Is Democracy Over Rated?

I’m of the opinion that democracy as it is doesn’t work and is slightly worthless. I have a number of problems with it which I will discuss, now I know that his is a strange view to have and it might not be true everywhere so maybe I’ll refine my statement to democracy in the UK is worthless; who actually sees a difference between the three main parties anymore. Back in the 60’s and 70’s there was a difference, labour were for socialism while the conservatives were for capitalism and the lib dems didn’t exist. Which meant when you voted you know there were vast differences; flash to the present and now everyone is fighting over the bland, tasteless middle ground? “But” you all shout out “the middle ground is what the voter’s want that’s why they are fighting over it.” “Oh,” I say “do we really need 3 parties then?” “Of course!” you shout, “that way they can each be held accountable to the public.” “But doesn’t that mean they just pander to the public? Without any true unified hope of putting any long term policies in place? That might cause the public some pain at first but might benefit society in the long run as they are worried about political careers?” I query. “Hmm.” You say, “Hmm.” I say. It worth quoting Socrates (or Plato, who knows where one of them begins and the other one ends), who claimed that the public often doesn’t know what’s good for them, especially in the long term and that it needs strong leaders to look out for their best interests even if they don’t necessarily instantly appreciate them for it.

Let’s say that I was a politician belonging to a political party. I am forced to toe the party line if I want to keep my job. This prevents me from voting in the commons as I would like to because I’ve chosen that my career is going to be that of a politician. If I voted against my party I would likely be kicked out and now I’ve lost my job.

I want to consider something else now, most political parties claim that the family is the basic building block of society, a cliché I know but lets run with it; this statement generally goes hand in hand with the conservatives trying to pass some sort of tax reduction on married couples. But let us consider the family, a family is not democratic; it is hierarchical. Only recently since I hit my 20’s has my opinion started to matter and in retrospect quite rightly so. When I have a family I know my children won’t get an equal say as me, I will decide what is best for them until I feel they can be relied on to make the decisions themselves. So if the family isn’t democratic and it’s the basic building block are we trying to build a perfect sphere out of squares?

The government also claims that the growth of the private sector will be the driving force that will eventually lead to our financial recovery. That shows a lot of faith in the business model on their part doesn’t it? Does that mean the model is more effective? Because last time I checked all good companies aren’t democratic. A CEO isn’t elected, nor does he want his choices ratified by a referendum. He wants what he decided implemented immediately.

However if you absolutely need a form of democracy to run your county, then one form I can see has promise. It’s called a demarchy or election by lottery. When we have trials we have a randomly selected sample of the public to stand in judgement of the accused, why shouldn’t the same be possible for government. What could be a more fair representation of all the different views and beliefs and cultures and ethnicities in a country than to have a randomly select sample from across the board (assuming it was a large enough sample every groups voice would be heard). They could each speak their minds and their voices would be equal, they wouldn’t need to worry about toeing the party line or their political careers as such thing wouldn’t exist and finally they would not need to be accountable to the public because after their term was up they would return without fail to the public. This is of course a system made famous by Athens in ancient Greece, the same guys who killed Socrates for spreading his philosophies (ahem.).

Anyways these are just my opinions. What do you think? Big fan of democracy?