Equality by lot

1. There would be less susceptibility to emotional proposals too motivated by fear or hope. Proxy electorates, which are specialized (expert on some topic), seasoned (from years of semi-monthly oversight sessions), and “select” (sifted upward through multiple ballotteries) at the state and national levels, would have more information, and would have acquired greater insight through discussion and debate. So they would more realistically assess what is possible (including adventurous proposals that just might work but affront conventional wisdom) and be less likely to divert down false trails and garden paths, and to ignore possible second-order effects. Their lesser credulity would insulate them from panics and propaganda. Their greater experience would simultaneously deliver aspiring politicians from the temptation to take advantage of their immaturity—of the virtual standing invitation that big-electorate, big-arena voters present to be played for Suckers. This inbuilt temptation of mass susceptibility eternally fuels the demonic dynamic—the co-dependent tragedy and farce—of DeMockery. (Its hidden “root,” to repeat, is its seemingly righteous, too-“wide,” electorate.)

2. Demiocracy’s decentralization would make a putsch more difficult, especially if it includes decentralization of the executive branch. (I.e., substantial independence of the executive departments from the chief executive, via PE-election of their heads.) Thus making tyranny less likely, a big concern of the Founders. Also insulating the government from a potty (barmy) POTUS. (“There is, of course, no such thing as a harmlessly mad emperor.” —Gore Vidal, Julian, Ch. 19.)

3. Demiocracy would more believably encompass the general will than DeMockery, thereby safeguarding democracy by pre-empting any would-be Caesar’s claim to embody general-will legitimacy.

4. Less Electoral Fraud. There would be less chance of electoral fraud in a small electorate with a known membership and only one ballot box; and recounts and, if necessary, revotes using a different counting procedure, would be easy to do. This is especially important in countries lacking good mass-election oversight.

5. The Public’s full preferences would be represented. The existence of independently elected, topic-focused Demi-legislatures would enable the public to express its topical policy preferences in detail. If it favors a “leftist” policy on one topic and a “right-wing” policy on another, as often happens, it will have the ability to do so. This is a Good Thing, period. This can’t happen with current omni-topic legislatures, where the majority party can pass partisan legislation on all topics. This rarely matches what the public wants, even after one party wins a landslide victory.

… few of us are wholly liberal or wholly conservative. … Rather, we draw some of our opinions from one side and some from the other. —Leland Baldwin, Reframing the Constitution, 1972, 75.

6. Blocks of single-issue voters would lose their disproportionate, undemocratic leverage. (Prohibition was put through by a single-issue block.) They will no longer be able to warp the overall political process by, for example, threatening to boycott an election or to run a third-party campaign. And members of such blocks would no longer be trapped into supporting whichever party caters to their demand, although its position on other issues mightn’t be to their liking. For that matter, the entire public would not be saddled with a governing party that would not have won but for its appeasement of system-“playing” extremists.

Why does Prohibition remain the law of the land? … part of the answer lies in the curious power that fanatical minorities have in American politics—a power that enables them, by playing upon the weaknesses of the two great parties, to overcome their lack of votes. —H.L. Mencken, in A Mencken Crestomathy, 1949, 415.

7. Diffuse majority interests would be better able to coalesce and oppose concentrated factions. John Burnheim writes (Is Democracy Possible?, 1985, 194):

It may well be the case that a party obtains power by buying the votes of a number of diverse minorities, and proceeds to enact a package of measures that are contrary to a significant number of majority interests. This may well be possible because the majority interest is too widely diffused to organize effectively.

The ability of factions to protect their ineffective-or-worse pet programs has led to a situation called “demosclerosis.”

8. Cheap (Pelf-Free) Political Campaigns. Campaigning would be almost free. Candidates would need only web access (which can be obtained in public libraries, if a person lacks a home computer). This would eliminate a big Pelf-privilege, making the system more democratic.

To the extent that the resources needed to influence people are unequally distributed, the capacity to make personal choices effective is unequally distributed. —Robert Dahl, After the Revolution?, 1970, 105-06.

As it is now, there are four parts to any campaign. The candidate, the issues of the candidate, the campaign organization, and the money to fund the organization. Without the money you can forget the other three. —former Speaker of the House Tip O’Neill.

9. Donors Dethroned. Candidates who don’t need campaign donations don’t need campaign donors either. Donors are usually Partisans or Pressure groups who typically want some quid for their quo. And that quid is often not entirely, or even partially, in the public interest. So eliminating their power helps to “realize” democracy.

Of course, the day may come when we’ll reject the money of the rich as tainted, but it hadn’t come when I left Tammany Hall at 11:25 A.M. today. —George W. Plunkitt, Plunkitt of Tammany Hall, 1905, p. 73.

10. Political Parties Dethroned. Candidates would no longer need their endorsement in order to win an election. This would open up candidacy to the substantial share of the public who are not party loyalists—and would diminish the incentive to be such a loyalist. This openness to all would be a big step toward a more representative democracy. Under DeMockery, quoth Mencken:

There is no middle ground for men who believe neither in the socialist fol-de-rol nor in the principal enemies of the socialist fol-de-rol—and yet it must be obvious that such men constitute the most intelligent and valuable body of citizens that the nation can boast. —H.L. Mencken, Editorial, American Mercury, 1924.

The near monopoly of American politics by two collusive party syndicates is not one problem among many. It is the first and most fundamental one as well as the wellspring of most of the others. —Walter Karp, Indispensable Enemies: The politics of misrule in America, 1973.

11. A greater variety of political options would be on the electoral “menu,”—e.g., more “third parties”—as a result of easy (cheap) ballot access—and, perhaps, of proportional representation.

Nobody knows what American politics would be like if we had the institutions to facilitate the development of a wider span of political competition. —E.E. Schattschneider, The Semi-Sovereign People: A realist’s view of democracy in America, 1960, p. 72.

… we have the discriminating tolerance today already, and what I want is to redress the balance. … The chance of influencing, in any effective way, this majority is at a price, in dollars, totally out of reach of the radical opposition. —Herbert Marcuse, in Prophetic Politics, 1970, p. 109.

At present city bosses have little trouble, for example, fending off insurgents…. Only by the dint of the most heartbreaking labors can they even make their names known to the urban mass and even then they cannot win the city dwellers trust, for they have no opportunity to do so. —Walter Karp, Indispensable Enemies: The politics of misrule in America, 1973, p. 308.

12. As a result of the above advantage, a greater variety of policies would be pursued across the political landscape, providing more opportunities for unorthodox policies to demonstrate that they will work in practice. There would be more pioneering jurisdictions serving as “laboratories for democracy.” I’m assuming that idiosyncratic persons would have more influence under Demiocracy, hence greater variety. Under DeMockery, on the other hand, “no matter how thin you slice it, it’s still baloney.”

In addition, the variety of policies pursued will increase simply because the small size of Proxy Electorates will increase random variations in their political composition—in other words, there will be more outlier-electorates.

… radio and TV have helped to increase the interest of the public in news, but at the same time, they have undoubtedly strengthened the current trend toward the standardization of ideas for easy assimilation for busy people. — J.A. Corey & H.J. Abraham, Elements of Democratic Government, 1947, 1964, p. 386.

13. There would be less misinformation. False facts and scurrilous rumors would have a short half-life, because they could be corrected quickly, and because the correction would be heard by the entire electorate.

14. Extraneous expertise would be unnecessary. Candidates for a topic-focused Demi-legislature would not need to have a “position” on a plethora of other topics, the way candidates for a current omni-topic legislature must. They needn’t pose as knowledgeable on all their constituency’s concerns, nor employ a staff to fill them in on such matters. They would need only 5% of that knowledge. This would open the door to part-time, amateur candidates who have a deep knowledge of some one topic—in other words, to the 90% of the public that has not interested itself on the whole political spectrum from their youth, unlike most of the political class. This opening up of political careers to Everyman would be a giant step toward real democracy.

In addition, there’d be no need to kowtow to extraneous (outside-the-topic) conventionalities:

Politics unfortunately abounds with shams that must be treated reverently by every politician who would succeed. —J.T. Adams, quoted in Lundberg, Scoundrels All, 1968, p. 135.

15. Extraneous distractions would be eliminated. Demi-legislators could concentrate on their jobs, free of the worries and distractions that afflict today’s “omni” legislators, who are only partially focused on their task. Current politicians have to think about extraneous things—such as how to vote and opine on bills in the omni-legislature.  They also have to worry about press coverage, about pressure groups, about their party’s stance, about potential pelf and the absence of it from donors, and about their mostly low-information voter-base. The task of the Demi-legislator would become a part-time occupation, as it was originally intended to be.

16. Better-Quality Officeholders. Mencken again (he’s so quotable):

The larger the mob, the harder the test. In small areas, before small electorates, a first-rate man occasionally fights his way through, carrying even the mob with him by the force of his personality. But when the field is nationwide, … then all the odds are on the man who is, intrinsically, the most devious and mediocre.” — H.L. Mencken, “Bayard vs. Lionheart,” 1920.

The multitude have often a true instinct for distinguishing an able man, when he has the means of displaying his ability in a fair field before them. —John Stuart Mill, Representative Government, VII, p. 157.

While the natural instincts of democracy induce the people to reject distinguished citizens as their rulers, an instinct no less strong induces able men to retire from the political arena, in which it is difficult to retain their individuality, or to advance without becoming servile. —Tocqueville, in The Viking Book of Aphorisms, p. 315.

… the democratic process may repel most of the men who can make a success at anything else. —Joseph Schumpeter, Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, 1947, p. 290.

Given the whole process of exclusion, laying greater stress on conformity and compromise than on ability and vision, it is no wonder that men like Orestes Brownson and H.L. Mencken asked whether hereditary monarchy has, by sheer accident of birth, produced a more random set of qualifications, a grayer level of mediocrity, than the electoral system has put into the White House. —Gary Wills, Nixon Agonistes, 1971, p. 406-07.

17. A Healthier Legislative Environment. Mencken saith:

A man, remember, is not a being in vacuo; he is the fruit and slave of the environment that bathes him. One cannot enter the House of Commons, the United States Senate, or a prison for felons without becoming, in some measure, a rascal. — H.L. Mencken, In Defense of Women, 1918.

18. There would be more participation by women of all sorts. Political campaigns for a seat in a Demi-legislature would be less stressful (no day-long speaking tours, no ambush-interviews, no bad weather, etc.) and less threatening (no jostlers or hecklers) than current campaigning, because they would mostly be conducted in cyberspace. In-person appearances would be in small meeting rooms mostly free of opportunistic, by-standing hecklers. Few women are “tough cookies” who are unfazed by those nasty attributes of the current campaign gauntlet. So their participation would increase, as it should under a real democracy. Speaking of the campaign trail:

Ever been a candidate? It is like getting married and having your appendix out, while going over Niagara Falls in a barrel. —Robert Heinlein, Expanded Universe, p. 254.

19. There would be more participation by working women. Working women who want to change careers would find a part-time, limited-scope, political career congenial. These would include women who feel burned-out and/or unfulfilled after clawing their way up to, or through, some glass ceiling, and who want an alternative. Some young women would simply skip all that and make this their career choice in the first place.

20. There would be more participation by mothers. Part-time, limited-involvement, web-sited Demi-legislatures would especially suit mothers, who have erratic demands on their time that would prevent them from participating in a full-time, physically present, omni-topic legislature. This will enable the real participation of a substantial (10%?) segment of the population that is currently implicitly excluded. Another win for real democracy.

21. More Participation by Retirees. These “elders” tend to have a seasoned perspective and real-world experience that is needed by legislators and lacking in jejune jackanapes. (I’m 80, BTW, and I know I’m wiser now than I once was.) It is a shame for them to waste their time in golf and gardening.

The years teach much which the days never know. —Emerson 

22. There would be more participation by the disabled. This is another group whose talents shouldn’t go to waste. With officeholding no longer being a full-time, “meatspace” job, many of the disabled would no longer be effectively blocked from a political career.

Filed under: Books, Elections, History, Participation, Proposals, Sortition |