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Forcible democracy

  
  

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No star here laces
07:53 / 15.04.03
Churchill: "...democracy is the worst form of Government except all those others that have been tried from time to time"

Whether or not they like current expressions of democracy, I think it would be fair to say that most people agree with this old saw. And it's generally felt to be a good thing if a nation's people rise up and throw off the "yoke of a brutal dictator" (insert stock phrase here) in order to install a representative democracy instead.

However as we are all aware right now, it's clearly a thornier issue when nations use force to install a democratic system in a non-democratic nation. But a lot of the critique out there in the real world focuses on issues like the US' intentions regarding oil, or their foreign policy history. But a far bigger question is whether it's ever right to act this way, whether any nation or body can morally alter another's political system using force.

So independently of your opinions of the US, the UN the UK and any other actual body capable of effecting this change, is it right or wrong for one group to forcibly install democracy in another nation?
 
 
Leap
08:36 / 15.04.03
You can lead a horse to water…………

That said, what is so great about democracy in the modern age: is it anything more than mob-enfranchised media-ocracy?
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
09:31 / 15.04.03
As opposed to when, exactly? People have been accusing democratic systems of being ochlocratic since the mid-5th century BC...

The forcible installation of democracy is question the first, but it does actually make a certain kind of sense- that is, essentially, if you have destroyed both the mechanisms and the ruling party of a system, then the best way to disclaim accusations of reconstructing the peace for one's own advantage is to throw open the election of the nex tlot of rulers to the body politic in what is in effect a plebiscite.

So, for example, Germany after WW2 no longer had a Reichstag or political parties in any meaningful sense, and the people who had been running the show for the previous 10 years were either dead, discredited or already working for the Vatican. So, what do you do? Inviting the people to bowl in who they think is best is probably as good a way of doing it as any. Whereas the imposition of a democratic system at the end of WW1, when the structure of civil government was still in decent shape, seems far more dubious, and lest we foget didn't end up terribly well. Was this a weakness in the structure, or a weakness in the thinking *behind* the structure?

Where the question becomes more complex again is when the people might not, in fact, *want* a democracy; what do you do as the occupying power if the people appear to be on the verge of electing somebody who will dismnatle the democratic mechanisms put in palce for just this moment and will instead rule with popular support but no democratic accountability? Is it ever justifiable to overrule the will of another sovereign people "in their own best interests"?
 
 
sleazenation
09:40 / 15.04.03
I'm not sure it is actually possible to divorce a debate on the imposition of democracy on non-democtratic states from the powers and ideologies that impose democracy.
 
 
Simplist
16:36 / 15.04.03
Where the question becomes more complex again is when the people might not, in fact, *want* a democracy; what do you do as the occupying power if the people appear to be on the verge of electing somebody who will dismnatle the democratic mechanisms put in palce for just this moment and will instead rule with popular support but no democratic accountability? Is it ever justifiable to overrule the will of another sovereign people "in their own best interests"?

This is where "the rubber hits the road", as it were. A legal structure can be designed to prevent just this problem (mandated regular elections, term limits for the executive branch, limitations on internal police powers, press freedom, and so on), but this will only be effective to the extent that people (most especially including people who work for the government) are willing to respect and enforce said legal structure, ie. the president is actually willing to step down voluntarily after two terms rather than ordering the army to impose martial law, the military leadership is willing to ignore those kinds of orders if they do come down, etc. This is all well and good in nations that have been democratic for generations, and which therefore have cultural values and expectations that support good behavior in these respects--a U.S. president, for instance, would have to have a damned convincing reason for declaring martial law, because otherwise the citizenry, including the military and police forces, simply wouldn't go along with it for more than a few days (the various fulminations of right- and left-wing paranoids notwithstanding). A place like Iraq, OTOH, where people lack ingrained expectations of reasonably fair treatment, may be another story.
 
 
Fist of Fun
08:08 / 16.04.03
Answering the 1st question - is it right or wrong for one group to impose democracy on another? Yes, it can be. Democracy is not perfect. There are many different forms of democracy. But in extreme circumstances the imposition of democracy is better than allowing, say, a violent dictatorship to continue.

Why? Two reasons.

First, because in most cases the alternative to one group imposing democracy on another is a sub-set of the latter imposing non-democratic government over the rest of that group. And why on earth is that considered somehow better than an outside group imposing democracy on the group? The imposition of democracy is the lesser of two evils. After all, if absolutely necessary the imposee group can vote democracy out after a while.

Secondly, and this is just a personal and highly subjective ethical opinion, but I think the following:
(i) In as much as there is 'good' and 'bad', then we have moral obligations to support the good and oppose the bad.
(ii) Just because the bad is happening to somebody else does not change that obligation.
(iii) That said, 'good' and 'bad' are subjective terms, and generally one should not impose one's own view of them on others because (a) you might well be wrong (you might both be right/wrong/meaningless), and (b) if you are wrong then your imposition of the wrong view might stifle the furtherance of both an understanding of and propogation of 'good'.
(iv) With that caveat, however, comes support for a basic set of social rules for the propogation of possibly competing ideas of the 'good' - a bare minimum set of liberal standards.
(v) Those include: not killing people who object to your rule, not using torture to stop people objecting to your rule, not oppressing the masses and using force to keep them under your rule - that sort of wishy-washy liberalism.
(vi) That's why it's right, in at least some circumstances, to impose democracy.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
09:08 / 16.04.03
(iv) With that caveat, however, comes support for a basic set of social rules for the propogation of possibly competing ideas of the 'good' - a bare minimum set of liberal standards.
(v) Those include: not killing people who object to your rule, not using torture to stop people objecting to your rule, not oppressing the masses and using force to keep them under your rule - that sort of wishy-washy liberalism.
(vi) That's why it's right, in at least some circumstances, to impose democracy.

But that assumes that democratic regimes do not do any of the things you mention in number (v). They may indeed be less likely to, but for example the US is currently pressing for the right to use torture against people opposed to it, and many democratic nations have used force to quell outbursts of popular dissent - the miners' strike, the poll tax riots, the Peterloo massacre...certainly a democratic state is on average apparently less likely to abuse human rights so flagrantly, but is that because democracies tend to be older, better-established and richer nations, or is (b) a result of (a)? Israel, to choose a contentious example, has some pretty dubious methods and yet is a democratic nation.

I think one interesting thing that's happening here is the assumption that democracy is inarguably the best possible mode of government for the protection of a nation's people, and it follows from that that the only real question is whether interference in another state's affairs in the interests of that state's non-ruling population is justified.

Or, to put it another way, there's always the lurking question cui bono? To take a fortunately historically distant example, the Athenians in the 5th century used to install democracies in the governments of any city -state they defeated. Were they doing this for the good fo the common peopel of those countries? Well, after a fashion, yes. But they were also doing it fro the good fo the democratic faction, whom they felt more confident would support them, and in the interests of removing vetsed interests and vested power structures with whom they had previosuly been at war. One could argue that the democratic element of the resulting government was a by-product.

To put it another way, is it possible to sound out the actual will of the people on this one? Or to set in place from outside a process of political reconstruction that does not in any way reflect the interests or the beliefs of those creating the system? How do you go about finding the clear glass to look through?
 
 
Leap
09:12 / 16.04.03
There are a few ‘commons’ that apply to all adult humanity:

We are personal beings – our nature is to be self-managing rather than puppets / drones and to be personally directly involved in the things that make us human (rather than delegating such to others - share rather than delegate).

We are social beings – it is our nature to be social and sociable (although sometimes we need time alone, that is a situation that forms the minority in our make up rather than the majority).

We are multifaceted beings – to obsess/specialise in a tight focus area is dehumanising and leads to a lack of sense of perspective and indeed to the great evils humanity have committed.

We are all equally capable of our human nature – egalitarianism is the standard….there is no need/call/room for an elite (except in the relationship between teacher and pupil; and then only so far as is necessary to raise the student to the level of ‘graduation’ (a condition we are all capable of (with the exception of the severely handicapped))).

We are creatures with an awareness of history – we can perceive the fundamental stability and long-term nature of the world (and us as part of that world) and as such favour principles that are in sync with that understanding and that of our own nature as seen above (social and personal), namely: reliability, honesty and a desire to ‘get along’.

When we deny the centrality of these things, in the name of whatever cause, we deny the reality of who we are…replacing the personal with the ‘interfered with’, the social with the ‘de-intimate-ed’, the multifaceted/generalised with the specialised, egalitarianism with elitism and the stable with the fragile. They should only be ‘ignored’ in the rare case that the person we are interfering with (!!!) does not recognise them, and then they should only be ‘ignored’ in as much as is necessary to make them central again (in a similar way that children, in their ignorance, should not be granted them fully until they are capable of holding to them).
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
09:23 / 16.04.03
Coudl you make that relevant to the thread topic? You're skipping a step if you assume that democracy is ipso facto the best way to treat humans as all of these things, before we even get onto the logic of force in implementing democracy.
 
 
Leap
09:39 / 16.04.03
Democracy is treated as a way of living everyday life, when in fact personal control (without interference) is best for that (with democracy limited to those rare events when all need to come to a conclusion on common events).

I am pro 90% anarchy/ 10% democracy Anardemocracy
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
09:50 / 16.04.03
So the state should interefere with the action of the individual as little as possible, and since democracy does do that then it is the best possible system? OK, that makes a degree of sense - and then, logically, if you can reach a government system where the state interferes not at all, beyond providing a financial structure (whatevcer that may be), welfare, the defence of the realm and so on, or where that is all dealt with an a personal, "social" level, then so much the better? Again, sounds good. And, logically, an oppressive dictatorship which limits people's rights to assembly, association and so on would therefore be bad, as in fact would be an oppressive democracy, in which people without the majority were oppressed (one might look at, say, the protections Muslims are given by the democratic government of India, or the MDC by the notionally democratically elected Zanu-PF party in Zimbabwe).

But that doesn't tie in to the actual question being asked, which is whether imposing democracy (or as has been seen in the last week or so in the place we shall not discuss, the very different sort of anarchy where hospitals and museums get looted) by force is a) jusitfied, and b) justified in terms of the ends or the means?
 
 
Quantum
09:57 / 16.04.03
I don't believe it's right to forcibly change a regime you don't like, to democracy or any other system.
I'd like to reiterate Haus's earlier point that many people equate Democracy with liberalism, conserving human rights etc. which is a fallacy. I personally am against democracy but (of course) am for the support of human rights etc. Don't conflate the political system with the ethical system. (I hope conflate is the right word!)
 
 
Leap
10:04 / 16.04.03
“But that doesn't tie in to the actual question being asked, which is whether imposing democracy (or as has been seen in the last week or so in the place we shall not discuss, the very different sort of anarchy where hospitals and museums get looted) by force is a) justified, and b) justified in terms of the ends or the means?”

The place that shall not be named [except to say that it is a wreck ] is a good (!) example of unprincipled anarchy (the anarchy that comes with neither principles nor govt)……………

Enforcement can only be justified in so far as it is directed towards the principles I listed above [now you see why I listed them ]. It is legitimate to use force as means to a good end so long as that force is indeed directed towards and likely to bring about such an end! The problem with Ir…ooops almost named it…. is that we are unsure as to the ends force is being used for (ok we are fairly certain it is to open up new markets for American business and give count Dooku, oops again, I mean Bushbabies potential assault on Iran and Syria a good push-off point).

Putting forward democratic interference in everyone’s life (rather than making principled anarchy the norm and democracy the exception … for exceptional events) is not a sound reason for force, and so its use is not legitimate…………….swapping one dictator x miles away for x dictators 1 mile away is not a good reason for force – a dictatorship is a dictatorship regardless of the number of dictators.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
15:20 / 16.04.03
So, intervention in another country's political system is only justified if it leads to the sort of government you, Leap, approve of?

Oh.........Kay.
 
 
Rev. Orr
18:12 / 16.04.03
To be even handed, that is the prevailing viewpoint of the most powerful nations. They may disagree over whose manifesto to ram down the throats of the people who 'just don't get it', but the principle is the same.

The danger lies in the thought process: 'System x is good. System x maximises personal benefits to all citizens under it. This is what we good for them. Forcing them to adopt System x will save them. We must enforce System x.'

Once any political system is seen in moral terms, an external government can see it (genuinely or cynically) as an imperative, duty or justifiable course of action to impose these beliefs on others. The fact that, at present, one nation has the power to enforce this urge unilaterally merely bring this to a head. What is the difference between this faith in democracy and the underlying drive towards universal adoption that has been the foundation of US foreign policy since the Truman doctrine, and the Crusades, the expulsion of the Moors and Jews from Spain, the foundation of the Internationale or the invasion of Palastine by Joshua? All that has been altered is the substitution of a faith in a political process or madel for faith in a religion or deity.
 
 
Linus Dunce
23:12 / 16.04.03
All that has been altered is the substitution of a faith in a political process or madel for faith in a religion or deity.

But don't you have to kind of ignore certain inductive facts to come to this conclusion? There are problems even bigger than Churchill would admit, but no leader of a liberal democracy has ever killed as many of his own and others as Stalin.

As for an answer to the question, one could argue that the US civil war, despite its major causes and its limited success, was a justifiable imposition of democracy. And you know, life in Europe is a lot more relaxed since we persuaded Germany to play the game too.
 
 
Kit-Cat Club
23:16 / 16.04.03
Yeah, but Germany was a democracy when Hitler became chancellor. He wasn't elected as such, it's true, but that just goes to show that the exigencies of managing regimes can be just as destructive in democracies as they can in other types of regime.
 
 
Linus Dunce
23:21 / 16.04.03
So Hitler wasn't elected ... but Germany was a democracy. :-)

And he didn't kill anywhere near as many as Uncle Joe.

What about the US civil war then?
 
 
Kit-Cat Club
23:33 / 16.04.03
Oh, he was elected all right, just not as chancellor. They had a proportional representation system, which at the beginning of 1933 had resulted in a Reichstag without a clear majority (the Nazis weren't even the biggest party, IIRC, which I may well not). There was some problem in forming a government from the various parties and their leaders - I think perhaps one administration had already broken down - and a behind-the-doors cabal shoved Hitler in as chancellor and head of the government because they thought he'd be easy to control (hollow laughter). Lots of governments have to form coalitions - it happens reasonably often in Israel, for example, and used to happen here before the two-party system solidified - Hitler was a bit of an unquantifiable factor, as no one took him very seriously despite reasonable public support. You may say that the installation of someone not elected by a majority as leader of the government is undemocratic, but look at the Supreme Court decision to install Bush... I'm just saying that democracies aren't inherently protected from cabals, manipulation, bloodthirsty leaders, etc.
 
 
Kit-Cat Club
23:36 / 16.04.03
Don't know enough about the American Civil War, sorry old chap... someone else will have an opinion though
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
00:24 / 17.04.03
Well, the other thing is - give it time. "Liberal democracy", if we assume by that a parliamentary democracy, universal suffrage, one man one vote, blah blah Weimarcakes, has existed for a bit under a century in a reasonably small number of places across the world, for about half of which one of the greatest democracies in the world has been one-half of a nuclear double act under which the entire population of the Earth was in fear of obliteration.

As for the Nazis - one might argue that democracy was undone by a set of unfortunate circumstances there. Support for the Nazis was *falling* - Hitler had lost in a challenge for the presidency to Hindenburg in 1932, although with a strong showing. The November 1932 elections say the Nazis lose 24 or so seats in the Reichstag, altohugh, begging Kit-Cat's indulgence, I think they were still the largest single party. Nonetheless, von Papen's chancellorship could stil pass laws and the democracy was still functioning, just about, until support for von Papen and his Centre Party started to crumble further and the army lost confidence in v.P. General von Schleicher (sp?) was appointed to deal with that, but he had no power base and lasted a couple of months before Hitler was left as the last remaining option. The democracy worked as hard as it could to ride out Hitler, but the economic crisis in Germany, along with the weaknesses of a system designed to represent every opinion fairly, and thus letting in Nazis in the first place who used spoiling tactics to undermine the authority of the Reichstag, ultimately did for it.

And the cause of the economic crisis? Most directly, probably the insistence in 1929 that Germany began repayments immediately on the loans of the Dawes and Young plans. That is, the democratic nation of the United States of America did for the Weimar Republic it had previously bankrolled. Stick in that both Germany and Russia were (albeit ephemerally in the case of Russia) democratic states, and the argument for democracy as the most stable and naughties-proof system, the most intrinsically right system, seems not necessarily as obvious as it may seem to us in the democratic nations. Not to mention that Spain and Portugal did OK without democracies in the post-war period...
 
 
Rev. Orr
00:56 / 17.04.03
the argument for democracy as the most stable and naughties-proof system, the most intrinsically right system, seems not necessarily as obvious as it may seem to us in the democratic nations

I'm not trying to back-seat mod here, but isn't this a different question? I thought we were skipping over the bit where Clarissa explains why democracy is da bomb and querying whether it's imposition is justified. I have great reservations about the system, but even if we were to assume for the sake of argument that it was all for the best in this best of all possible regimes, I remain unconvinced that an outside nation can justify imposing by force the replacement of any other system of government in another sovereign state.

one could argue that the US civil war, despite its major causes and its limited success, was a justifiable imposition of democracy

I haven't looked closely at American history prior to the ante-bellum period, but my hazy picture of the war of Independance fails to include an external power ousting the British and forcing the colonials to accept democracy against their will. Citizens of a nation (or part of a nation) choosing their own system of government runs counter to the option of imposing our values on others. I'm not criticising the spread of democratic regimes or even their creation through violence, for me, that's a whole 'nother thang. It's a question of internal/ external forces; self-determination versus imperialist notions of 'doing what's best for the benighted savages'. I fail to see how a group of terrorists winning their independance from a larger nation and selecting a limited federal democracy as their government of choice is comparable to TWAT forces razing a sovereign state to rubble and sand in order to save a foreign people from an admitttedly despiccable regime.

To change tack slightly, here in the UK we have an unelected head of state who refuses to relinquish power to tally with a US-style democracy model. Over yonder in the real world we aren't next on George's hit list, but in theory, would he be justified in using the same tactics to remove the current tenants of Buckingham Palace?
 
 
Leap
08:51 / 17.04.03
Haus –

So, intervention in another country's political system is only justified if it leads to the sort of government you, Leap, approve of?

Oh.........Kay.

Is your babel fish faulty or are you just not getting a clear signal on whatever planet you are on?

Yes Haus, it is called standing up for what you believe in rather than taking the cross-your-fingers-and-hope approach; but then as my weapon of choice is the pen rather than the sword…… Of course I would like to hear what you think is so bad about the ‘system’ I posted above (or is that asking a little too much)?

Orr –

“To change tack slightly, here in the UK we have an unelected head of state who refuses to relinquish power to tally with a US-style democracy model. Over yonder in the real world we aren't next on George's hit list, but in theory, would he be justified in using the same tactics to remove the current tenants of Buckingham Palace?”

Now there IS a thought
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
09:20 / 17.04.03
There is, presumably, a difference between standing up for what you believe in and invading another country for what you believe in, toppling the leadership of that country for what you believe and imposing a new system of government on the population of that foreign country for what you believe in. This is the kind of strange distinction we make on my planet, Planet Ounceofsensia.

You have not advanced a system, you have advanced a set of vague "we, the people, believe that puppies are lovely" precepts, and the critique of your magic system of joy is not the topic under discussion. The topic under discussion is whether it is justifiable to impose democracy on other nations. Further threadrot, including but not limited to ad hominem attacks, will not be received kindly in the Head Shop.

To look at it another way, if one believes that military action against another country is justified in the context of imposing democracy, because in doing so one is "standing up for one's beliefs", then one cannot logically criticise, say, somebody invading the country next door and imposing a dictatorship friendly to their own government, because they are standing up for their beliefs that that would be in the best interests of the country in question, as it would now have a faithful ally and trade partner in their neighbour, and because dictatorship has been proven by history to be the most stable, long-term form of government. *Unless* we are assuming that democracy has some transcendent moral or other character or quality that makes it inherently better in absolute terms than other systems, and thus makes it a moral or other obligation to impose it.
 
 
Leap
10:56 / 17.04.03
Ok, I will try to keep it simple as you insist on reading whatever you wish in whatever I post:

Military action is only EVER justified against a clear and present MILITARY threat. The use of force as a means of choice denies the fundamental dignity of humanity to be directed by education (with evil arising through mistake / ignorance).

That said, argument and education to attempt to change the mind of others is not simply allowed but is required!

Simple enough.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
11:31 / 17.04.03
Ah....so when you said

Enforcement can only be justified in so far as it is directed towards the principles I listed above [now you see why I listed them ]. It is legitimate to use force as means to a good end so long as that force is indeed directed towards and likely to bring about such an end!

You were incorrect? In fact enforcement can only be justified when there is a present military threat to oneself?

Excellent. But you would then believe, after force has been used to remove that military threat, that a system fostering your principles *should* be set up, because it is justified to alter a conquered country's consitutional setup in the interests of "better government", or that it *should not* be set up, as that would be averse to the dignity of man. Note: insisting that the education system is change counts as an imposition.
 
 
Leap
11:56 / 17.04.03
Haus –

When I said:

Enforcement can only be justified in so far as it is directed towards the principles I listed above [now you see why I listed them ]. It is legitimate to use force as means to a good end so long as that force is indeed directed towards and likely to bring about such an end!

I clearly referenced the principles I had previously posted. These include the respect of privacy and self-restraint. However when a country offers a clear and present military threat force is legitimate.

In fact enforcement can only be justified when there is a present military threat to oneself?

Correct.

Excellent. But you would then believe, after force has been used to remove that military threat, that a system fostering your principles *should* be set up, because it is justified to alter a conquered country's constitutional setup in the interests of "better government", or that it *should not* be set up, as that would be averse to the dignity of man. Note: insisting that the education system is change counts as an imposition.

Yes. There are minimum standards to freedom (it is not freedom at any cost). Those minimum standards are the centrality of dignity. By dignity I mean:
- A society built upon Privacy not Supervision
- A society built upon Self-restraint (born of education and a sense of perspective) not Behavioural Enforcement
- A society built on Egalitarianism (believing that the vast majority of people have the capability for competence – making ‘competence’ the standard) not Elitism (belief that ‘mere’ competence is insufficient but that ‘exceptional’ is the standard)
- The holding to Vigilance (defending the dignity of others and self by neither abusing others nor allowing yourself to be abused) rather than promoting slopey shouldered sleepiness.
= conforming to our nature as personal, social, multifaceted, egalitarian, historically aware beings.

If they refuse to accept these then we leave them to it and kick their arses again if/when they again pose a military threat (again offering them the above afterwards)…and so on until they accept.
 
 
grant
14:31 / 17.04.03
What about the US civil war then?

In some ways, the US Civil War was about a breakdown of democracy; a little less than half of the participants in the US democracy decided to leave, because a slight majority was telling them to do things they didn't want to do. They formed their own democracy, based on a similar structure, with their own president (former US Senator & Cabinet member Jefferson Davis - whose father and uncles all fought in the Revolutionary War, a similar breakaway movement*) and two representative bodies for "co-equal states" framed in their Constitution.

The reason for the split really depends on who you ask. There are still some living (though not many) who refer to the Civil War as the "War of Northern Aggression." And my favorite bit of trivia challenges the popular view that the war was about slavery, slavery, and nothing but slavery: Confederate General Lee freed his slaves before the Civil War. Union General Ulysses S. Grant still owned slaves at the end of the war. The Emancipation Proclamation freed slaves... in the South. Keep 'em in Kansas, though, and you could do what you like.

The first black fighters in the Civil War were also fighting on the Confederate side - they'd worked *really hard* to buy their freedom and set aside enough land to farm, and weren't about to have a "liberating army" march in and redistribute it. The actual number of "Blacks in Gray" is a matter of debate to this day. As a fighting force, they might not have been *significant*, but it's hard to deny that they existed. (And the end-game attempts to use slaves as soldiers isn't exactly the same thing.)

But the victorious force makes the history - and there's no denying that the South's economy relied on slavery to keep going, and that there was a long cultural heritage of racism. Very easy to amplify that and suppress the stuff that doesn't quite fit.

So now, it's easy to say that the democracy that was "truer" (with representation for everyone) won out against a less-true democracy (which was really just a totalitarian splinter group), it's not altogether accurate.

And the thing is, this issue is what really haunted the leaders on both sides, generals and politicians alike: Is this Civil War evidence that democracy cannot work? (Bear in mind, the US is less than 100 years old at this point.)

It's still a good question, although subsequent years have taken some of the sting out of it.

It seems like the presidents with the greatest cults of personality - Lincoln and Kennedy - both had to grapple with what it means to be *truly* democratic, with the Civil War and the civil rights struggles respectively.

-----------
* from the linked biography, worth reading in its entirety: The failure of his government to establish itself in permanency by the power of its armies will not be accepted as evidence against his own right to be reverenced, except by such persons as those who regard the triumphs of superior over inferior force as decisive of merit. Such persons judge men and their causes by an exploded savage theory which subjected the weak to the strong. The feudal system, Russian serfdom, and African slavery in the beginning of the horrible slave trade, rested on this basis. Men divested of that prejudice which constricts the reason will not decry the President of the Confederacy because it failed. Not the Southern people alone, but intelligent men of the finer mould of thought and feeling among all nations, are gratified by the cessation of the vituperous language of twenty-five years ago, with which even men of eminence as well as the lower sort declaimed against the exalted man who in public service for a like period of twenty-five years, filling positions in war and peace of great public trust, did not in the least degree betray the confidence which his people had reposed in him.
 
 
Simplist
17:05 / 17.04.03
Yeah, but Germany was a democracy when Hitler became chancellor. He wasn't elected as such, it's true, but that just goes to show that the exigencies of managing regimes can be just as destructive in democracies as they can in other types of regime.

This is the dynamic I referred to earlier when I mentioned social traditions and cultural expectations. German culture at that time had no democratic tradition to draw on, thus Hitler's gradual consolidation of greater and greater power went largely unchallenged by a citizenry that wasn't accustomed to challenging its leadership. OTOH, no American or British leader could pull that off at this point, as the citizenry of those countries are accustomed to reasonably accountable government, and simply wouldn't go along with it--nor would the military by and large be willing to smack the citizens down Tiannamen Square-style to force them to. So even if a "moral" case can be made for it, the imposition of democracy on a population more accustomed to dictatorship, though, will always be a dicey proposition at best, unless the imposing power is willing to stick around for a generation or two to insure that regular (and non-corrupt) elections are held, press freedom is not significantly impaired, and so on. And of course even this implies a degree of benevolence and enlightened behavior on the part of the occupying power that's probably highly unrealistic to expect of any country that would be willing to be an occupying power in the first place.
 
 
Linus Dunce
17:20 / 17.04.03
Well, yes, the US civil war was a simplistic example, but as you say, some more people did eventually get the vote. That was my point, and that's why I qualified it.

Bush has more right to be in office than Hitler did. Many people voted for Bush, and the final result was decided in a recognised court. The constitution was bent like buggery, but not actually broken.

liberal democracy ... has existed for a bit under a century

Well, yes, if you use votes for women as your waypoint. But that's a whole 'nother thang too.

democracy as the most stable and naughties-proof system, the most intrinsically right system

But no one's arguing that it's right ... just the least wrong.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
11:52 / 21.04.03
People are arguing that democracy is *universally* the best system to be imposed on another nation (or, in Leap's case, that anarchodemocracy is the best system not to be etc), which suggests that there is a transcendent rightness to democracy that gives democratic nations the greatest possible hope of stability, and specifically you are saying that a western model of liberal democracy (and if you want to define liberal democracy, we can work out when it started - I would have thought universal sufferage would be a pretty terminus ante/post quem, but we could go back to Chartism, say) is the best thing for a nation to have in terms of its stability and its likelihood of going to war. The obvious examples of this thesis being oversimplified in Europe itself, whence comes your Hitler thesis, come from Spain and Portugal, and in a different way Yugoslavia. I think you need to work on some of your precepts, is all.
 
 
Linus Dunce
12:06 / 21.04.03
Run that last bit by me again. Spain, Portugal and Yugoslavia. :-)
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
12:28 / 21.04.03
Well, Spain and Portugal had stable, functional dictatorships for a fair amount of time after the Second World War, and Yugoslavia was held together by the Dictator Tito in a way that democratic systems failed to replicate, although the number of factors in play there makes it a poor example for any point, really. I'd suggest sticking with Spain and Portugal. You might also want to take a look at the processes of the democracies in Italy and Greece, and also at how the post-WW2 German democracy succeeded where the post-WW1 democracy failed - why was that?
 
 
Linus Dunce
14:27 / 21.04.03
So, for example, Franco's rule was a good thing ...

Sorry, still not with you. Unless we are arguing that stability alone is the measure of the value of a system. Which I'm not.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
14:36 / 21.04.03
You are arguing that "number of own citizens killed" and "number of citizens of other nations killed in acts of war" are the two yardsticks of successful government, which I have abbreviated to "stability":

....no leader of a liberal democracy has ever killed as many of his own and others as Stalin.

...And you know, life in Europe is a lot more relaxed since we persuaded Germany to play the game too.

In which terms, Salazar in Portugal and Franco in Spain, by scrupulously avoiding loss of their own citizen's lives through WW2 and subsequently, and not attacking other states and thus killing large numbers of other nationals, oversaw two of the most successful states of the 20th Century.

If you'd like to expand a bit on what defines a successful state, and what constitutes a liberal democracy, and how the one maps onto the other, then go for it.
 
  

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