Manfred Belheim
Moaner Lisa
- Joined
- Sep 11, 2009
- Messages
- 8,633
Democracy's not for the people.
Since i have already tripped myself up by sheer blindness:I may be wrong, but as I understand the graph, being above the diagonal line means your trust has increased since when it was first measured (in 1981-1991) and when it was last measured (in 2005-2014) and being below it means it has since decreased.
So Estonia, Belarus and Russia being in different places does not necessarily mean our starting figure was different, although it does not rule that out either.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the post heading said, "Moving BEYOND Democracy." But everything being discussed here is just different countries going up and down and around very familiar territory in well-trodden and well-known political paradigms. I see no mention of virtual legislative government forums, pantiscocracy, technocracy/political meritocracy, responsible libertarianism, automated government, or other political ideas that are currently just theoretical for lack of any nation seriously taking them up.
I don't know. There wasn't, for instance, much left of the Imperial, feudal, aristocratic, Orthodox Christian-dominated, strongly agrarian (and glorifying agrarianism), Cossack-admiring, highly conservative government of the Tsars by 1924 when Lenin passed away.If you play Civilisation, you can just swap your state system, get the immediate properties, and you swap other policies, and you get the immediate properties.
Real life does not only grant you those immediate properties, I think very much that the underlying culture/customs/values/traditions of citizens, civil servants and politicians will always make a hybrid out of that and the formal state system.
Discussing state systems as such, without taking into account how they could and likely will tick in practice, is very theoretical, and imo only good for getting insights in possible mechanisms you already have or can cause.
EDIT:
The (political) makeability of a society is low with high inertia.
And like so often with new laws and regulations, made from a too high belief in makeability, often having counter-productive effects to what you wanted.
As Metatron explained, it was different - while it is possible that level of social trust in USSR was a bit higher than in modern Russia, but the difference between Belorussia and Russia in 80-s seems really weird.I may be wrong, but as I understand the graph, being above the diagonal line means your trust has increased since when it was first measured (in 1981-1991) and when it was last measured (in 2005-2014) and being below it means it has since decreased.
So Estonia, Belarus and Russia being in different places does not necessarily mean our starting figure was different, although it does not rule that out either.
I don't know. There wasn't, for instance, much left of the Imperial, feudal, aristocratic, Orthodox Christian-dominated, strongly agrarian (and glorifying agrarianism), Cossack-admiring, highly conservative government of the Tsars by 1924 when Lenin passed away.
Democracy works just fine. It isn’t going away anytime soon.
So why would anyone want to move "beyond democracy"? Perhaps it is true that non-democracies can do well in some aspects, but I would argue that democracies do better.
Aren't Nordic social democracies happiest countries on the planet? Why fix what isn't broken?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the post heading said, "Moving BEYOND Democracy." But everything being discussed here is just different countries going up and down and around very familiar territory in well-trodden and well-known political paradigms. I see no mention of virtual legislative government forums, pantiscocracy, technocracy/political meritocracy, responsible libertarianism, automated government, or other political ideas that are currently just theoretical for lack of any nation seriously taking them up.
Except for Sweden, which is now all Arabs — when it's not ALSO homogeneously white if course...That can easily be ascribed by critics to the fact that those societies are homogeneous (and white).
1. You seem to believe that the actual companies have power. I think they largely don't. They are largely a plaything of governments. Not even their own ones. You may underappreciate that because your government is not that terribly effective.
2. You are implying that this is something that just comes over people like a biblical plague.
I would contend the general notion... hmm... how do i best put this... that American liberals are hugely arrogant idiotic imbeciles who know nothing about the world and are intellectually deficient to the point where they are unable to perform informed citizenship - just as much as American conservatives - and that this state of affairs in not universal accross the developed "west" but exceptional.
Oh, you know, EIU's Democracy Index, WJP's Rule of Law index, RSF's Freedom of the Press index, Freedom House's Freedom in the World index etc.
Things of that nature.
I'm not sure if you can find satisfactory data, since most of these people have hideous web presences or even market their reports.
All the arguments I hear against workplace democracy would work just as well against democracy in general (everyone would just vote for lower taxes and more gubmint handouts!!!), yet stable democratic states have an extremely good track-record, and states that have moved from extreme unstable situations to better ones have generally done so while constantly increasing government accountability to the will of the people.
Yeah i was alluding to the fact that Lexi et al are angsty about these companies vis a vis their recent elections and are generally concerned that their government has lost regulatory control, while my government b-slaps these companies around like the insolent, small and easily disciplined brats that they are (the companies; my government... too, in other contexts - anyway, you know what i meanHis government built the largest intelligence gathering network and got other people to pay for it and produce a profit! Starts with a G. I don't think they are ineffective at all.
Is Portugal in any immediate danger to elect a joke as whatever office you people have?Don't underestimate how much they have already exported their culture around the world. All empires do. But you are right in that there is no need to despair: pagues come and go, their preys develop immunity over time.
Yeah, sure you can argue that they are unreliable for small changes or comparisons of close data points.Better that pulling out "my personal feelings about..." but still unsatisfactory because these people all have agendas too.
Euro. Refugees. Welcome to my world.(I don't think Sweden actually exists in the global perception anymore. It has already been supplanted by whatever pet-idea one group or another is currently peddling.)
Is Portugal in any immediate danger to elect a joke as whatever office you people have?
Is there a near coplete breakdown in public discourse and efficacy of the 4th estate?
Are moral panics in Portugal frequent, recurring, increasingly unhinged and beginning to turn violent?
No?
Then maybe this exporting business is overrated in this case.
Even though most democracies are flawed, it's the best system of governance we've figured out so far, that doesn't completely ignore the needs of the citizenry.
Yeah i was alluding to the fact that Lexi et al are angsty about these companies vis a vis their recent elections
Fair enough.Lexi finds attempts (mostly by uncritical Clinton-supporting types) to blame the 2016 election results on fake news on facebook laughable. Lexi is "angsty" about these companies for reasons that are much more far-reaching than the results of one election.
When it is about the usual indicators to measure the quality of life in countries, the Nordic democracies score indeed high.
Striking thereby is that the Nordic countries have all a very low masculinity on the Heert Hofstede cultural dimensions, compared to most other countries.
Correlation ofc no causality
But empathy for your fellow citizen does matter.
Trudeau said yesterday:
"Teaching boys to be feminists gives them a sense of justice and empathy and helps them “escape the pressure to be a particular kind of masculine” that is damaging to men and those around them, Trudeau writes. “I want them to be comfortable being themselves, and being feminists – who stand up for what’s right, and who can look themselves in the eye with pride.”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...ay-on-raising-feminist-sons-all-of-us-benefit
To be honest, I'm too lazy to dig up statistics here, but I daresay that when measured by whatever positive metric, you'll find democracies at the top of the list.Do elaborate.
Homogeneous and white? I thought that was a bad thing? That diversity is the way to go?That can easily be ascribed by critics to the fact that those societies are homogeneous (and white).