Much of this is gleaned from my latest Great Courses series - this time it's Professor Robert Kane's 'Quest for Meaning: Values, Ethics, and the Modern Experience'.
Plato in The Republic had various criticisms of democracy – and what’s interesting about his predictions is, well, that they all seem to have come true.
So, he said that leaders in a democracy would be more concerned about popularity than statesmanship: they’d want to appeal to the people’s emotions, they’d not want to impose on the people any kind of sacrifice (taxation, lockdown, conscription, responsibilities and duties) and so could risk harm either in the present or the future for these failings. They’d be more inclined to do what they thought the people wanted than what, all things considered, with all the information that they had and looking into the future, they, the democratically elected politicians, considered to be the best course of action. Overall, they’d focus on short term goals with neat, accountable outcomes.
Plato also argued that debate in democratic politics would become superficial and focus more on images, less on substantive issues. He had a rather elitist view of the masses, for sure, but if we consider that we are all working hard to earn a living and get through our lives, it’s unlikely that we'd want to read through the thousands of pages of information and background that are required to understand the complexities of any political decision. Thus we tend to ‘go with our gut’ or to be swayed by propaganda, clever story telling and the like. He also thought that the electorate would be more concerned with the candidate’s presentation than with her substance or the depth of her understanding, commitment and integrity.
He said that democracies provided fertile ground for ‘sophists’ – in his day these were itinerant teachers who trained the art of rhetoric, rather than the search for wisdom. We might see them as spin doctors. Because people’s interests would be manipulated by these sophists, Plato thought there would be unrestrained growth and competing special interests seeking to manipulate public opinion to fulfill private desires rather than the public good. People would be more concerned with the look of everything – and so would eat poorly as they’d choose a shiny pesticide grown apple rather than a vitamin rich organic one.
And it goes on - people would gradually lose a sense of shared values. Everything would be rooted in the individual and in private needs, projects and desires, with fewer willing to sacrifice time, money or energy for the common good. There would be a profusion of fads and fashions that would capture the public attention and then fade away. These fads would fill the void left by lost value and the corroded communal spirit.
Plato therefore predicted, social disorder, increased crime, distrust of authority and government and a greater gap between the generations, since young people would want to do their own thing and would not share values with their elders.
Plato saw the only viable state as governed by philosopher kings (lovers of wisdom), or, to put it another way, as my dad always says, a benign dictator.
The problem with this is that it is authoritarian. The public have no say; the dictator is not accountable. Plato had this whole education process for his philosopher kings (or queens), but what do we have? Eton and Oxford? Surely not – that’s where half our current lot hale from.
Besides, could we really turn the clock back and not value individual freedoms and the democratic ideal? I don’t think so – nor would I want to. And yet, it’s hard to feel that what we have ain’t broke.
Political theorists have suggested ways to make democracy ‘better’, to help develop more trust in it.
The key issue seems to be the unbridgeable gulf between on the one hand the electorate’s sense of distance from decision-making and decision-makers and on the other the public’s own disinclination to address the substantive issues that should be the backdrop to rational and appropriate decision-making. We condemn the technocrats and the elites, but we for our part would just choose according to superficial feelings and existing beliefs that might have no evidential framework or considered reasoning and might also be limited by our own prejudices. This is another divide: the politician has to see us as all with the value of one and none with greater value than one, whatever our class, creed or skin colour; but we have natural inclinations to favour our own interests and those of the people dearest to us.
Now, as I have said before, to the extent that love and affection, that the time and energy we invest in our own projects are in large part what makes life meaningful to us, it is morally neutral that this should be the perspective that we hold for our own lives, so long as we are not harming the interests or dignity of others through our pursuits. That we care for our well-being and the well-being of those close to us is perfectly reasonable and indeed appropriate in day-to-day living. Further, for such liberty to be rooted in the facticity and transcendence, and being for others (though in a rather more empathic and less paranoid way than Sartre envisions), of our own lives may well be what enables artists, creatives and so on to bring forth objects and ideas for which we can all be grateful. But this personal perspective disables us from making decisions for the collective – which is why we have elected representatives to do that for us and to take a broader perspective: for their constituency in some situations and for their nation in others. That they may be side-tracked by ‘funders’ and by ‘party interests’ or indeed by their own career interests is unfortunate and checks and balances are required.
It is also unfortunate that big money, big data, foreign agents and manipulative campaigning corrode the democratic process.
All that of course demands close and stringent attention and policing, but the particular issue that I want to address is how to bring the public closer to the process without turning the decision-making into just another form of persuasion by propaganda (as can happen during a referendum, for example: in the UK very few of us had any idea really what Brexit or Remain entailed).
One method, which I have mentioned before – but I can't recall where – is a form of direct democracy pioneered by James Fishkin. He gathers a representative sample of the populace, gives them the information and allows them to deliberate on a matter.
This quote is taken from the Open Democracy website, to help clarify how 'deliberative assemblies' work:
Fishkin is not a political scientist for nothing, and he prepares the ground for the assemblies with a scrupulous regard so that those who take part are properly representative of the population as a whole; are fully and impartially briefed on the issues for discussion; have genuine opportunities to hear and question a variety of experts; and are enabled to express their views and participate with others in exchanging views before coming to joint conclusions. Those conclusions, it is hoped, can then reasonably be taken to be representative of the whole population if everyone experienced the same quality of preparation and debate. The political problem of course is that the wider public will not necessarily accept the conclusions, or not enough of them will (as in British Columbia’s review of electoral reform).
Not a quick or immediate fix for trust – but surely we can’t stop trying.
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