Democracy is interesting and surprisingly successful in the midsts of ignorance.
I am not so sure of that, if by 'democracy' you mean a system whereby there is a central federal government and states or provinces or whatever, with a central justice system and legislature or parliament with an attendant civil service. Also, most policy-making offices being elected.
The problem with this system is that it tends to grow unchecked and become complex. And complex systems are fragile systems. Just look at the dog's breakfast large democratic states have made of their budget and entitlement programs. Judged by this light, democracies are utter failures. Oh, sure, our freedoms are more or less punctiliously preserved (unless you run into the more Orwellian aspects of the Patriot Act here) but there is more to it than that. Surely a successful democracy implies successful monetary and fiscal policies. Democracies are on the whole proving to be failures in this regard. The larger and more complex the democracy, the less successful, or so it seems.
Which countries do you consider to be successful democracies?
The one I would point to is Switzerland but it has system in which the typically complex federal bureaucracy system does not appear to exist. A couple of the cantons still can hold meetings of all citizens where expenditures, etc., are debated and laws passed in an example of pure, direct democracy. It appears that the Swiss adopted a Jeffersonian model that works very well for them. I am not sure a large state can emulate this example. Of course, the Swiss are quasi libertarians (but don't know it) for they refuse to go to war, practice neutrality, and are more interested in truly free trade than anything else.
If you cannot name the Swiss president or prime minister, it is because none exist. Executive power is shared by the members of a federal council.
en.wikipedia.org
Large democratic states with fiat currencies breed politicians who cannot check their spending, and that will be the downfall of all of them, subprime and the EU troubles being the latest example of this indisputable truth. |
