An alternative view

In the wake of the revelations about Liam Fox and Atlantic Bridge, I came across this response to an article by one Stephen Hewitt". Mr Hewitt was involved in reporting Atlantic Bridge to the charities commission, ultimately leading to it losing its charitable status. The saga behind that is not appropriate to this thread, but this comment on the article is, I think.


As the writer says, this notion has a long history. Qualifying for the vote was based on property in this country for many, many years: and the idea of democracy was horrifying to the wealthy, who openly and successfully opposed it for decades, if not centuries

I had not realised that strand of opinion was alive and kicking. I imagine this person is in a small minority, and perhaps it is also related to the fact that the UK is still a very class ridden society. The word has been abolished, but the fact has not. Nevertheless I had not anticipated that plutocracy would be openly espoused, and put forward as a serious alternative to democracy as the fundamental form of government.

So the question is, what is wrong with this person's position?

It is now clear that the concept of democracy is not valued as I had assumed: and it is sobering to find that it is not seen as worthy of defence. It is true that the abandonment of that system has been noted, and criticised in a minor key: but at the same time the ease with which it has been overturned in Greece and in Italy is, at least, suprising. Since this has happened I have seen it justified in terms of the fact that the elected politicians in those countries have approved it. In these circumstances it is evident that my own notion of the centrality of democracy is not universally shared: perhaps not even widely. I am at a loss to understand how this has come to be. Until recently even those on the very far right have tendered the tribute of vice to virtue in the efforts they have made to pretend that what they pursue is in some sense democratic: but that is now gone. This is a greater problem than any so far considered in this thread. It gives the lie to a distinction I entertained upthread between the perceived threats in the US and in Europe. That notion must now be abandoned.

In another thread I commented on the views expressed in one paper to the effect that the 4 countries most badly affected by the financial crisis have no tradition of democracy: certainly both Italy and Greece were under totalitarian rule within the last century, and for significant periods of time. Can we then argue that the willingness to abandon that system is confined to nations where the idea is not deep rooted? I think not. Although other countries have not abandoned the forms there is a very strong feeling in the UK, at least, that democracy is increasingly unresponsive to the needs and wishes of the people. That is also resonating with some in America, as evidenced by the Occupy movements: for at bottom that is the complaint, I would argue.

When the people are disenfranchised (which I think is the root of this) there is a danger that the value of democracy is undermined: it seems that often people do not see the problem as a subversion of democracy, but as a failure of it in functional terms. In short they assume that democracy was working as intended and was failing to meet the legitimate aspirations of the people: they do not seem to think that it was not working as intended, because power has been transferred from the democratic power to another body, as I think. This narrative has a long history, and a shameful one.

Nonetheless it is now important to consider the implications of a shift in the prevailing wisdom. For many years we have presumed that democracy is " the worst form of government except for all those others that have been tried." as Churchill said. That view was shared by left and right (or at least lip service was paid to it) and indeed we have fought many wars ostensibly to bring democracy to the third world etc. Or so we said. In face of the prevalence of that narrative it is truly surprising how easily it has been abandoned: how fragile our committment to it.

But it seems to me that it demands a consideration of other possible systems: we can no longer assume that democracy is desirable.

What Italy and, to a lesser extent, Greece, have decided to do, I would contend, is to adopt Plato's republic as a system of government. If that sounds extreme, you may find it instructive to read Popper's account of that in the "The open society and its enemies". Is this what we want?

How interesting. I did not know that. From a quick read through of the wiki the arguments against don't seem to me to be all that convincing.