[HN Gopher] How old are democracies across the world?
___________________________________________________________________
How old are democracies across the world?
Author : Brajeshwar
Score : 214 points
Date : 2022-02-24 15:25 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (ourworldindata.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (ourworldindata.org)
| mike10921 wrote:
| It's all coming back in reverse. The young generation who don't
| appreciate having democracy are bulking at democracy and choosing
| socialism. The vast majority of immigrants from socialist
| countries do not vote or support socialism because they
| appreciate their freedom.
|
| Someone who is born with abundance doesn't appreciate his
| blessings, but one who is born with very little and acquires
| abundance appreciates it every day.
| causi wrote:
| Speaking as someone who's far more Libertarian-leaning than I
| suspect most of HN is, socialism is not the opposite of
| democracy.
| muglug wrote:
| It's not the young people who are turning against democracy.
| It's the baby boomers who talk ceaselessly about "fake news",
| rejecting anything that doesn't match their cloistered reality.
| SSilver2k2 wrote:
| One is a form of government, the other is an economy.
|
| You can have a Socialist Democracy or a Socialist Dictatorship,
| just like you can have a Capitalist Democracy or a Capitalist
| Dictatorship.
| newaccount2021 wrote:
| ekidd wrote:
| > The young generation who don't appreciate having democracy
| are bulking at democracy and choosing socialism.
|
| Contrary to what some people argue, "democracy versus no
| democracy" and "capitalism versus socialism versus communism"
| are separate axes. For example, there exist capitalist
| countries with very little democracy. And there exist socialist
| countries with relatively robust democratic institutions. And
| the opposite combinations exist.
|
| (There have not, as far as I know, been very many self-
| proclaimed communist countries with robust democratic
| institutions.)
|
| The questions that I care about are, "Can the people of the
| country make a comfortable living?", "Can they successfully
| petition the government for a redress of their greivances?",
| and "Does the country protect minorities of various sorts from
| the tyranny of the majority?" Achieving all three of these can
| be a challenge, and different countries may vote for more or
| less safety net.
| distances wrote:
| I'm not sure if I'm taking a bait here but the young people
| talking about socialism almost universally mean the Nordic
| style social democracies, which represent the most free and
| stable of all democracies. It's a deliberate misunderstanding
| and derailment of discussion to equate it with some autocratic
| communist societies like USSR or Venezuela.
| sampo wrote:
| > the young people talking about socialism almost universally
| mean the Nordic style social democracies
|
| It's just plain wrong to call us Nordics socialist. We have
| free market economies just like all Western countries.
|
| https://www.vox.com/2015/10/31/9650030/denmark-prime-
| ministe...
| distances wrote:
| Indeed, but the Nordic approach is what the people talking
| of "socialism" usually mean. Not command economies.
| vidarh wrote:
| Meanwhile, something like 1/3 of the market cap on the Oslo
| Stock Exchange is state owned, the second largest media
| group is owned by a public benefit corporation, the largest
| bank is owned 34% by the government and ~10% by a
| foundation with a public benefit mandate. At the same time
| Norway has a more expansive welfare system than most
| supposedly socialist countries.
|
| It's fair enough that they're not fully socialist by any
| means, but for a lot of socialists the Nordic model is far
| closer to what they want than e.g. China.
| Tokelin wrote:
| Why do you conflate socialism and a lack of democracy? Am I
| wrong in thinking there can be a democratically elected
| socialist government?
| pjc50 wrote:
| > Am I wrong in thinking there can be a democratically
| elected socialist government?
|
| Yes, if a socialist government is democratically elected it's
| overthrown shortly afterwards by the CIA.
|
| (sarcasm, but this is basically what happened to South
| America, and there's longstanding questions about some of
| Italy's postwar politics)
| zo1 wrote:
| I can't quite express it, but there is something very
| fundamentally "unfair" or "undemocratic" at the core of
| socialism and its policies. And it's not that I'm selfish and
| don't want to help those that are suffering. To me, socialism
| means I am giving less consent. At least with democracy, that
| is less apparent and I technically have "more consent" to the
| things imposed on me.
| cuteboy19 wrote:
| It's just that there hasn't been a notable example in
| history. Its constructor throws a NotImplementedError
| triceratops wrote:
| "The constitution declares India a sovereign, socialist,
| secular, and democratic republic"[1]
|
| If the largest democracy in history isn't a "notable
| example" what is?
|
| 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitution_of_India
| cuteboy19 wrote:
| The word socialist was added to the constitution because
| of Indira Gandhi, the only dictator to ever hold power in
| India. So I think you are making my point for me
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forty-
| second_Amendment_of_th...
| triceratops wrote:
| Are you seriously arguing that India didn't practice
| socialist policies before that amendment? And continued
| to do so for decades afterwards? Arguably continues to do
| so in some respects even today.
|
| Even the link you provided notes the same thing:
| "Ambedkar's (the original author of the
| constitution)...objection [to putting "socialist" in the
| original preamble] was [it was] "purely superfluous" and
| "unnecessary", as "socialist principles are already
| embodied in our Constitution" through Fundamental Rights
| and the Directive Principles of State Policy."
| kingkawn wrote:
| Social Democracy, where the state is used as a tool to support
| the populace, is not whatever boogeyman of socialism you are
| trying to conjure
| hdesh wrote:
| The source for this analysis comes from V-Dem project.
| Specifically related to India, the V-Dem results are highly
| questionable. Their results have been rebutted point-by-point in
| this (paywalled) piece [1].
|
| I will highlight one aspect of the questionable results from the
| analysis about India. There's a "Clean elections index" in the
| V-Dem project which is about absence of registration fraud,
| irregularities, election violence etc. Interestingly India's
| clean elections index score keeps sliding downward after 1998.
| Note that India was under officially declared emergency from
| 1975-77 and an election was held in 1977. The V-Dem clean
| election index doesn't reflect this phenomenon.
|
| India adopted the electronic voting machines (EVM) sometime
| between 1998-2001. Before using EVM, paper ballots would be used
| for elections. It is well documented [2] that EVMs have helped
| ensuring freer and fairer elections. Anecdotally I would remember
| so many incidents of booth-capturing (described in [2]) and re-
| elections due to irregularities, prior to the EVM era.
|
| [1] - https://swarajyamag.com/ideas/an-analysis-of-the-v-dem-
| data-...
|
| [2] - https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2019/04/05/indias-
| el...
| swayvil wrote:
| The obvious question is, "What does the transition from democracy
| to dictatorship look like?"
|
| I mean if the rich guys own everything anyway.
|
| Do they ramp up authoritarian reasonings to justify policies?
|
| Do they just stop trying to justify?
| marcodiego wrote:
| In Brazil, dictatorship created problems by lack of planning
| with fast urbanization for 21 years. During the rule, they
| kidnapped and killed dissenters. When social and economic
| problems were about to explode, they handed the government and
| the country entered a democratic period. To this day there are
| people who blame democracy for the problems that exploded after
| the dictatorship ended and spread lies about the dictatorship
| being a better time. Elections of 2018 was partly a result of
| this thought.
|
| My best counter argument is: "Are there more democracies among
| developed or underdeveloped countries? Are there more
| dictatorships among poor or rich countries? We can see that
| dictatorships are more related to empoverishment and
| democracies are more related to development."
|
| I think something similar happens in Chile.
| ModernMech wrote:
| Autocracy revolves around the ego of the autocrat. Usually the
| autocrat's message is something along the lines of "I alone can
| solve all your problems, and your problems are because of
| _those people_ ", where "those people" are usually some
| minority ehtnic, national, or religious group.
|
| Obviously not all of the problems in the world are due to these
| people. Therefore autocracies are heavily invested in
| obfuscating the truth, gaslighting populations with propaganda,
| takeovers of national media, and jailing or execution of
| dissidents. After all, you can't have people going around
| saying the autocrat is not the solution to everything and
| "those" people aren't the one and only problem. People might
| start to get ideas.
|
| Thus the downward spiral begins. This is why autocracies are
| unstable. They require an ever shifting narrative about why
| things are so bad. The real reason things go to shit under
| autocracies is because no one in charge is invested in solving
| real problems. The problems that autocracies aim to solve are
| made up to incite people and to appease egos. They aren't
| evidence based because following the evidence would reveal
| _shockingly_ that the autocrat doesn't have all the solutions.
| politician wrote:
| It seems to look like tacit control of the press giving way to
| overt public directives to the press.
| swayvil wrote:
| Well that sounds familiar.
|
| Some emails were posted here just a few days ago. Fed and
| facebook discussing propaganda strategy.
| version_five wrote:
| I liked that the article focuses on the important distinction
| between democracy and liberal democracy. There are lots of places
| I find democracy conflated with a "free country". It's limits on
| government power (regardless of what a majority want) and the
| ability for the people to kick out the current government that
| imo are most necessary for a free country. The other details
| don't really matter if you don't have these.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| Liberalism and democracy are two conflicting tendencies. This
| is acknowledged in the literature. The most important liberty
| under liberalism is the liberty to pursue property, and (or as
| Aristotle claimed) democracy threatens that since democracy
| leans more towards egalitarianism.
|
| The most important rights are the negative liberties of the
| rich. Which of course are universal on paper.
|
| The democracy part is a concession to popular pressure and also
| to serve as a unifying slogan, since democracy is valued even
| higher than liberalism in polite discourse.
|
| But it's really just a thin veneer. All it takes is one vote
| for the "wrong candidate" or for someone to read the first
| three paragraphs on _The Republic_ on Wikipedia for that high-
| minded ideal to go out the window. Then the specter of populism
| looms.
| VictorPath wrote:
| > It's limits on government power (regardless of what a
| majority want) and the ability for the people to kick out the
| current government that imo are most necessary for a free
| country. The other details don't really matter if you don't
| have these.
|
| So a country where the people can't change their own government
| are what you call liberalism and democracy. Got it.
| frosted-flakes wrote:
| I think that should be read as
|
| > (limits on government power) and (the ability for the
| people to kick out the current government)
|
| not
|
| > > limits on (government power) and (the ability for the
| people to kick out the current government)
| version_five wrote:
| Yes I meant the first one, I did not expect it to get
| misread the other way
| 2ion wrote:
| This is a very important point. Whereas there is "convergence"
| between for example the penal codes of states commonly referred
| to as "democratic", what is nothing in one country might be a
| crime to just say in the other. In fact, comparative political
| science has only some veeeeery basic "features" that make them
| say it's "a democracy"; there is a lot of freedom to tip the
| scales in one direction or another. Also, commonly overserved
| is the notion among elites that some democracy is "too much"
| (for example, no referendums in core governance questions).
| hunterb123 wrote:
| Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely.
|
| You need checks in place against the government for that,
| regardless of the majority.
|
| A constitution is a contract between the government and its
| people how they agree to be governed.
|
| You weren't specific in your criticism so I'm not sure what you
| take issue with.
| version_five wrote:
| > You weren't specific in your criticism so I'm not sure what
| you take issue with
|
| Why do you need to take issue with something?
| hunterb123 wrote:
| Context matters and you didn't specify what "limits on
| government power" you were talking about.
|
| Constitutional limits don't conflict with democracy, they
| preserve it.
|
| If you were talking about some other sort of limitation an
| example would be nice.
| AniseAbyss wrote:
| Someone said something really interesting that stuck with me
|
| "in the US land votes"
|
| Perhaps one day NYC will secede and tell Wyoming to go fuck
| themselves.
| oceanplexian wrote:
| The USA is the oldest democracy in the world, and only has been
| that way for ~250 years (And even then, having survived one of
| the worst Civil Wars in history). Most European democracies have
| only been so for a few decades. I think some of the bias comes
| from the fact that people have a a short-term memory. We've had
| it so good in the last century that we forget that we are the
| exception, not the rule.
| xeromal wrote:
| According to the study we're talking about, America became a
| real democracy in the early 1900s once it let women vote.
| Before that, only a minority was allowed to vote so was it
| actually a representative democracy?
| retrac wrote:
| The English can make an equally strong claim there and it's
| older. Parliamentary supremacy was quite established by the
| 1700s. While Parliament had a restricted franchise (as did the
| USA until the 20th century) it was an elected body with full
| powers.
|
| Indeed, one of the major points of discontent was lack of
| parliamentary representation for the Americans despite
| nominally being equals -- kind of like the situation of Puerto
| Rico today.
| brimble wrote:
| > While Parliament had a restricted franchise (as did the USA
| until the 20th century) it was an elected body with full
| powers.
|
| Indeed--one of the key factors for the US war for
| independence was that rich Americans wanted to expand the
| franchise to all rich men, not _just_ rich men who happened
| to be born to the correct parents. They wanted to do this
| only in the colonies, but that likely would have emboldened
| reformers in Britain proper, too ( "why should those
| colonists get more of a say in government than we do?"). This
| would have threatened the power of the British nobility, so
| of course war and (ultimately) losing the 13 colonies was
| chosen instead.
| TheCoelacanth wrote:
| Only the House of Commons is democratic, and it didn't become
| the more powerful house of Parliament until late 19th or
| early 20th centuries.
| lentil_soup wrote:
| according to the posted website Australia is the oldest, not
| the USA.
|
| Edit: Actually Switzerland seems to be older in their data
| vinay427 wrote:
| I'm curious what the article's source is for this claim.
| Naturally, democracy can be defined differently, but there
| are reputable sources that disagree with this [1], and even
| if considering limited suffrage to preclude democracy,
| Australia and particularly Switzerland perform poorly as
| well.
|
| https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/08/countries-are-the-
| wor...
| lentil_soup wrote:
| They seem to take their definition from here:
|
| "The identification of electoral democracies is based on
| the Regimes of the World classification by Luhrmann et al.
| (2018).
|
| In electoral democracies, citizens have the right to
| participate in meaningful, free and fair, and multi-party
| elections."
| ska wrote:
| The article discusses it's sources, and also the inherent
| difficulty in defining "democracy".
| ekianjo wrote:
| > ). Most European democracies have only been so for a few
| decades.
|
| you might want to revise this claim
| Simon_O_Rourke wrote:
| awelxtr wrote:
| As a Spaniard this is, sadly, our everyday life.
|
| Specially if you watch the news.
|
| On the flip side we also use it to make jokes.
| gostsamo wrote:
| Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the spanish past all about a
| right wing dictatorship?
| swayvil wrote:
| I hear that "for the public health" is a historically popular
| justification for unreasonable dictatorial action.
|
| Do you see that justification used much in Spain?
| christkv wrote:
| Spain NOT the US
|
| We had an illegal lockdown at the beginning of the pandemic.
| Number of people punished 0.
|
| During most of the pandemic it's been back and forth on do
| this, do that. Things done that flies against all science
| like masking outside (just lifted) and other silly things
| like keeping small children masked in school knowing now that
| there rate of infection has been the same with or without
| masks.
|
| Other than that we seem to have avoided the authoritarian
| tendencies of the us, canada, australia, new zeland, germany,
| austria, france etc.
|
| Compared to those countries we have not had it to bad when it
| comes to violating our rights.
|
| Now it's time to vote all of them out of office. I don't want
| a single politician in power who got used to wielding power
| during a pandemic.
| onion2k wrote:
| _We had an illegal lockdown at the beginning of the
| pandemic._
|
| What law was broken?
| swayvil wrote:
| Well in Illinois (USA) the governor kept reupping his
| emergency powers instead of passing control to the court.
| Shady af.
|
| (And he owns much of the pandemic related testing
| facilities, and related infrastructure, which is nice. He
| is richer now)
| christkv wrote:
| Free moment is guaranteed by the Spanish constitution it
| can only be set aside for martial law . Government never
| declared martial law only state of alarm (we have 3
| levels of exception) so they did not have the right to
| restrict movement.
|
| We were all locked in our houses for 6 weeks. So yeah I
| want people to go to jail.
| melenaboija wrote:
| What is illegal from the lockdown?
| version_five wrote:
| In my country (not Spain) our government broke many laws
| (violated the constitution) in the name of covid
| restrictions. They decided it was ok because of public
| health. But laws are pointless if they can just be
| ignored when the government wants to. So in the sense of
| discussion, I think "illegal" is probably appropriate
| here, otherwise "in violation of post-enlightenment
| liberal democratic norms" maybe?
| sobkas wrote:
| > In my country (not Spain) our government broke many
| laws (violated the constitution) in the name of covid
| restrictions. They decided it was ok because of public
| health. But laws are pointless if they can just be
| ignored when the government wants to. So in the sense of
| discussion, I think "illegal" is probably appropriate
| here, otherwise "in violation of post-enlightenment
| liberal democratic norms" maybe?
|
| Because elites live under state sponsored anarcho-
| capitalism. It's only illegal if you're found out and
| then only if you find someone to prosecute you(cash only
| verdicts don't count for obvious reasons).
| legalcorrection wrote:
| Democracy is rule by the class of people who control public
| opinion--by the puppeteers--not rule by the people.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| An inaccuracy. The important propaganda is aimed at the 10-20%
| of the population that has a stake and an impact on politics.
| Patrons of outlets like _The New York Times_. That's most of
| what media critics like Chomsky has been writing about for half
| a century.
|
| Most of the population of liberal democracies (or at least in
| the US) have very little influence on politics. To the point
| where they are not being propagandized against as much as they
| are kept distracted with less "serious" things than opinion
| pieces about killing babies in incubators.
| swagasaurus-rex wrote:
| Democracy can also change things by popular vote. Something top
| down forms of government prefer to ignore.
| [deleted]
| aeternum wrote:
| This can be true but also better than all other alternatives.
| TheCoelacanth wrote:
| What's the preferable alternative? It's not perfect, but
| democracy is undeniably better at serving the interests of
| average people than any other alternative that I'm aware of
| ever being tried on a large scale.
| legalcorrection wrote:
| The Chinese government has been incredible for the Chinese
| people (not all of them, but most of them). Democracy with
| much more limited suffrage is probably more appropriate for
| the Western man, but we are ideologically closed to that
| option.
| oldsecondhand wrote:
| > The Chinese government has been incredible for the
| Chinese people
|
| By what metric?
| tshaddox wrote:
| I'm a different commenter, but if I had to guess I'd say
| primarily by the metric of starvation.
| elzbardico wrote:
| There's one very close up north, indeed.
| yalogin wrote:
| Are you in a country below Russia?
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| oblio wrote:
| One thing to note: a huge threat to democracy is war.
|
| Frequently autocracies invade democracies because autocracies are
| inherently unstable and need frequent propping up of internal
| support by fake "injections of popularity", such as war.
|
| Look at Eastern Europe bloom in 1990 - 1992. For all intents and
| purposes these countries were under foreign occupation and
| regimes imposed from abroad.
| qiskit wrote:
| > Frequently autocracies invade democracies because autocracies
| are inherently unstable
|
| Simply not true. Ask north korea, cuba, etc. No democracy could
| withstand an enemy 1000X its size attacking it. Can you imagine
| the US withstanding an enemy 1000X stronger than us? Not a
| chance.
|
| > need frequent propping up of internal support by fake
| "injections of popularity", such as war.
|
| Historically, it's usually the other way around. Democracies
| have invaded "autocracies". In the past 100 years, most of the
| invasions have been by democracies ( predominantly the US and
| our allies ) against other nations.
|
| Actually, "protecting democracy" was propaganda we used to get
| involved in ww1 against the wish of the american people. And it
| hasn't stopped since. In the name of "democracy" we've invaded
| dozens of countries and set ourselves a nice little empire.
|
| That democracy is a good is modern propaganda. Go read up on
| what the founders wrote about democracy. Go read about what
| Socrates did. Most intelligent people throughout history have
| not been fans of democracy. For a good reason, the greatest
| genocides in history have been committed by democracies. Just
| think about it.
| oblio wrote:
| You must not be reading the same history books as me.
| margalabargala wrote:
| Could you elaborate?
|
| The parent makes a reasonable point. Cuba, an autocracy,
| has invaded no one in its history. North Korea is a bit of
| a special case as it's maintained a de jure state of war,
| but it has not invaded anyone new since the war that
| created it. Vietnam, an autocracy, has invaded no one since
| the war that created it and is doing quite well.
|
| There are numerous old (multiple generations) autocracies
| in the world that are indeed stable. There are plenty of
| old democracies that have invaded no one and are stable,
| and plenty of democracies that have performed plenty of
| invasions.
|
| It seems to me that there are enough counter-examples on
| both sides that claiming "democracy is stable and invades
| no one, and autocracy is unstable and must invade" doesn't
| fit with much of anything.
| oblio wrote:
| This is not about absolutes.
|
| Comparatively democracies are more peaceful than
| autocracies.
|
| And autocracies for sure have committed far worse
| atrocities in total numbers.
|
| Let's not cherry pick Cuba when the Soviet Union was
| around, or Nazi Germany, or Imperial Japan, or Communist
| China, etc, etc.
| margalabargala wrote:
| Your original comment reads like an absolute:
|
| > autocracies are inherently unstable
|
| Making that claim, and holding up democracies in contrast
| to that, implies that democracies are inherently stable
| in a way that autocracies are not. I don't think that's a
| reasonable claim to make.
|
| > Comparatively democracies are more peaceful than
| autocracies.
|
| > And autocracies for sure have committed far worse
| atrocities in total numbers.
|
| Completely agree here. I would certainly agree that
| autocracies tend to commit worse atrocities, but that
| isn't necessarily directly connected with the stability
| of the regime.
| aksss wrote:
| Foreign policy is more determined by consolidated power.
| And system of government doesn't determine consolidation
| of power. The US had a very different global role before
| the world wars of the 20th century. It wasn't because the
| US allowed women to vote that it became a superpower, for
| instance. North Korea is not insular because it's an
| autocracy, it's because it's a vassal state of China and
| has no capability to exert its will independently in any
| meaningful way - arguably they would take the South given
| the elbow room. Throughout the globe and time you can
| point to plenty of autocratic nations with expansive
| foreign policy - not just meddling in other nations with
| kinetic actions but attempting to subsume entire
| territories into their own empire/nation. That this
| happens regardless of governing system seems to
| demonstrate that there is no strong deterministic bond
| there. I'm not saying there's no indirect link - I tend
| to think that democracies when done right (separation of
| powers, rule of law, free and fair elections) make a
| country less brittle in the face of organic seasonal
| challenges - think agricultural society vs hunter
| gatherers. Being less brittle to the daily challenges may
| give them the adaptability to survive longer than the
| cresting and crashing empires. Maintaining
| continuity/momentum is beneficial to consolidating power,
| so there may be an indirect link. TBD. Democracies fall
| in on themselves too. Pure democracies in particular,
| implying pure democracy is probably not the ideal end
| state we should imagine ourselves working towards.
| qiskit wrote:
| It's possible since each country has their own history
| books. What countries did north korea, cuba, etc invade in
| your history books. Now compare that with the list of
| countries britain, australia, france, canada, US, etc
| invaded.
|
| List the countries currently occupied by "autocracies". Now
| list the countries we occupy.
|
| List the nations genocided by democracies. It's rather
| shocking. So on and so forth.
|
| Not saying autocracies are good. Just that the idea that
| democracies are necessarily good is simply not true.
| Democracies have committed the worst crimes against
| humanity. It wasn't an autocracy that did hiroshima or
| nagasaki. But we each have our own history books I guess.
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| Democracy comes in three parts. It's possible to have
| elections, yet still not be a democracy. I suspect that
| has something to do with the confusion.
| oblio wrote:
| The linked article even mentions "electoral autocracies",
| precisely for your description.
| swagasaurus-rex wrote:
| Why don't you list them since you're the one making a
| claim.
|
| Hiroshima and Nagasaki is a limp argument. Emperor
| Hirohito controlled Japan when they committed an
| absolutely disgusting amount of war crimes. It had to
| end.
| bllguo wrote:
| > One thing to note: a huge threat to democracy is war.
|
| > Frequently autocracies invade democracies
|
| These are not claims? Evidence was provided for one side
| of this argument already, and it's not yours.
| swagasaurus-rex wrote:
| I don't understand what you are saying
| oblio wrote:
| You argument is that the worst atrocities were committed
| by the Allies, in a war against Nazi Germany and Imperial
| Japan???
| qiskit wrote:
| No. My argument is that being a democracy doesn't make a
| nation good. Democracies can be just as barbaric, evil
| and genocidal as autocracies. I provided a simple example
| - hiroshima and nagasaki. I think murdering hundreds of
| thousands of innocent men, women and children in seconds
| qualifies as evil. Don't you? If you think that only that
| democratically elected nazis ( people always forget that
| a democracy gave us nazi germany and that hitler actually
| won his election to gain power ) were evil in ww2, then
| you are missing at least half the story. Also, if you
| think only autocracies commit genocide, then you might
| want to explore the history of the genocide against the
| native americans, aborigines, africans etc by
| democracies.
| oblio wrote:
| Like my other reply to your comment, this is <<not>>
| about absolutes. Democracies are generally more peaceful
| and produce lower casualties than autocracies. There's a
| reason people like them more when they can vote with
| their feet.
|
| > I think murdering hundreds of thousands of innocent
| men, women and children in seconds qualifies as evil.
| Don't you?
|
| I do, but do you know why they did it? Honest question,
| why did the UK nuke Japan?
| qiskit wrote:
| > Like my other reply to your comment, this is <<not>>
| about absolutes.
|
| Agreed. But your replies to me seem to indicate
| absolutes.
|
| > Democracies are generally more peaceful and produce
| lower casualties than autocracies.
|
| Not sure what you mean by "generally" or "peace".
| Internally or externally? Because I'm betting autocratic
| countries are much more peaceful internally. If you mean
| externally, I've already shown you that democracies have
| shown themselves to be more violent/invasive. Just take a
| look at the US. In our short time, we've "grown" from 13
| states to 50 states + many territories. And in the last
| 100 years, we've invaded more countries than any
| autocracy. We currently occupy more countries than any
| autocracy. Two democracies ( US and Russia ) have invaded
| Ukraine in the last 10 years.
|
| > There's a reason people like them more when they can
| vote with their feet.
|
| Is that why everyone is fleeing to india, the largest
| democracy in the world? Nobody comes to the US, Canada,
| Australia, etc for democracy. People come here for
| money/wealth. The countries with the highest proportion
| of immigrants in the world is saudi arabia, UAE, qatar,
| etc. None of them are "liberal democracies".
|
| > I do, but do you know why they did it? Honest question,
| why did the UK nuke Japan?
|
| Of course you do. And I do. But instead of stating the
| truth, you'll say because japan refused to surrender/etc.
| But that makes it even a more heinous war crime in my
| mind. The US was a racist nation in the 1940s. We did
| hiroshima/nagasaki for the same reason we sent jewish
| refugees back to europe in the 1940s, racial hatred.
|
| Your assertions are what we were all raised with. Most
| just blindly believe it. But if you were correct, then
| everyone would be immigrating to india for democracy and
| not saudi arabia, qatar, etc. North korea would be the
| most violent nation invading everyone. Instead it's the
| US, britain, france, etc.
| oblio wrote:
| > Two democracies ( US and Russia ) have invaded Ukraine
| in the last 10 years.
|
| 1. The US didn't invade Ukraine, or did I miss something?
|
| 2. Russia is not a democracy, did you even look at the
| article this whole discussion is based on? :-)))
|
| > Of course you do. And I do. But instead of stating the
| truth, you'll say because japan refused to surrender/etc.
|
| Well, not just refusing to surrender.
|
| Numbers. US planners estimated that the Japanese would
| defend their homeland and that the number of casualties
| would be over 1 million people.
| qiskit wrote:
| > 1. The US didn't invade Ukraine, or did I miss
| something?
|
| I thought we did. Remember there being a coup a while
| back. But I may be mistaken.
|
| > 2. Russia is not a democracy, did you even look at the
| article this whole discussion is based on? :-)))
|
| Just like Venezuela isn't a democracy. Just like Iran
| wasn't a democracy. Chile wasn't a democracy. Democracies
| that don't vote the "right" way are not democracies.
|
| > Numbers. US planners estimated that the Japanese would
| defend their homeland and that the number of casualties
| would be over 1 million people.
|
| I know. That and the billion purple hearts argument.
|
| All your assertions are standard propaganda we all grew
| up on. I used to believe it too. Now I know better as the
| evidence to the contrary is rather convincing. I gave you
| enough information for you to get started and explore
| incovenient truths. Good luck.
| mupuff1234 wrote:
| Don't most of us work in environments that are basically a
| variation of a dictatorship?
|
| As a species we're quite accustomed to a having an alpha
| male\female\etc make the calls. I think all of us are just a few
| steps in the wrong direction from a dictatorship.
| mertd wrote:
| No. Dictatorship means someone else holds absolute power over
| the basic rights of all subjects including their right to live.
| There is no equivalence with a corporate org structure. I don't
| know how the two can even be confused.
| nautilius wrote:
| Also, your boss won't shoot you, or lock you and your family
| away when you give your notice.
| kingkawn wrote:
| True, only starve them to death and let them die from
| neglect and lack of shelter if you slip up.
| nautilius wrote:
| It's not clear to me how your future former boss has the
| power to starve you to death.
| brabel wrote:
| This is a response from someone who tries really hard to not
| understand the point. OP said corporations are * a few steps
| away * from dictatorships, they did not confuse the two. If
| you don't understand that a few steps away does not imply
| it's the same thing, you need to reflect on your skils as a
| reader.
| nautilius wrote:
| But they're nowhere close to even be compared. What you're
| saying is like claiming that a dog is like an eagle,
| there's only a few ft difference in altitude. The key
| feature of the dictatorship (bird) - the absolute and total
| power over your life (flying) - is something the
| corporation most of use work in (dogs) simply cannot have.
| If they want to (flap your paws real hard, I guess) just
| walk away.
| brabel wrote:
| I am sorry, but I cannot agree at all because you make no
| real points why you think there's a large difference
| between having an all-powerful CEO who makes all
| decisions alone on a corporation (except he's obviously
| not allowed to arrest you or use violence, usually) and a
| regime where the leader gains those missing powers to do
| whatever the hell he wants. The two things originate from
| the same desire humans have to "believe" in an all-
| knowing entity, and their propensity to attribute
| superpowers to a leader. These are only different by the
| level of the power the person has at his disposal, which
| is not nearly as different as you seem to believe...
| history shows things can escalate extremely quickly
| without anyone noticing.
|
| You make a silly analogy and seem to actually believe
| it's representative of what we're discussing, showing a
| lack of understanding beyond that which would allow a
| proper discussion to continue. That doesn't show your
| intelligence and ability to debate, quite the opposite.
| nautilius wrote:
| Haha, yeah, the 'you're stupid' argument seems to be the
| only one you're capable of. Enjoy.
| kingkawn wrote:
| Feudalism lives on in all spheres other than narrow semiannual
| popularity contests.
| russellbeattie wrote:
| I sorta loathe this sort of revisionist history. Especially the
| type which casually tries to wipe out 200+ years of American
| democratic history by simply saying, "Yeah, but it wasn't a
| _real_ democracy. " So cliche!
|
| There's just too many pedantic definitions, technicalities and
| arbitrary choices which make any sort of analysis like this
| arguable in soooo many ways.
|
| Just one glaring example: The US has "technically" been a
| Democratic Republic since our Constitution was ratified in 1789.
| But Boston, where I grew up, was founded in 1630, 159 years
| earlier. Massachusetts and other states implemented various
| democratic systems that continued _through_ the founding of the
| Federal government. Putting the line at 1789 doesn 't tell the
| full story because the states of the United States are all
| pseudo-nation states and existed decades before the Union, and I
| will bet many exist nearly unchanged after the Union is dissolved
| some day as well.
|
| One could also argue that after the English Civil War, the king
| was mostly a figurehead and that the Parliament was actually a
| form of representative government that was _copied_ by the
| Americans, and that we were basically throwing a hissy fit for
| having to pay our fair share of taxes and not really rebelling
| against tyranny. In fact England had been electing
| representatives to Parliament since the 1500s. And that 's
| totally a valid way of looking at it. The point stands.
|
| Anyways, I feel that the American pride in the fact that we're
| the first "real" democracy (for whatever definition of real you
| want) is well founded *without any caveats*. Our ancestors could
| have done better, and so can we!
| ricardoplouis wrote:
| As a country that strips away voting rights from felons, it's
| arguable that we still don't have a democracy until all citizens
| are guaranteed the right to vote.
| marcodiego wrote:
| According to the graph, Brazil is a democracy since 1987.
| Actually, after the 1964 coup, our first civil president was
| appointed in 1985 but first general direct elections only
| occurred in 1989.
| marcosdumay wrote:
| Brazil being Brazil, it's very hard to pick a number.
|
| We can argue endlessly about what a mess the process was, and
| if the results did reflect the electors wishes. But the people
| did elect delegates, that met and decided on a president.
| Formally, that is a perfectly valid election (that started by
| 82, and only really ended in 87 - that's an entire mandate
| duration with the delegates not really deciding on it).
| yalogin wrote:
| The politics threads on HN are very revelatory for me. I always
| thought the HN crowd is very analytical, logical and knows how to
| understand data and reason with it. In that sense these threads
| are more disappointing than some random interactions on reddit or
| twitter.
| steve76 wrote:
| brabel wrote:
| > I always thought the HN crowd is very analytical, logical and
| knows how to understand data and reason with it.
|
| Did you arrive at that conclusion driven by observation and
| evidence? If so, then that means you notice this behaviour only
| on the politics threads. Now, ask yourself: are people here
| really not behaving analytically and logically only when it
| comes to politics, but you only happen to notice that when it
| comes to politics? Or maybe you only think that this happens in
| politics because you have an unreasonably emotional reaction to
| truly analytical points of view that contradict your political
| view points?
| zamadatix wrote:
| I'm having a brain fart on the word/phrase to describe this
| but it'd be really interesting to see how "split" accounts
| are when commenting on the technical articles vs fluff
| articles. It may well be different groups commenting on
| certain posts often and others not as often giving a strong
| rise to a real difference in tone/analysis. There may not be
| things like "subreddits" here but that doesn't inherently
| mean you can pick a random political topic and expect the
| same userbase is participating.
|
| This wouldn't rule out the above, both reasons can coexist
| even, but it'd add to the understanding significantly.
| watwut wrote:
| > Did you arrive at that conclusion driven by observation and
| evidence? If so, then that means you notice this behaviour
| only on the politics threads
|
| You second sentence does not follow from first one. It is
| quite possible for HN to have that behavior in more then one
| topic while OP making the first observation in politics.
| Swenrekcah wrote:
| It happens in politics because yes, people in general have
| much more emotional reactions to topics like politics and
| religion.
|
| That's why people who might otherwise have a logical and
| analytical approach to technical matters forget how to apply
| that when it comes to these topics.
|
| That is also the reason why politics and religion are not
| generally "allowed topics" on this forum except when directly
| related to tech or a major world event.
| ferdowsi wrote:
| Technical discussions are far more ideologically driven than we
| give them credit for. Witness the hype cycles and evangelism
| machines around certain technologies, programming languages,
| etc. They're often barely rooted in technical merit.
| [deleted]
| xwdv wrote:
| I think it is more likely you came to that conclusion because
| you don't agree with their opinions, a common mistake people
| make. Without good self-awareness we will assume people who
| don't think like us are somehow dumb or irrational. Look no
| further than say, an opposing political party, and I bet you'd
| write off most of its members as blithering idiots.
|
| Personally, I find the HN crowd to be very logical and
| intelligent on most issues, though there are some pockets of
| ignorance and SJWs. However, much of that ignorance is fueled
| by external motivations and misguided desires.
| texaslonghorn5 wrote:
| shagmin wrote:
| Can't find the article, but I vaguely remember reading an
| article I think from Hacker News which aggregated some
| statistics like people with an engineering background are much
| more likely to be a terrorist, more likely to be on one extreme
| side or the other on the political spectrum, and things like
| that. Politics seems to be so ingrained in people, being
| analytical and everything can just help people can find things
| that support their biases easier.
| stingraycharles wrote:
| Even analytical, logical people make interpretations; politics
| is prone to many different reasonable interpretations, and it's
| often difficult to establish facts, so you see a vast variety
| of opinions.
|
| I think generally speaking political discussions are
| discouraged on HN for this precise reason.
| [deleted]
| vinay427 wrote:
| > Only a few countries have been electoral democracies for a long
| time. Eight countries -- Canada, Finland, Iceland, Ireland, New
| Zealand, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States --
| have been electoral democracies for a century or more. And
| according to this data, just two countries have been electoral
| democracies even longer: Australia and Switzerland have been
| democracies since the mid-19th century.
|
| Am I missing something? By which measure was the US (and possibly
| another among the first eight in this list) not an electoral
| democracy for as long as Australia and Switzerland? All three had
| significant restrictions on suffrage, with Switzerland
| particularly regressive in this regard in the late 20th century.
|
| EDIT: I was thinking of Iceland as well, which has a very
| reasonable claim to be the oldest (continuous and current)
| democracy along with the US and possibly the Isle of Man,
| depending on how democracy is defined.
| lkrubner wrote:
| I think, for the sake of precision, we should just go with the
| percentage of the population that could vote. For dead
| democracies, we can reference their peak, so:
|
| Ancient Athens, 400s BC, 10%
|
| Polish Lithuanian Commonwealth, 1500s, 10%
|
| Britain mid 1700s: 8%
|
| Britain after reforms of 1832: 15%
|
| USA before 19th Amendment: 20% peak actually voted.
|
| USA after 19th Amendment: 35%
|
| And so on. The percentage is more revealing than the label.
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| I think suffrage is a bit of a one-dimensional way of
| measuring a democracy.
|
| Athens puts all modern democracies to shame in who actually
| held office, and ensuring that those that did had real skin
| in the game.
|
| I imagine contemporary politics would look very differently
| if officials that fucked up risked ten years of exile by
| public vote.
| hulitu wrote:
| > I imagine contemporary politics would look very
| differently if officials that fucked up risked ten years of
| exile by public vote.
|
| But would be wonderful. You will see an increase in
| responsability.
| xeromal wrote:
| Or every 4 years, we just exile the old president. lol
| groby_b wrote:
| "Athens puts all modern democracies to shame in who
| actually held office, and ensuring that those that did had
| real skin in the game"
|
| Well, unless you were a woman, a slave, or under 30, in
| which case oh well. Let's not exaggerate the glory of
| Athens.
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| Right, but who gets to vote is just one aspect of it.
| Regardless of the fact more people get to vote in our
| democracy, our officials almost without exception are
| from a fairly small socioeconomic elite. This has changed
| remarkably little since universal suffrage some hundred
| odd years ago. Despite how a lot of people get to vote,
| not a lot of people get to rule.
|
| The key difference, in Athens, is most political
| appointments were by random lot. It was literally a
| government by the people. No matter who you were, if you
| were eligible to vote, you could end up with political
| office. This is just not true with our modern
| democracies. Most people eligible to vote have no
| realistic path to political office.
| [deleted]
| watwut wrote:
| > No matter who you were, if you were eligible to vote,
| you could end up with political office.
|
| Point is, this was rather small portion of population.
| And who you were, who parents were, mattered a lot in
| whether you was eligible to vote.
|
| > This is just not true with our modern democracies. Most
| people eligible to vote have no realistic path to
| political office.
|
| There is too many of us eligible.
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| > Point is, this was rather small portion of population.
| And who you were, who parents were, mattered a lot in
| whether you was eligible to vote.
|
| Sure, but what does voting matter if the options
| basically are the same?
|
| > There is too many of us eligible.
|
| Right, but I'll repeat the criticism you levied above. In
| modern democracy, who you are, and who your parents are,
| matters a lot in whether you are de facto eligible to
| hold office.
| groby_b wrote:
| I think you are confusing "eligible" and "get elected to
| the biggest, most visible positions".
|
| Turns out, even in Athens, for the really big jobs they
| were kind of picky - dokimasia is an excellent filter to
| remove those you don't want. (Part of the process was
| questioning your "moral character", which is a pretty
| good proxy for "has an in with the powers that be").
|
| And if we exclude high-visibility offices, there's a lot
| of people who can and do run in the US, for their local
| offices. School boards, city council members,
| commissioners, etc.
|
| If we want to debate shortcomings of modern democracy, we
| might want to focus on the devaluation of local offices
| to the point of only focusing on national office.
| watwut wrote:
| They also had non small population of men who were not
| slaves and not citizens. Had to be born to right parents
| too. And have wealth I think too.
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| You needed to be a male citizen landowner. But part in
| this is because eligibility to vote was eligibility to be
| assigned political office. Voting wasn't just a right, it
| potentially came with duties as well.
|
| It's not _that_ illogical to exclude slaves because a
| slave in office gives their masters influence over an
| official, exclude people without land because they were
| susceptible to bribery, and exclude women who could get
| pregnant.
| toqy wrote:
| I don't imagine exile would be as bad today as it would
| back then. Our national level politicians are fairly
| wealthy too. Getting exiled as a local level politician
| would be tough though.
| earleybird wrote:
| Assuming that would be exile relative to the jurisdiction
| of service - you might have to move to the next town :-)
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| You got to keep in mind most Athenian officials were
| selected via sortition (i.e. random lot), not elected. If
| you were eligible to vote, you were eligible for a term
| in office. Only a small fraction of the officials were
| elected, including for example generals.
| ThalesX wrote:
| IIRC, you could basically put your name in the lot, or
| put the name of whoever you thought would make a fit
| candidate.
| adamsmith143 wrote:
| Is this percentage of possible eligible voters? If this is
| counting children for example then it's pretty useless.
| peeters wrote:
| I'm currently reading through the source here for the same
| answer:
| https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/e09f/417c2d78b48fb100bea6dd...
|
| Sliding back the US and Canada flipped from electoral autocracy
| to electoral democracy in 1921.
|
| > In electoral autocracies, on the other hand, the chief
| executive is dependent on a legislature that is itself elected
| in de-jure multiparty elections (in parliamentary systems),
| directly elected alongside a separately elected legislature (in
| presidential systems), or a combination of both (in semi-
| presidential systems)
|
| I'm not sure what happened in 1921 to flip the U.S.. I think
| 1920 was the first election that allowed women to vote? But as
| you say, why that isn't counted against Switzerland I'm not
| sure.
| pclmulqdq wrote:
| That could be related to the direct election of senators
| rather than their appointment by states. The change happened
| around that time. Of course, Canada still has an appointed
| senate, so I'm not sure what the distinction is.
| lapetitejort wrote:
| The 17th amendment (Senators elected by the people) was
| ratified in 1913 and the last senators to be elected by the
| people took place in 1918.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seventeenth_Amendment_to_the_
| U...
| TravelPiglet wrote:
| Guessing the US crossed a threshold with with women's right
| to vote.
| noasaservice wrote:
| To be honest, the USA is a kleptocratic oligarcic republic with
| the facade of "democracy". Even the founders held democracy in
| a great ill repute.
|
| And in the USA, it was first deemed that only landowning white
| men could vote. Then in 1865, Black people were permitted to
| potentially vote, but in effect they simply couldnt.
|
| Then women were allowed to vote in the 1920's. In a rights-
| review, black men were seen as higher standing than women.
|
| And Jim Crow laws were in full effect until 1965. It took 100
| years to go from 'kind-of-mostly-not-really ending slavery'
| (unless you get 12 angry white guys saying guilty, then you
| qualify as a slave. still do, btw) to the federal govt moving
| military in to enforce desegregation. Now it's just hidden.
|
| And fast forward, in 1974, women finally apply and get credit
| (including credit cards, loans, etc). My SO was born in that
| year. And, not too long afterward in 1985, the Credit Check was
| created.
|
| But if you're a white guy working in tech, its all cool.
| vinay427 wrote:
| > Then women were allowed to vote in the 1920's. In a rights-
| review, black men were seen as higher standing than women.
|
| Did you actually mean to respond to my comment? I acknowledge
| this and mention Switzerland, where I lived for years, due in
| part to its refusal of women's suffrage through much of the
| 20th century (1990 or so in one canton). That seems to make
| this definition of democracy, if used to preclude the US,
| rather questionable if not inaccurate.
| autokad wrote:
| its revisionist bs. The US was a democracy for much longer than
| their BS metrics
| lagolinguini wrote:
| Arguably the United Kingdom was not a true electoral democracy
| until the 50s and until decolonisation. In the early 20th
| century the United Kingdom governed much of the world and non
| of those people had much say in the government that governed
| them.
| ant6n wrote:
| Arguably, a country without a fair, equal and representative
| electoral system is not a true democracy. This excludes the
| us and most Commonwealth countries, except new Zealand (since
| their electoral reform a decade or so ago).
| lazide wrote:
| You pretty quickly hit a 'no true Scotsman' situation
| pretty quickly though. If only one country (or a single
| digit percent) that calls itself a democracy qualifies
| under the criteria, what use is the criteria?
| batrachos wrote:
| Maybe it's not useful? Or not as presented here? I mean,
| Malaysia and Japan have both been ruled by basically the
| same party for all but maybe a few years since the end of
| foreign occupation. One is ruled a democracy here, thee
| other isn't. I don't see a good reason why, other than
| Japan is friendlier with Western values than Malaysia.
| It's also useless when you look more than about 50 years
| in the past. In 1835 you were really democratic if every
| white man could vote, now even somewhere like Iran has
| suffrage for women and minorities.
| baybal2 wrote:
| > United Kingdom governed much of the world and non of those
| people had much say in the government that governed them.
|
| Yes, and important point. India had a pet parliament, but the
| prime majority of Indians had no option to vote. In fact, it
| was mostly Britishers themselves who sat there until mid-192X
| pjc50 wrote:
| The UK _still_ has an unelected upper house with theoretical
| veto power. One of its members is ... Evgeny Lebedev, son of
| former KGB man and oligarch Alexander Lebedev.
| unfocussed_mike wrote:
| The veto power of the Lords is almost entirely non-
| existent. Essentially its only power of veto is over laws
| that the Commons might try to pass to extend the lifetime
| of a parliament. Literally it can stop the Commons
| unilaterally extending its power to govern; that's it.
| Otherwise it can only hold up legislation so as to make it
| endure more scrutiny, and then only for a year.
|
| https://www.lawteacher.net/free-law-essays/administrative-
| la...
|
| I think people outside the UK don't really understand the
| value of the Lords or the way it works, which is remarkably
| restrained and serious even given various governments'
| attempts to stack it, and your comment is giving a crucial
| wrong impression.
|
| With a handful of exceptions, I'll take the UK House of
| Lords over a dysfunctional elected senate. There's very
| little bad-faith use of powers there and far less
| obstructionism, compared to, just say for example, the US
| Senate, which is almost totally dysfunctional.
| SllX wrote:
| I happen to quite like our Senate. It's a chamber for
| deliberation, not rubber stamping what the House throws
| their way, and since it is formulated differently it's
| resistant to tyrannical majorities and you don't
| typically find either a Marjorie Taylor Greene nor a
| Maxine Waters among their ranks.
|
| What precisely do you find dysfunctional about the Senate
| compared to the House of Representatives or UK
| Parliament?
| unfocussed_mike wrote:
| It's not a chamber for deliberation in the way the UK
| House of Lords is, because it has a role in creating
| legislation rather than just amending it/discussing it.
|
| As I understand it in the USA system, you can get
| legislation starting in both houses that often get
| merged.
|
| Whereas in the UK (apart from the one single form of the
| veto) the Lords can only delay or offer amendments to
| legislation, and the Commons can reject them.
|
| It puts the Lords much more in the service of the Commons
| than the comment I was replying to suggests. People
| outside the UK might see an unelected chamber making law,
| but it doesn't and can't. It can only offer reflection
| and advice.
|
| The US system, I'm sorry, but your Senate is wilfully
| obstructionist in its roles in federal appointments and
| judges, the majority abuses procedure to suit it, and it
| is abusing both the two thirds majority rule -- by simply
| refusing to even sit when things won't on the face of it
| won't get past strict party loyalty -- and the
| filibuster.
|
| Look at how unseriously it treated its role in the
| impeachment or Obama's supreme court picks; the whole
| world sees an unserious, childish organisation.
|
| There _is_ party representation in the Lords but it does
| not work the way it does in the Senate, because nobody is
| running for election (there are also many "crossbench"
| peers who have no affiliation).
|
| Second, the way your system elects senators is by no
| means impervious to the MTG types. John Kennedy, Josh
| Hawley, Kyrsten Sinema -- these are not serious people;
| they either act in bad faith, play up to their base or
| don't turn up. Hawley is actively bad, John Kennedy is a
| fake and a disgrace, and Sinema is wasting her seat.
| (Let's agree not to talk about Rand Paul or Ted Cruz.)
|
| Because of how the Lords works, almost nobody is in that
| sort of position, and the Lords functions in a genuinely
| more collegiate way. I mean someone offered to resign --
| in good faith and all seriousness -- from a ministerial
| position in the Lords for being late.
| SllX wrote:
| > It's not a chamber for deliberation in the way the UK
| House of Lords is, because it has a role in creating
| legislation rather than just amending it/discussing it.
|
| > As I understand it in the USA system, you can get
| legislation starting in both houses that often get
| merged.
|
| > Whereas in the UK (apart from the one single form of
| the veto) the Lords can only delay or offer amendments to
| legislation, and the Commons can reject them.
|
| Correct. I think this point actually makes it a _more_
| effective chamber of deliberation because the Senate is
| empowered to bring forth an alternative, initiate
| legislation that the House is unwilling to, or stop
| legislation in its tracks.
|
| > It puts the Lords much more in the service of the
| Commons than the comment I was replying to suggests.
| People outside the UK might see an unelected chamber
| making law, but it doesn't and can't. It can only offer
| reflection and advice.
|
| I don't see this as a feature. A Senate in service to the
| House would be subordinate and less effective. If it
| works for the UK, great, but your Parliament has passed
| much legislation in the past 20 years that has made it a
| less appealing alternative to my own country over time,
| to me at least. Still a wonderful country to visit, just
| respectfully not a place I would choose to emigrate to.
| :)
|
| > The US system, I'm sorry, but your Senate is wilfully
| obstructionist in its roles in federal appointments and
| judges, the majority abuses procedure to suit it, and it
| is abusing both the two thirds majority rule -- by simply
| refusing to even si when things won't on the face of it
| won't get past strict party loyalty -- and the
| fillibuster.
|
| If you can stomach a single podcast episode on the
| American system of government, Constitutionally
| Speaking's latest episode, Episode 77, has a good primer
| on the Filibuster in an American historical context and
| why we have it. The long and the short of it is, it
| benefits both parties, at least in the present, but
| likely only has a few years of life left in it because of
| our contemporary political situation. It's 3/5 to bring
| cloture so the Senate can proceed to the next item on the
| agenda, and the Senate has both the power to revise its
| standing rules and does so regularly. If you can stomach
| two episodes, the preceding episode covers how the US
| House functions.
|
| > Second, the way your system elects senators is by no
| means impervious to the MTG types. John Kennedy, Josh
| Hawley, Kyrsten Sinema -- these are not serious people;
| they either act in bad faith, play up to their base or
| don't turn up.
|
| Resistant would be a more honest way of putting it rather
| than impervious, and I didn't mean to suggest it was
| impervious, merely resistant.
|
| That said, I agree with your assessment of the individual
| Senators save for the fact that I wouldn't put any of
| them in the same league as the two House members I listed
| nor many more that I could list. One of the nice things
| about deliberative bodies of all stripes though is that
| they tend not to speak with one voice.
|
| > Because of how the Lords works, almost nobody is in
| that sort of position, and the Lords functions in a
| genuinely more collegiate way. I mean someone offered to
| resign -- in good faith and all seriousness -- from a
| ministerial position in the Lords for being late.
|
| It's possible that this statement is true about the Lords
| being more collegiate, but my understanding of the Senate
| from listening to both Senators in interviews and from
| people who have worked on Senatorial staffs or spent a
| great deal of time in the chambers is that the Senate is
| quite a fair bit more collegiate than the podium and
| television camera politics let on. They all have a base
| that needs pandering to to one degree or another in order
| to get re-elected, they'll do their pandering for the
| cameras, but I do wish we could throw out the audiovisual
| recording devices from both the House and Senate floors.
| unfocussed_mike wrote:
| > Still a wonderful country to visit, just respectfully
| not a place I would choose to emigrate to. :)
|
| Christ. I was born here and _I_ wouldn 't emigrate here.
| Veen wrote:
| The British Empire and the United Kingdom are not the same
| entity. The UK was a parliamentary democracy and
| constitutional monarchy that ruled a non-democratic empire.
| ch4s3 wrote:
| I've always found that to be quite the hair to split.
| Quasi-democracy in the narrowly defined homeland and
| crushing authoritarianism for all other subjects.
| Separating the UK and the British Empire that way feels
| like a bit of a fig leaf, a polite fiction.
| teatree wrote:
| This reminds me of Shashi Tharoor's [0] speech at Oxford Union.
|
| It is a bit rich to celebrate UK's democracy as 102 years old
| when they were practicing colonization and slavery less than a
| human lifetime ago (75 years), isn't it?
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7CW7S0zxv4
| n4r9 wrote:
| Clicking through to the source of the metric they used:
|
| > A country is classified as an autocracy if it does not meet
| the above criteria of meaningful, free and fair, multi-party
| elections
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/regimes-of-the-world-data
|
| My guess is it may be to do with the difficulties that African
| Americans faced when voting.
| eatonphil wrote:
| The list of universal suffrage (all men, all women, all
| ethnicities) is different from the article too though. Only
| New Zealand in the 19th century. Followed closely by Finland,
| Norway, Denmark, etc.
|
| Switzerland only required all cantons to allow women to vote
| in 1991. Australia only allowed all ethnicities to vote since
| 1967.
|
| I agree the original article has a concept of democracy that
| is hard to understand when it says Australia and Switzerland
| were the only ones in the 19th century.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_suffrage
| sampo wrote:
| > Only New Zealand in the 19th century.
|
| In New Zealand women could vote, but not run. Only in 1919
| were women eligible to be elected to the House of
| Representatives. And only in 1941 were women eligible to be
| appointed to the Upper House.
| eatonphil wrote:
| Suffrage and ability to run are different I think but
| yeah point taken.
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| Heck it took until the 1990's for women to be US Senators
| (but for an exception or two).
|
| Curiously a US woman was a representative _before women
| had gained the vote_. So kind of topsy-turvy there.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Curiously a US woman was a representative before women
| had gained the vote.
|
| Before women had gained a nationally guaranteed equal
| right to vote; women had the vote in many states
| (sometimes on an unequal basis) prior to that point.
| n4r9 wrote:
| Suffrage is one thing. I agree it's a shortcoming of the
| metric. Making the vote free and fair amongst those who
| _can_ vote, is a separate matter.
| yodsanklai wrote:
| I don't know how they define democracy. Why France isn't in
| that list?
| peeters wrote:
| They were governed by an autocracy during WWII. This is
| measuring the age of _current_ democracies.
| dopidopHN wrote:
| Nazi occupation in half of it, puppet regime in the other
| half ( Vichy regime )
| bryanrasmussen wrote:
| I don't think external occupation really works, yes there
| are a few people alive that have a memory of being
| oppressed by the invaders but that 5 years or so of Nazi
| rule does not wipe out the memory of democracy before it.
|
| In the same way Denmark was a democracy since 1849 but
| because they had some people bossing them around that
| nobody wanted for 5 years all the traditions and
| understanding of how democracy works went out the window? I
| might actually think that appreciation of democracy might
| increase if you've had it, lost it, and then recover it.
| vidarh wrote:
| If you look at the graphs for both Denmark and Norway
| it's clear that the nazi occupations "reset" the count
| for the sake of those maps - they're mapping the amount
| of time since the latest emergence of democracy. It'd be
| interesting to do a map with short-lived occupations
| excluded too, but it'd be a different thing.
| bryanrasmussen wrote:
| Yes, I understand the concept. I'm saying I think the
| concept is bull for the reason I mentioned.
|
| >they're mapping the amount of time since the latest
| emergence of democracy.
|
| again emergence of democracy because you have a
| revolution and overthrow the dictatorial elements of your
| own society, and re-establishment of democracy by kicking
| out some invaders seem like two very different things.
| ruggeri wrote:
| With due respect, your comment would benefit from a
| better understanding of French 20th century history.
| Vichy France was not Nazi rule, and it was not oppression
| by invaders. It was oppression of the French and by (some
| of) the French, albeit with significant coercion from the
| Nazis.
|
| To be clear: Vichy was a client state of Nazi Germany,
| but from 1940 to 1942 its southern portion was not
| occupied. It was collaborationist, but Vichy was not
| simply ruled from Berlin.
|
| It would not be accurate to imagine Vichy as an entirely
| foreign invention. Like in much of Europe at that time,
| there were many domestic supporters of reactionary
| conservatism and authoritarianism. As for the strength of
| democratic sentiment in France, remember that a President
| of France (and republican) once gave it only the faint
| praise: "republicanism is the form of government that
| divides France least."
|
| The domestic political situation was in no way unique to
| France. There existed significant authoritarian movements
| and tendencies in every European country at this time.
| You are probably aware that both Portugal and Spain had
| adopted authoritarianism, and not simply by foreign
| imposition. My point is: the Nazis found an existing
| domestic reservoir of authoritarian French willing to
| collaborate.
|
| Just to provide a few more facts about Vichy:
|
| Vichy was the French government formed after invasion and
| occupation of northern France by Nazi Germany. Its head
| of government was general Philippe Petain, and Pierre
| Laval was its prime minister. Both had been significant
| domestic political figures in France. Vichy France was
| formed after the National Assembly voted to give full
| powers to Petain.
|
| Vichy had its own paramilitary militia (the Milice)
| consisting of about 30,000 Frenchman. This was similar to
| the SS and Gestapo, but considered more dangerous by
| resistance French.
|
| Of course, unoccupied Vichy adopted anti-Semitic policies
| and deported Jews to be murdered by the Nazis. Maurice
| Papon (later the prefect of police in Paris 1958-1967)
| participated. You can look up yourself his subsequent
| misdeeds during the Algerian War. Unfortunately, even
| after the fall of the Nazis, there continued (and
| continue) to be significant reactionary and authoritarian
| political elements in France.
|
| If you wish to learn more about this period, you can
| start here:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vichy_France
| bryanrasmussen wrote:
| >With due respect, your comment would benefit from a
| better understanding of French 20th century history
|
| In the comment to which I replied to there was a
| reference to Nazi occupation, and there was a reference
| to Vichy France.
|
| I made a short paragraph commenting about Nazi occupation
| but not mentioning Vichy France. Why would you think that
| meant I did not know what Vichy France was? Normally I
| would think this person wants to focus on the Nazi
| occupation part here for some reason?
|
| Then I segued into another paragraph where I mentioned
| Denmark and said I did not think the Nazi occupation
| meant that democracy was destroyed. At this point I might
| even think, that guy wants to talk about Denmark, or
| maybe just various Nazi occupations in general and thus
| his reasons for ignoring Vichy France!
|
| But at any rate my point is that if Denmark had engaged
| in Vichy like collaboration with the Germans, if there
| had been established an independent Danish government
| forced into a quasi-fascistic mode then I suppose the
| return to democracy would have been more difficult and
| noteworthy, but as there was not such a system (there was
| an attempted National Socialist Danish party but it got
| very few votes) I don't think occupation was a destroyer
| of the democratic norms, especially as the Danish
| government was officially disbanded at one point in
| protest of the death penalty for sabotage being set by
| the occupying Germans.
|
| Why did I say so much about Denmark in this post, and so
| much in the previous, and not really seem to care about
| Vichy France? I don't know, my name is just Bryan
| Rasmussen and I suppose the reasons for my interests in
| Denmark in this discussion must remain shrouded in
| impregnable mystery.
| dopidopHN wrote:
| Oh. No. The French let it happen and democracy was no
| more.
|
| Paris was occupied by Nazi germany. Yes. But the southern
| half of the country was not.
|
| A military guy from ww1 took over and setup a government
| composed of French folks.
|
| That the problematic part in my book.
| adolph wrote:
| It's hard to Monday QB the rump part of a destroyed
| nation (quote from 0). I'm willing to give France a pass
| on democracy being interrupted during WWII. On the other
| hand, WWII marked the end of France's "Third Republic"
| and the current constitution was established in 1958 (1).
| I don't think it is fair to consider the current
| democracy the same as the one before WWII.
|
| _The official postwar French position was that Vichy was
| a German puppet state. Some historians have since the
| 1970s rejected that position by arguing, "Vichy had a
| political agenda of its own, which it pursued without the
| slightest pressure from Germany".[6] Germany kept two
| million French prisoners-of-war and imposed forced labour
| (service du travail obligatoire) on young French men.
| French soldiers were kept hostage to ensure that Vichy
| would reduce its military forces and pay a heavy tribute
| in gold, food and supplies to Germany._
|
| 0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vichy_France
|
| 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/France
| kergonath wrote:
| > I don't think external occupation really works, yes
| there are a few people alive that have a memory of being
| oppressed by the invaders but that 5 years or so of Nazi
| rule does not wipe out the memory of democracy before it.
|
| Petain was a very French dictator, who got his absolute
| powers directly from the French parliament. Even if you
| say that the French government in exile in London was the
| legitimate one, it was not elected either.
|
| I am not saying that the concept of 'longest continuous
| democracy' is very useful (I don't think it is), but
| France did stop being a democracy for a few years.
|
| Although there is an argument that the 3rd Republic did
| not end in 1940 (its constitution was not suspended or
| replaced until after the war), therefore the Vichy regime
| was illegitimate and thus should not count.
| Veen wrote:
| All that may be true, but this research is about how old
| existing democracies are, not about which countries have
| a tradition of democracy that precedes the existence of
| the current democratic state.
| jkingsbery wrote:
| It looks like they consider the US to have become a democracy
| in 1921, which would point to the 19th amendment as the thing
| that made the US "become a democracy" (https://en.wikipedia.org
| /wiki/Nineteenth_Amendment_to_the_Un...). The term "electoral
| autocracy" hardly seems to fit, whatever failings the US might
| have had prior to that time. Nor does the term "closed
| autocracy" really seem to make sense referring to the
| administration of George Washington. While Washington was
| unanimously elected to be President (https://en.wikipedia.org/w
| iki/List_of_United_States_presiden...), the President had
| relatively little power at the time, and the other government
| officials were not unanimously elected.
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| By that measure Switzerland wasn't a democracy until 1971 or
| 1991.
| watwut wrote:
| Why is that issue?
| ska wrote:
| They've used a constructive approach to this, and I think
| what flips from "Electoral Autocracy" to "Electoral
| Democracy" relies on a threshold calculation of "polyarchy":
| "We claim that Dahl's theory of polyarchy (1971, 1998)
| provides the most comprehensive and most widely accepted
| theory of what distinguishes a democracy based on six
| (1998,p. 85--originally p. 8 in his 1971 book) institutional
| guarantees (elected officials, free and fair elections,
| freedom of expression, alternative sources of information,
| associational autonomy, and inclusive citizenship). This
| conception requires not only free and fair elections but also
| the freedoms that make them meaningful, and thus avoids the
| electoral fallacy (Diamond, 2002; Karl, 1986). "
|
| I don't know how they made and weighted that calculation, but
| you can see how any country near the threshold would have
| lots to argue about. US I imagine scored low (or high, not
| sure which way is +ve) on inclusive citizenship in earlier
| years, less clear on the others.
| politician wrote:
| Arguably, Canada is not a democracy at the moment due to the
| minority government's invocation of its emergency powers act.
| quasse wrote:
| Aren't you like two days late on this AM radio talking point?
| [1]
|
| [1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/02/23/canada-
| trude...
| politician wrote:
| That's unnecessarily bitter, but I wasn't aware that he
| capitulated. Thanks for the update.
| tensor wrote:
| Even before it was dropped it still did not remotely
| affect our democratic status. There is a great deal of
| misinformation about this in the US media. It did not
| invoke a state of martial law. It did not invoke the
| military.
|
| What it did do is allow higher level police to override
| local police that were refusing to do their jobs. It also
| allowed the government to temporarily use heavy tow
| trucks because the contracted companies were also
| refusing to honour their contract. The blockades were
| already illegal under normal laws. Protesting was always
| allowed and still is. Breaking other laws while
| protesting is not allowed.
|
| More, our government has multiple checks and balances for
| using the emergency act, and they were all in play.
| Opposition parties had to agree to keep it in play, which
| they did. It was under continual review. At no point was
| it "not a democracy."
| SketchySeaBeast wrote:
| "Capitulated" seems a strong term - the emergency was
| dealt with and the convoys were dispersed so the act was
| revoked.
| DocTomoe wrote:
| Just because you do not have universal suffrage does not make
| you an electoral democracy.
|
| I would guess San Marino being on that list also, having been a
| republic (with elections, similar to the Roman republic) since
| the fourth century...
| squidsurfer wrote:
| AnotherGoodName wrote:
| It's particularly weird since Australia was founded in 1901.
|
| Before that the states were independent nations with their own
| militaries, collected their own taxes, had border controls
| between them etc.
|
| So how are they tracing it back? The states still have their
| own democracies to this day but I don't think you can call that
| Australia's democracy.
| amitport wrote:
| Can someone please explain Puerto Rico? I just read the
| Wikipedia page and I'm a little shocked to learn that their
| people do not have voting rights in the US.
|
| Sounds outrageous to me that the US Give them equal rights or
| leave you can't own a nation... Or at least not while calling
| youself a democracy. Seriously, if I'm reading this wrong I
| would really appreciate an explanation.
| boredumb wrote:
| We don't have _federal_ voting rights in the US. We have the
| ability to vote for our city/state(oh-boy) policy and
| politicians. We also have a commissioner that 'represents'
| puerto rico in the house* of reps.
|
| We also don't have to pay _federal_ taxes so we aren't being
| taxed without representation.
| Fezzik wrote:
| Only recognized states are given federal voting rights by the
| constitution. Puerto Rico is designated as a territory.
| That's the logic at least.
| vkou wrote:
| The US is a democracy, but it's not a fair democracy. All
| non-proportionate[1] democracies are unfair in one respect or
| another. On a macroscopic set of trends, it's been getting
| more fair over the centuries.
|
| [1] One can make arguments for why non-proportionate
| elections might be better than proportionate ones, but those
| arguments do _not_ include 'non-proportionate elections are
| more fair'.
| aksss wrote:
| States have sovereignty separate from the federal government.
| Tribal nations have limited sovereignty from federal
| government. _Territories_ do not have any sovereignty from
| the federal government - they basically are the same entity.
| Since the federal government was created by and is formed by
| sovereign states, no, territorial landholdings of that
| federal government don't have a role. Think about them like a
| city relative to a state. Or perhaps like the frontier - they
| are lands held by the country, underdeveloped, and depending
| on sophistication of population, may or may not have
| organized local governments - and in those cases, yes, people
| vote for their own local government. When you think of the
| "wild west" those were territories that eventually achieved
| statehood. Or Alaska. People born in those territories (US
| Nationals) can move to US states to live and work, or
| continue to live in the "frontier". And trust me, there are
| aspects of living in the frontier that make it "freer" than
| living in a state - basically that people give less of a shit
| what goes on out there if they even know where "there" is.
| Some territories (like Marshall Islands) elect not to become
| states but to become sort of quasi protectorates for lack of
| a better term - having their own internationally recognized
| sovereignty as independent nations but in tight alliance with
| and under the defensive umbrella of the US. At risk of
| pushing too many analogies, saying the US is less democratic
| because territories don't have the same rights as states
| would be like saying your country is less democratic for not
| letting adolescents vote in elections. Well, maybe that's
| true in strictest sense of the term, but then "full
| democracy" by that definition is not really anyone's ideal.
| Perfectly pure systems for their own sake are usually not a
| desirable end outside of thought experiments.
| rhino369 wrote:
| Puerto Rico is not part of our union. And until recently,
| Puerto Rico generally wanted to be the gray area it is in
| within the USA. It's not sovereign, but it is exempted from
| laws that apply to all other states and incorporated
| territories. It can have a lower tax rate, doesn't have to
| follow the same regulations. It's like being part of the EU
| without having to follow all the rules.
|
| And unlike US states, it can be granted independence by a
| simple vote of congress. It gives them the option to gain
| independence.
|
| It's important to note they are full citizens in every
| respect. If you move from Puerto Rico to Florida, you
| instantaneously can vote, without having to anything other
| than register the same way Floridians do. And a Floridian who
| moves to Puerto Rico loses their ability to vote for
| President and doesn't have real representation in Congress
| either.
|
| Though some territories, like American Samoa, don't even get
| citizenship. They are full-on colonies.
| newaccount2021 wrote:
| erlklkj45k wrote:
| Maybe Europe should be spending more money on defense rather than
| socialism.
|
| The US should absolutely leave and defund NATO of which we pay
| the vast majority for.
| erlklkj45k wrote:
| Is this not a factual comment?
|
| Why should my tax money be used to pay for European defense
| when they won't pay for it themselves?
| politician wrote:
| Russia has 6000 nuclear weapons and 100 million people. The
| US has ~5000 nuclear weapons and 300 million people. It's in
| the interest of the US to see the Russian nuclear stockpile
| reduced by strangling its economy. Russia's demographics are
| already in a nosedive.
|
| Europe has been largely demilitarized with the US providing
| protection. It would be a strategic blunder for the US to
| abandon its position in Europe to Russia.
| zeruch wrote:
| We don't pay the majority of it and we gain a considerable
| amount of leverage for it.
| dopidopHN wrote:
| NATO is your toy. You pay for it.
| hunterb123 wrote:
| NATO is so we don't have to BACK over to Europe...
|
| No one wants a third trip over there and to rebuild Europe/UK
| again.
|
| There's an agreement of % of GDP that members should pay.
|
| They should pay it or defend themselves. I don't see why
| that's a debate.
| dopidopHN wrote:
| NATO also give you access to bases where you would not, and
| capacity to deploy your air career where you would not. (
| Black Sea for instance )
|
| Or store ICBM where you could not.
|
| It's convenient.
|
| RE: going back to Europe, for what exactly. If the German
| act out again? Russia maybe? We'll see what actually happen
| with that one but we can only notice the US is way less
| trigger happy than it was in says : Iran invasion.
|
| Overall, we figured it out amongst ourself for a while. It
| will be fine.
|
| NATO allow the US army to have a considerably larger reach.
| I do agree with recent comment that it's "brain dead" ( see
| : Turkey bullying Greece.)
|
| I'm with you, it should be disbanded and Europe should pay
| for its own army.
|
| But I don't think the US would actually want that. That
| would be a blow to it's reach.
|
| Edit : mandatory comment about USSR bearing most of WW2 war
| effort. Not the US :)
| throwrqX wrote:
| NATO is the only reason the rest of Eastern Europe at the
| very minimum isn't also under the threat of invasion. I
| know a few Russian military guys, they joke often about
| raping Germany a second time, not in the sense of
| military but in the sense of their women, with the first
| being 1945 of course. Sometimes I doubt they are jokes,
| although perhaps if Germany was under such threat again
| it would make them realize their current strategy of
| being passive and try to be neutral will never work out
| in the long run.
|
| The ICBM argument has long been irrelevant since you can
| loiter nuclear subs around a country, especially Russia
| which has large ocean borders.
| nautilius wrote:
| See what happens to all the US non-NATO wars/interventions
| in the middle East when there are no more NATO-justified
| bases in Europe (Ramstein) as convenient turnstiles.
| hunterb123 wrote:
| That would be a bonus in my eyes. We shouldn't be there
| fighting endless wars, funneling taxpayer money into
| defense contractor's and politician's pockets.
|
| We should reduce our presence in Germany speaking of
| Ramstein, Merkel didn't like that idea though when
| President Trump pitched it.
|
| Nowadays it'd be more useful to have them in Poland.
| n4r9 wrote:
| The US funds about 16% of the running costs. Accounting for
| GDP, this is less than many other countries.
|
| HTTPS://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-44717074
| bpodgursky wrote:
| That's not the right measure. That's of "running NATO" itself
| ($2-$3B, for training missions etc), which is pocket change
| compared to the actual defense budgets.
|
| And the US far, far dominates actual national defense
| spending, which is what matters for collective defense. It's
| the $700B the US spends on defense that backs the NATO
| defense commitment, not the couple billion spent on training
| missions.
| standardUser wrote:
| The larger NATO allies are among the most well-funded, well-
| trained and technologically sophisticated militaries the world
| has ever known.
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