Democracy: Do you support it?

Post Reply New Topic

Is it possible to form a one person rule? One person can't rule alone, he/she needs the support of important fractions of society. Those with money and/or power are usually operating backstage.

The issue really comes down to implementation and how we consider a person good. Some people's notions of good will go against other people's and one person's great leader may be another person's horrible tyrant. If there was one easily identifiable and knowable good act, then you might be right on how dictatorships have so much potential to be the best form of government, however, we live in dismal ignorance on both how we ought to act given the facts about the world and even the facts themselves come into dispute, so even if 2 people believed in the same ethical theory, if they subscribed to different theories of society(functional theory vs conflict theory, left Keynesianism vs monetarism, realism vs international idealism, etc) then they would disagree sharply on policies perhaps both in short term and long term policies.


I really don't know what you are criticizing. If you are criticizing a system of power vacuums without support then everybody would agree. If you are criticizing anarchism then you really don't have any idea what the heck you are talking about, as anarchism is not just a lack of government but rather refers to the idea of governing systems emerging without centralized government, and really the latter is much more difficult to criticize as most anarchies are without regard to anarchism. You actually could be correct on the viability of anarchy, however, I think you are making the assumption that anarchism denies the existence of law and societal mechanisms, which it does not but rather seeks to organize them differently.

It is rare, but it has happened. Stalin, for example, had thoroughly purged the military, the secret police, etc. There were no counterweights to his authority. Dictator Francia in Paraguay set up a similarly single-person rule; he ruthlessly subjugated the landowners, the military and the Church, and cut the country from the outside world. To some extent the same can be said of Rome under Octavian Augustus.

I'm not so knowledgeable in History, so please pardon my inaccuracies...

But surely somebody was behind Stalin in this? Even if he would strategically switch his chosen supporters, he couldn't rule without them.

One person alone can't run the system. The system isn't that simple.

For instance, from Wikipedia, on Octavian Augustus:



He ruled alone, but he could not rule alone.

(Does that last line make sense? )

well i dont know. im just stating the obvious, im no politician

A dictator is not a god, he must rule through subordinates - however it is different if there are separate centres of power, or they are completely subservient to the ruler (like the Roman Senate to Octavian). Under Stalin, the army was completely subordinate to him (he executed about 2/3 of the generals), as was the secret police (likewise purged), the bureaucracy and the top party hierarchy (idem); the churches were marginalised and the kulaks were either executed or sent as slave labour to Siberia. Paraguay under Francia and Solano Lopez had similar concentrations of power in one individual.
In the more typical dictatorships, the army, the rich, religious authorities, etc have some measure of power, even when a dictator has complete control of formal political institutions.

I see. Thanks for the clarification.

"Democracy is the worst for of government, except all others that have been tried from time to time."

---Winston Churchill

Local government.

People tend to have similar views as those living around them. The more localized the government is the more freedom there is because of this. In the US, the states in the NE tend to vote liberal and the South tends to vote conservative. If the states had more power, people could have a government that represents them instead of having all the power in a national government that forces itself on the rest of the country.

It's probably not the best system, but it's better than this post-democracy crap we're moving into...that's for damn sure.

i also agree with this

Having Local government with no central authority is impossible...as is any form of social-economic thought that advocates the abolition of a central government.

Simply because that is no different than essentially having more nations.

Even if you agreed to have non-conflict and live in peace with governments controlled on a local level or by individuals...

SOME PEOPLE, or SOME GROUPS, will want MORE. It is how desire works(something that you cant exactly eliminate). That person may very well be an idiot when it comes to helping others, or understanding a big picture...or it may be someone intelligent who sees he/she could manipulate the masses.

In the end That person(s)/group(s) will decide they want what you have and Take it. They will use FORCE. That is how it works. People will get hurt, people will die, and chances are the person who sparked it won't give two s**ts.

It doesnt matter how nice and tidy society is, and how thoughts emerge about nonviolence, passive nature, etc...there will be AT LEAST ONE person, who doesnt really care.

As I said before, having less authority imposed upon individuals is all warm feeling and ideal...however short of humans becoming near flawless sentient beings(something which will either never happen or will not happen for billions and billions of years), having a care-free or ideal attitude about authority is not possible.

Assertion.


Well, then if it is just creating more nations, then how isn't it possible?


Some people or some groups always will want more, which is why centralizing power is bad. At least these people who want more can be shoved back into their little hole without affecting the whole of humanity. Let's just say that New Jersey has a bad governor, will the Californians be as impacted as if they had a bad governor? No, they won't.


They will seek to use force, ok? So? We can use force against them. All that legal systems do is that they create disincentives for the use of force and incentives to not use force. What is the difference.

Nobody here has mentioned non-violence.

Assertion. Why is it impossible? Nobody has said that we would all live in perfect harmony, people have just stated that they thought that local systems would be superior to more centralized systems. Such an idea will certainly reduce hierarchy, but it won't remove orderly legal structures.

source

Sad but true.

Well democracy is better than communism, but, politics is a load of trubbish no matter what. Whenever the elections come, all the rival parties are like "I will do this and they won't etc".

It's all talk and no do. Politicians are good at talking bull.