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That's government by the majority, not the whole. Democracy is “a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state” (OED; emp
by r-w 5y ago
That's government by the majority, not the whole. Democracy is “a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state” (OED; emphasis added).
- bedobi 5y agoJust because you think the cost of voting for small extremist parties should be high doesn't mean you're in favor of absolutist majority rule? + liberal democracies have (at least in theory) unalienable basic rights that can't be taken away, even by majority. Eg just because a 90+% majority votes to revoke citizenship from all muslims that doesn't mean that it will go through.
- vidarh 5y agoThe effect of eg. FPTP is to effectively disenfranchise large portions of the population. A country with a voting system like that makes a mockery of the very term democracy. As for these "inalienable" right, I'm not aware of any system without a mechanism for altering their constitutional laws. To your specific example, the UK just had a government representing a minority of voters vote through a law that allows them to strip citizenship from millions as they please.