1y ago

Fewer people now say representative democracy is a very good way to govern in many countries surveyed.

www.pewresearch.org

Representative Democracy Remains a Popular Ideal, but People Around the World Are Critical of How It’s Working

2y ago

Global study: many say their country would be better off if more women, people from poor backgrounds and young adults held elective office

www.pewresearch.org /global/2024/02/28/representative-democracy-remains-a-popular-ideal-but-people-around-the-world-are-critical-of-how-its-working/

76 comments

A lot of people are saying that bourgeois democracy is the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie.
BBC, 2014: Study: US is an oligarchy, not a democracy
The US is dominated by a rich and powerful elite.
So concludes a recent study by Princeton University Prof Martin Gilens and Northwestern University Prof Benjamin I Page.
This is not news, you say.
Perhaps, but the two professors have conducted exhaustive research to try to present data-driven support for this conclusion. Here's how they explain it:
Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organised groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on US government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence.
Well yeah, bourgeois "democracy" is only really democratic for capitalists and not workers.
As Churchill once famously said, democracy is the worst form of government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.
I guess one of the nicest things about democracy is that it has a built-in mechanism for removing a government. It may not be reliable at getting good leaders in place, but at least when there's a bad one it has a way of getting them back out again without having to go in shooting.
- The fact that you think that genocidal scumbag had good ideas means your opinion can be safely discarded.
  
  Lol, what?
- I'm not seeing anyone removing Biden or Netanhitler from power though?
- I spent way more time than i'm willing to admit trying to figure out what swear the filter was removing.
We need direct democracy tbh.
- Democracy: Dictatorship of the majority. Mob rule.
  
  The capitalist class, Walter Lippmann, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the Trilateral Commission’s The Crisis of Democracy would be proud (emphasis mine):
  Al Smith once remarked that "the only cure for the evils of democracy is more democracy." Our analysis suggests that applying that cure at the present time could well be adding fuel to the flames. Instead, some of the problems of governance in the United States today stem from an excess of democracy […] Needed, instead, is a greater degree of moderation in democracy.
It’s still the best way even if it’s bad. Ranked choice voting would make it better.
- It's demonstrably not, but westerners just keep clinging to their failed system lacking the courage and imagination to try anything different.
  
  Go on. Enlighten us.
  
  What’s better?
- Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
  https://piped.video/yhO6jfHPFQU?si=x7aHPIT1KL7n_JPg
  Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
  I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.
  
  That could be a nice improvement to the US’s representative democracy also. The nice thing about ranked choice voting is that it forces people to have more than one choice. People may only approve of exactly their favorite choice.
- Ah, yes, the Athenian Method.
The problem with democracy is that people can be manipulated.
- that's why education of the people is a core pillar of a democratic nation.

76 comments