I’ve always had a visceral dislike of what I call “normie theories of democracy.” We are told that democracy works because it provides checks and balances, allows for the peaceful transfer of power, and the correction of mistakes. It takes account of public opinion and gives citizens a say in how they are governed, thus creating some level of social peace.
I used to scoff at these theories. They seemed to be the product of social desirability bias. How convenient that intellectuals who believe in democracy find that it is the best system humans have ever designed.
Reading a few-months-old Richard Hanania post and, like, man, what do you think it means to believe in something
always a wacky line but when I see things like this I wonder if these people view belief in like, a fundamentally different way
there’s a gap between those two paragraphs though, like I think that peaceful transfer of power is important, as is boosting the perceived legitimacy of government, taking input from public opinion etc. etc. however “the best system humans have ever designed” is a very casual way to sum that up!
there are many democratic societies and they can vary quite widely in the details, so it’s not one single system, and of course there is a big difference between the best system that humans have ever designed and the best system that humans will ever design, it’s not like our current arrangements represent some optimal peak of institutional design as I think everyone would agree.
yea, i thought about it more and it’s very easy to understand now—
—like you can compare a hypothetical benevolent dictatorship to a democracy and it’s unclear which should be favoured if the former was producing better outcomes and how much favouring the latter would be informed by ideological bias towards democracy regardless of practical outcomes
right, in order for a system to be better it has to produce better outcomes, unless you’re so committed to aesthetic or metaphysical principle that you will accept worse outcomes purely for the satisfaction of being punished by something you admire.