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>This bug in democracy was there in the beginning. But it's only now, 2500 years later, that it can be exploited effectively enough to invalidate the whole conc
by 0xDEAFBEAD 1y ago
>This bug in democracy was there in the beginning. But it's only now, 2500 years later, that it can be exploited effectively enough to invalidate the whole concept.
Not sure where the 2500 number came from. The US is about 250 years old, and the founders were extremely wary of democracy based on its history prior to the US. The US constitution was designed to mitigate issues with democracy, e.g. that is the purpose of "checks and balances". By democracy standards, the US has been very successful; the average constitution only lasts 17 years: https://www.law.uchicago.edu/news/lifespan-written-constitutions https://www.law.uchicago.edu/news/lifespan-written-constitut...
This article estimates that the US is the #2 longest-lasting republic after the Roman Republic: https://www.broadstreet.blog/p/the-democratic-institutions-of-the https://www.broadstreet.blog/p/the-democratic-institutions-o...
Nonetheless, you would think that the "technology" for writing constitutions would've evolved more in the past 250 years. And in fact, in the Federalist Papers, it is predicted that political technology will evolve, just like any other field of technology. Yet results there have been quite disappointing, if you ask me. There aren't that many interesting and innovative ideas in this area. Most people, even programmers, tend to get lost in the object level us-vs-them conflict instead of going meta with their creative algorithmic brain.
- ringeryless 1y agoumm Switzerland disagrees with the assessment of the USA being the oldest democratic republic. If we are only speaking of republic, Portugal has been one since the 12th century, albeit there's been 10 or 11 iterations on the constitution, including Salazars so-called New State.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- 0xDEAFBEAD 1y agoCorrection here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44223617 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44223617
- alimw 1y ago> Not sure where the 2500 number came from. Athens probably? From what I remember of school, this was the world's first democracy. (I've heard that Americans are taught something else!)
- 0xDEAFBEAD 1y agoI didn't get the impression that Athenian democracy was particularly successful. So it seemed weird to say that the flaws in democracy are only now becoming apparent. In fact, I understand that CamperBob2's critique of democracy is quite similar to that of Socrates. So I'm puzzled by the claim that it's "only now" that the critique is being proven correct, given that US democracy is notably more stable and long-lived than Athenian democracy. In general, I think times of turmoil are always much more salient when you yourself are living through them. We lack the historical perspective to understand how bad turmoil has been in the past.
- CamperBob2 1y agoThe flaws in democracy were always apparent, and they've always been exploited by parties willing to do the dirty work. But they couldn't be exploited consistently and decisively. Now they can be. Think of it this way: you can't reach people who don't read much by starting a newspaper, but you can reach them with Fox News and Twitter. Mix in a bit of that old-time religion -- Billy Graham with a side of sauce Bernays -- and the left-hand side of the bell curve is yours to do with as you please.
- 0xDEAFBEAD 1y agoMy comment is too old to edit, but I would like to issue a correction. I should not have written "This article estimates that the US is the #2 longest-lasting republic after the Roman Republic", since the caption for the figure in the article states something different ("Duration of Long-Lived Democracies", i.e. the word "democracy" is used rather than "republic", and also there wasn't a claim to "longest-lived") Never trust internet comments!