Schrödinger's Cat]

Uh, I think that's impractical.

[revolution inaction]

Consensus democracy, its the only way people can come to a perfect agreement. If two heads are better than one, then 5 billion would be incredible :lol:

I think that with today's technology that Consensus Democracy could be perfectly implemented on a mass scale.

How do you plan to to deal with stubborn people who disagree with the majority?

[JimmyJazz]

Radicalgraffiti and Gene, can you explain what makes you anarchists if you oppose consensus (for very good reasons imo)? And I'm especially confused by the need to include it when it's hyphenated with communism, since communism by anyone's definition is without hierarchy.

[AnthArmo]

How do you plan to to deal with stubborn people who disagree with the majority?

Then you merely work with them. If 99% of a group are Fanatically religious and 1% are Atheist then I belive it's possible to work with both groups, say, for example.

Initiative : We should make going to church compulsory for everyone

99% agree, the 1% stubbornly disagree, then they state that they'll be happy with a change as such

Initiative : We should make going to church compulsory for anyone who professes Fanatical Religious Beliefs.

100% agree, everyone wins

:thumbup1:It's called Democracy:thumbup1:

[mikelepore]

I'd like to see someone test out a system of voting priorities. I cast my vote like this: A,C,B. I vote for A, but if A loses, change my vote to C and count everyone's votes again. Then, if C loses, change my vote to B and count everyone's votes again. Such a system would almost always converge quickly, in just a few computer iterations. In a very rare case, it can go into an endless loop. the advantage is no one ever having to compromise any principles. You're can always feel free to put the idea you really want first, even if it has a negligible chance to win. That won't take away your opportunity to select "lesser evil" choices.

[AnthArmo]

I'd like to see someone test out a system of voting priorities. I cast my vote like this: A,C,B. I vote for A, but if A loses, change my vote to C and count everyone's votes again. Then, if C loses, change my vote to B and count everyone's votes again. Such a system would almost always converge quickly, in just a few computer iterations. In a very rare case, it can go into an endless loop. the advantage is no one ever having to compromise any principles. You're can always feel free to put the idea you really want first, even if it has a negligible chance to win. That won't take away your opportunity to select "lesser evil" choices.


An excellent idea, its however already employed here in good old Australia! It's called Priority voting or something like that. We have, on our ballot paper, a list of candidates for Prime Minister, we use a number system to show our preference and it pretty much works just as you described it! I love it because no-body's ashamed to vote Green out of fear that the Labour party will end up losing to the Neo-Liberal's

[nom de guerre]

I would love to see demarchic, participatory democracy. Any other democracy is basically a sham.

[Schrödinger's Cat]

Radicalgraffiti and Gene, can you explain what makes you anarchists if you oppose consensus (for very good reasons imo)? And I'm especially confused by the need to include it when it's hyphenated with communism, since communism by anyone's definition is without hierarchy.

I believe in free association. You can still have majority democracy if it's agreed upon by all parties.

[Schrödinger's Cat]

Then you merely work with them. If 99% of a group are Fanatically religious and 1% are Atheist then I belive it's possible to work with both groups, say, for example.

Initiative : We should make going to church compulsory for everyone

99% agree, the 1% stubbornly disagree, then they state that they'll be happy with a change as such

Initiative : We should make going to church compulsory for anyone who professes Fanatical Religious Beliefs.

100% agree, everyone wins

:thumbup1:It's called Democracy:thumbup1:

That is way too simplistic. Look at issues like the death penalty and abortion where the differences are never compromised.

[JimmyJazz]

I believe in free association. You can still have majority democracy if it's agreed upon by all parties.

Ah that makes sense. Which would lead to the "free market in legal services" suggested in John Hasnas' essay "The Myth of the Rule of Law (http://faculty.msb.edu/hasnasj/GTWebSite/MythFinalDraft.pdf)".

[LOLseph Stalin]

Dictatorship! lol jk! I like cumulative democracy. It's the fairest system I think even though the wealthiest candidates are going to get all the votes anyway...

[AnthArmo]

That is way too simplistic. Look at issues like the death penalty and abortion where the differences are never compromised.


Okay, try me :cool:

Initiative : We should Legalize Abortion

A referendum shows 60% agree while 40% disagree. They argue that they are still "God's children" or some other annoying religious crap. After some arguing, we change things a bit

Initiative : We should Legalize Abortion, but you must have a good excuse, such as Teenage pregnancy or Rape

A Referendum shows 90% agree while 10% are still being stubborn. After some debate, maybe some experts in ethical philosophy or doctors will speak. After some time the Facilitator might change the Initiative as such

Initiative : We Should Legalize Abortion, but you must have a good excuse, such as Teenage pregnancy or Rape, and it must only be up to 3 months after that they are human. And a Doctor can refuse to do an abortion due to religious beliefs.

100% agree, everyone wins. Although the 10% were still reluctant to agree.

Do keep in mind, I'm against a simplistic "Yes" or "No" answer. That simplifies things too much, maybe something like "Definetly Agree", "Strongly Agree", "Unsure", "Disagree", "Strongly Disagree" would be more able to accurately measure the masses happiness with such a system. Again, IT would help speed up the process incredibly.

[Slave Revolt]

Initiative : We Should Legalize Abortion, but you must have a good excuse, such as Teenage pregnancy or Rape, and it must only be up to 3 months after that they are human. And a Doctor can refuse to do an abortion due to religious beliefs.



Consensual democracy cannot work in practice. You'll still have people like me who think that having an abortion is completely up to the mother to decide and fundamental religious people saying that any abortion is murder. You can't just persuade people that easily on an issue where most have very strong opinions.

Consensual democracy cant work because it requires everyone to have exactly the same beliefs and, as you can see even in this internet community, everyone has their own unique ideals (apart from those who blindly follow the words of their heros).

[DesertShark]

I think that democracy works best within small groups. The whole 50%+1 seems ridiculous in large populations, why not just have two separate communities because there's enough people on both sides to form the communities. But I also think that as a species, our ideal state is small groups that interact (yay for the internet). Mostly because if you live in a group and do not agree with them, you can move to a different group that holds your ideals.


I'd like to see someone test out a system of voting priorities. I cast my vote like this: A,C,B. I vote for A, but if A loses, change my vote to C and count everyone's votes again. Then, if C loses, change my vote to B and count everyone's votes again. Such a system would almost always converge quickly, in just a few computer iterations. In a very rare case, it can go into an endless loop. the advantage is no one ever having to compromise any principles. You're can always feel free to put the idea you really want first, even if it has a negligible chance to win. That won't take away your opportunity to select "lesser evil" choices.

An excellent idea, its however already employed here in good old Australia! It's called Priority voting or something like that. We have, on our ballot paper, a list of candidates for Prime Minister, we use a number system to show our preference and it pretty much works just as you described it! I love it because no-body's ashamed to vote Green out of fear that the Labour party will end up losing to the Neo-Liberal's
If there has to be a democracy, this way seems the most reasonable. I wish that America would upgrade it's voting system. Democracies established after ours, took our ideas and improved them; this and run-off voting in France are such improvements.


1) Why is this in the History forum?
2) First, the democratic principle of universal suffrage must be expanded from its current purpose of propping up parliamentarism to a level that forms the basis of participatory democracy. Second, there should be no elections whatsoever in terms of voting for people. The democratic principle of universal suffrage must be combined not with the current oligarchic principle of personnel selection, but with the democratic principle of personnel selection: sortition (http://www.nesc.ac.uk/action/esi/download.cfm?index=2972).
I agree with your first claim and also that it shouldn't be combined with an oligarchy. Can you explain what sortition is and/or how it works?

-DesertShark

[Die Neue Zeit]

^^^ Pure sortition is basically pure random selection ("luck of the draw") from a population. Typical sortition involves pre-established criteria (technical knowledge for administrative jobs would be one key criterion). One those criteria have been set, everybody in the population who meets those criteria are up for random selection.

All this sortition comes AFTER policies themselves have been decided upon by either a population at large or sortition-based legislative-executive bodies (soviet representatives being selected by lot and not by votes). In the case of the latter, they should still be subject to "aristocratic"/"oligarchic" recall (I use those terms because recall votes are still based on the principle of who is "best" to be in those positions - something deemed "aristocratic"/"oligarchic" by Aristotle).

[Junius]

"Revolution is not a problem of organisational forms. Revolution is on the contrary a problem of content, a problem of movement and action of revolutionary forces in an unceasing process, which cannot be theorised by fixing it in various tentatives of unchangeable 'constitutional doctrine'."

Bordiga - The Democratic Principle, 1921

[AnthArmo]

Consensual democracy cant work because it requires everyone to have exactly the same beliefs and, as you can see even in this internet community, everyone has their own unique ideals (apart from those who blindly follow the words of their heros).

I agree with you, Everyone has different opinions and different ideals of what is right, that is why I strongly disagree with Majority rules. If the Majority has power, then the minority are completely undermined. For example, The majority of the population are neo-liberal capitalists and are massively religious, they vote for a similarily minded president, and as a result Atheist Socialist's are completely underminded! This isn't even a fake example this is America TODAY!

Allow me to alert you to a short analogy that I read somewhere, 5 blind men are confronted by an elephant. They each grab a piece of the elephant, one of them thinks that he's holding a hose, the other a massive slab of meat. None of them has the entire picture so as such none of them know that they're playing around with an elephant. If they were to put they're opinions together they would decipher that they are in fact holding an elephant.

If you put everyone's opinion together, you get a superior solution.

[Die Neue Zeit]

I read Bordiga's work; he reduces "democracy" to electoralism (hence Bordigist parties were quite authoritarian with unaccountable leaderships), even while making legitimate criticisms of policy decision-making through votes. Again, per what I've said above, these are two separate questions.

[Junius]

Hi,

I think you are confused - but that is not surprising considering you have Kautsky, Luxemburg and Lenin in the same image - that is a puzzle that I think cannot be solved. Only joking : )

I think, however, you have missed even the first part of the Democratic Principle:


The use of certain terms in the exposition of the problems of communism very often engenders ambiguities because of the different meanings these terms may be given. Such is the case with the words democracy and democratic. In its statements of principle, Marxist communism presents itself as a critique and a negation of democracy; yet communists often defend the democratic character of proletarian organizations (the state system of workers' councils, trade unions and the party) and the application of democracy within them. There is certainly no contradiction in this, and no objection can be made to the use of the dilemma, "either bourgeois democracy or proletarian democracy" as a perfect equivalent to the formula "bourgeois democracy or proletarian dictatorship".

The Marxist critique of the postulates of bourgeois democracy is in fact based on the definition of the class character of modern society. It demonstrates the theoretical inconsistency and the practical deception of a system which pretends to reconcile political equality with the division of society into social classes determined by the nature of the mode of production.

Political freedom and equality, which, according to the theory of liberalism, are expressed in the right to vote, have no meaning except on a basis that excludes inequality of fundamental economic conditions. For this reason we communists accept their application within the class organizations of the proletariat and contend that they should function democratically.

(Emphasis mine).

[Die Neue Zeit]

^^^ Not at all, actually:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/social-proletocracy-revolutionary-t83064/index.html

The specific section in question: http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1183457&postcount=25