4 ms·

Since tomorrow is the 4th of July, it's perhaps worth remembering that democracy also relies on the implicit credible threat of revolution. Without that threat,

by geofft 8y ago

Since tomorrow is the 4th of July, it's perhaps worth remembering that democracy also relies on the implicit credible threat of revolution. Without that threat, what is the motivation for politicians to remain honest?

grzm 8y ago
In a democracy the threat of being voted out of office can be a sufficient threat: one doesn’t require the threat of revolution.
- geofft 8y ago
  The threat isn't against the politicans - new politicians can always be bought, or simply ineffective. The threat is against the people doing the buying.
- ataturk 8y ago
  I disagree. Mao said "power emanates from the barrel of a gun." Force is all the state knows and government at all levels has grown enormously since the 1950s and is now an unruly beast. The people are not speaking with one voice, but if they did, and there was a real threat, the bureaucrats and the pols would listen. They are spineless opportunists, after all.
- vertexFarm 8y ago
  It is obviously and demonstrably not. We have outrageous amounts of corruption, up to the point that it's been outright legalized. The amount of pay-for-play in our legal system and filthy regulatory capture by the regulated industries themselves in the US is incredible. The risk/reward situation is not balanced at all. There is such an obscene amount to be gained, and the only repercussion is to lose a cushy job. They get to fall back on a nice executive gig on the other side of the revolving door. Do we hold other criminals to those standards and lay out that kind of weak punishment? And even when it comes to being voted out, there's all sorts of gerrymandering and bad-faith efforts to obfuscate and soft-rig US elections. Everyone should absolutely vote, that much is true. You should always vote, even if you think it doesn't matter because they've successfully gamed the system. You still gotta vote to make it as difficult as possible to manipulate results. But voting alone is not going to cut it one day. Other civil efforts are needed to keep a democracy from becoming corrupt. A lot of people have bought into this myth that most civil progress is bloodless, but despite MLK and Gandhi's good efforts it has taken a lot of toil and death to make society even remotely acceptable and fair, to make it even superficially resemble a meritocracy. It didn't happen by itself or through voting. It took real work.
- opportune 8y ago
  It does if your only choices don’t represent you. And because of FPTP, the choices you do have are incredibly “sticky” There is also the problem of when a group is very upset with the government but constitutes a minority. I see this as a problem with the government effectively being a gerontocracy
geezerjay 8y ago
> perhaps worth remembering that democracy also relies on the implicit credible threat of revolution. No it doesn't. It's precisely the opposite. In fact, any "credible threat of revolution" only serves the purposes of those who want to put an end to any semblance of democracy.
- geofft 8y ago
  Is your position that the treason of 1775 put an end to any semblance of democracy in the US?
  - vertexFarm 8y ago
    I wanted to add something which is rightfully controversial and unpopular because it comes from an entirely different and somewhat naïve era. It's easy for us to overlook in this day and age what kind of context they had in 18th-century America. They didn't have much of a concept of a revolutionary dictator, a monstrous autocrat who emerged out of a popular revolution. Back then, dictators and despots already ruled everything through heredity and divine right. The dictators who arose from revolutions in the late 19th and early 20th centuries were an out-of-context problem at the time. To them, assassination didn't carry connotations of Kennedy or Franz Ferdinand. It was a wilder and more violent age. Probably one that shouldn't be emulated. But it's astounding how rarely it's acknowledged that the second amendment was meant to act as a violent deterrent against our own government. It isn't to defend against home invaders, or hunt, or whatever. Of course the staunchest supporters of the second are often the very ones voting in the crooks they should be ousting, or at least acting as a deterrent for. That part of our central legal document exists explicitly to facilitate credible threats of assassination as one of our government's checks and balances, and we like to dance around that ugly fact. At this point it obviously doesn't work the way things did in the 1700s, like most things from three centuries ago. We now know that method doesn't end well, and alternatives should absolutely be pursued until there's no other option. But today we also live in a time when the most massive and damaging crimes done by those in government--or the pseudo-government of industry--carry no punishment at all except an abstract (and impotent) threat of being voted out of office in a few years. And our absurdly low approval rating / incumbency ratio should show us that there's something deeply wrong with that avenue. I think more people should be concerned about the implications of extremely low approval ratings combined with near-perfect rates of re-election. This casts a doubt about democratic legitimacy that we cannot deny or brush away. I think at least serious prison time should be on the table. And of course I mean the real prisons that we send normal criminals to. But that is unheard of. We need to acknowledge that checks and balances have already failed in a very fundamental way.

by geofft 8y ago

grzm 8y ago

In a democracy the threat of being voted out of office can be a sufficient threat: one doesn’t require the threat of revolution.

geofft 8y ago
The threat isn't against the politicans - new politicians can always be bought, or simply ineffective. The threat is against the people doing the buying.
ataturk 8y ago
I disagree. Mao said "power emanates from the barrel of a gun." Force is all the state knows and government at all levels has grown enormously since the 1950s and is now an unruly beast. The people are not speaking with one voice, but if they did, and there was a real threat, the bureaucrats and the pols would listen. They are spineless opportunists, after all.
vertexFarm 8y ago
It is obviously and demonstrably not. We have outrageous amounts of corruption, up to the point that it's been outright legalized. The amount of pay-for-play in our legal system and filthy regulatory capture by the regulated industries themselves in the US is incredible. The risk/reward situation is not balanced at all. There is such an obscene amount to be gained, and the only repercussion is to lose a cushy job. They get to fall back on a nice executive gig on the other side of the revolving door. Do we hold other criminals to those standards and lay out that kind of weak punishment? And even when it comes to being voted out, there's all sorts of gerrymandering and bad-faith efforts to obfuscate and soft-rig US elections. Everyone should absolutely vote, that much is true. You should always vote, even if you think it doesn't matter because they've successfully gamed the system. You still gotta vote to make it as difficult as possible to manipulate results. But voting alone is not going to cut it one day. Other civil efforts are needed to keep a democracy from becoming corrupt. A lot of people have bought into this myth that most civil progress is bloodless, but despite MLK and Gandhi's good efforts it has taken a lot of toil and death to make society even remotely acceptable and fair, to make it even superficially resemble a meritocracy. It didn't happen by itself or through voting. It took real work.
opportune 8y ago
It does if your only choices don’t represent you. And because of FPTP, the choices you do have are incredibly “sticky” There is also the problem of when a group is very upset with the government but constitutes a minority. I see this as a problem with the government effectively being a gerontocracy

geezerjay 8y ago

> perhaps worth remembering that democracy also relies on the implicit credible threat of revolution. No it doesn't. It's precisely the opposite. In fact, any "credible threat of revolution" only serves the purposes of those who want to put an end to any semblance of democracy.

geofft 8y ago
Is your position that the treason of 1775 put an end to any semblance of democracy in the US?
- vertexFarm 8y ago
  I wanted to add something which is rightfully controversial and unpopular because it comes from an entirely different and somewhat naïve era. It's easy for us to overlook in this day and age what kind of context they had in 18th-century America. They didn't have much of a concept of a revolutionary dictator, a monstrous autocrat who emerged out of a popular revolution. Back then, dictators and despots already ruled everything through heredity and divine right. The dictators who arose from revolutions in the late 19th and early 20th centuries were an out-of-context problem at the time. To them, assassination didn't carry connotations of Kennedy or Franz Ferdinand. It was a wilder and more violent age. Probably one that shouldn't be emulated. But it's astounding how rarely it's acknowledged that the second amendment was meant to act as a violent deterrent against our own government. It isn't to defend against home invaders, or hunt, or whatever. Of course the staunchest supporters of the second are often the very ones voting in the crooks they should be ousting, or at least acting as a deterrent for. That part of our central legal document exists explicitly to facilitate credible threats of assassination as one of our government's checks and balances, and we like to dance around that ugly fact. At this point it obviously doesn't work the way things did in the 1700s, like most things from three centuries ago. We now know that method doesn't end well, and alternatives should absolutely be pursued until there's no other option. But today we also live in a time when the most massive and damaging crimes done by those in government--or the pseudo-government of industry--carry no punishment at all except an abstract (and impotent) threat of being voted out of office in a few years. And our absurdly low approval rating / incumbency ratio should show us that there's something deeply wrong with that avenue. I think more people should be concerned about the implications of extremely low approval ratings combined with near-perfect rates of re-election. This casts a doubt about democratic legitimacy that we cannot deny or brush away. I think at least serious prison time should be on the table. And of course I mean the real prisons that we send normal criminals to. But that is unheard of. We need to acknowledge that checks and balances have already failed in a very fundamental way.