The Mises Community
An online community for fans of Austrian economics and libertarianism, featuring forums, user blogs, and more.
Forums
 »
Economics
 »
Political Theory
 »
Pro's and Con's to a Democratic Hierarchy

Thank you for your participation and interest in the Mises Community. This software platform has seen its day, however, and so is now closed. We are redoing our entire site, so look for some exciting developments by the end of the year. Thank you for your support of Austrian economics, liberty, and peace.

Pro's and Con's to a Democratic Hierarchy

rated by 0 users
This post has 21 Replies | 4 Followers

Top 500 Contributor
Posts 203
Points 5,305
Reply
TelfordUS Posted: Sun, Aug 16 2009 8:21 PM

Hypothetical Situation:

A country has an annual election, where every town elects a commision of a local council. Those local councils vote among themselves to elect a state council, whose councils vote among themselves for a federal council of 1000 representatives (Reichstag). From that, 100 (Bundesrat) are elected out of those 1000, and a president comes out of the 100. This system would resemble a pyramid, where the officials would be elected by people they know personally, instead of voting for someone you don't know or don't agree with.

A radical theory, yes. But it works in theory, and given the right conditions, it could work smoothly, no?

  • | Post Points: 110
Top 50 Contributor
Posts 1,649
Points 28,420
Reply
E. R. Olovetto replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 8:25 PM

Works to dilute individual liberty? OK.

Democracy means the opportunity to be everyone's slave.—Karl Kraus.

  • | Post Points: 20
Top 10 Contributor
Posts 7,105
Points 115,240
ForumsAdministrator
Moderator
SystemAdministrator
Reply
nirgrahamUK replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 8:26 PM

when you say it works do you have my liberty in mind?

Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid

Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring

  • | Post Points: 20
Top 500 Contributor
Posts 203
Points 5,305
Reply
TelfordUS replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 8:37 PM

nirgrahamUK:

when you say it works do you have my liberty in mind?

Yes, the system is supposed to benefit both the individual and the country. In a representative democracy, the individual must be given the opportunity to vote for the officials that will represent them as best as possible. This can be done by electing local officials, for they can represent you better than an aristocrat who doesn't know you or your concerns.

This puts power and importance on the local level, where it should be.

  • | Post Points: 35
Top 10 Contributor
Posts 7,105
Points 115,240
ForumsAdministrator
Moderator
SystemAdministrator
Reply
nirgrahamUK replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 8:41 PM

i dont want somone to be my representative, my advocate in a poltical tussle over how i should be treated politically. i want the END to political tussles. no more politics. the political means are anathema to liberty and justice. in contrast, the economic means are congruent with liberty and justice, and sufficient for my material being as well. that's why i am a libertarian, voluntarist, anarcho-capitalist, or market anarchist. or some other cool sounding name.

Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid

Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring

  • | Post Points: 20
Not Ranked
Male
Posts 12
Points 75
Reply
Luis Ramirez replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 8:49 PM

Please don`t mention "pyramids" too loosely, it sounds too much like Ponzi schemes.

  • | Post Points: 5
Top 25 Contributor
Posts 4,532
Points 84,495
Reply
Stranger replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 8:51 PM

It would create a pyramid of politicians who would have full reign to exploit the realm the closer to the top they got.

If you think politicians elected by the people are bad, what do you think politicians elected by politicians elected by politicians elected by politicians elected by the people would be like?

This plan in no way addresses the principal failure of the electoral process, its lack of accountability. The same people up for elections make the rules on how elections are to be conducted. It would be as if you and I formed a company and agreed that its chief executive could not be fired except when he offered us the choice to, and could not be replaced except by another candidate of his choice. Clearly he would have the incentive to make sure that getting rid of him would be an extremely cumbersome enterprise, and that the alternative candidates would be much worse than he in any case.

The fallacies of intellectual communism, a compilation - On the nature of power

  • | Post Points: 20
Top 25 Contributor
Posts 4,532
Points 84,495
Reply
Stranger replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 8:53 PM

TelfordUS:

Yes, the system is supposed to benefit both the individual and the country. In a representative democracy, the individual must be given the opportunity to vote for the officials that will represent them as best as possible. This can be done by electing local officials, for they can represent you better than an aristocrat who doesn't know you or your concerns.

This puts power and importance on the local level, where it should be.

This would in no way return power to the local level, as the meta-politicians would be no more accountable to their politician-electorate than regular politicians to that people.

The fallacies of intellectual communism, a compilation - On the nature of power

  • | Post Points: 20
Top 500 Contributor
Posts 203
Points 5,305
Reply
TelfordUS replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 8:58 PM

nirgrahamUK:

i dont want somone to be my representative, my advocate in a poltical tussle over how i should be treated politically. i want the END to political tussles. no more politics. the political means are anathema to liberty and justice. in contrast, the economic means are congruent with liberty and justice, and sufficient for my material being as well. that's why i am a libertarian, voluntarist, anarcho-capitalist, or market anarchist. or some other cool sounding name.

I don't like politics or representatives either. I wish i was able to have an equal say in the conditions of my country, instead of voting for people that do. Although anarcho-capitalism promises the most personal freedom and liberty, progression is made quicker when the public is united under a government for security and efficiency. It's our duty as people of that union to make the system represent us as best as possible, my idea is to vote locally so my people's concerns are proportionally met with the rest of the country's.

  • | Post Points: 20
Not Ranked
Male
Posts 12
Points 75
Reply
Luis Ramirez replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 9:03 PM

More checks and balances made up through the law?  Don`t think it`ll work mainly because there`s no fundamental change with the present system. If anything it centralizes power.  If you`re going to have some sort of government, let it be as close and represent as few constituents as possible. Anything else (other than anarchy) won`t solve much.

  • | Post Points: 5
Top 500 Contributor
Posts 203
Points 5,305
Reply
TelfordUS replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 9:03 PM

Stranger:

If you think politicians elected by the people are bad, what do you think politicians elected by politicians elected by politicians elected by politicians elected by the people would be like?

Modern politicians are bad because the selection we have to vote from are narrowed to those that can 1.) afford a national campaign and 2.) possess no radical interests (radicals are scary in the democratic system).

This small selection reduces democracy to an oligarchy.

  • | Post Points: 20
Top 10 Contributor
Male
Posts 11,343
Points 194,945
ForumsAdministrator
Moderator
SystemAdministrator
Reply
liberty student replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 9:08 PM

There are pros to democracy?

"When you're young you worry about people stealing your ideas, when you're old you worry that they won't." - David Friedman
  • | Post Points: 5
Not Ranked
Male
Posts 12
Points 75
Reply
Luis Ramirez replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 9:08 PM

Who`s to say, though, that honest representation will remain that way and not be corrupted?  Or even, be able to excersize their moral fortitude when being opposed by less honest politicians?

  • | Post Points: 5
Not Ranked
Male
Posts 12
Points 75
Reply
Luis Ramirez replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 9:16 PM

The lex (legislative law) is artificial. The state only recognizes "citizens" and not human beings, therefore, any sort of government is an imposition.

  • | Post Points: 5
Top 10 Contributor
Male
Posts 11,343
Points 194,945
ForumsAdministrator
Moderator
SystemAdministrator
Reply
liberty student replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 9:26 PM

TelfordUS:
progression is made quicker when the public is united under a government for security and efficiency.

What is this statement based on?  There is no proof that going back to limited government is possible.  Big governments collapse, they don't shrink.

And has all of the work of libertarianism in the last 40 years amounted to a hill of beans in the size of government?

How long did it take for the ideals of the anti-federalists to be compromised?  Was the ink even dry on the Constitution yet?

TelfordUS:
It's our duty as people of that union

Duty?  Who signed the Constitution?  Who agreed to it?  Can people secede from it?  Read some Lysander Spooner.  It's not a valid contract.  There are no duties of the people to that union.

 

 

"When you're young you worry about people stealing your ideas, when you're old you worry that they won't." - David Friedman
  • | Post Points: 5
Top 25 Contributor
Male
Posts 4,850
Points 85,810
Reply
Andrew Cain replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 9:36 PM

TelfordUS:

Hypothetical Situation:

A country has an annual election, where every town elects a commision of a local council. Those local councils vote among themselves to elect a state council, whose councils vote among themselves for a federal council of 1000 representatives (Reichstag). From that, 100 (Bundesrat) are elected out of those 1000, and a president comes out of the 100. This system would resemble a pyramid, where the officials would be elected by people they know personally, instead of voting for someone you don't know or don't agree with.

A radical theory, yes. But it works in theory, and given the right conditions, it could work smoothly, no?

By what authority does this process even start?

'Men do not change, they unmask themselves' - Germaine de Stael

 

  • | Post Points: 5
Top 25 Contributor
Male
Posts 2,959
Points 55,095
Reply
Spideynw replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 9:38 PM

TelfordUS:
A radical theory, yes. But it works in theory, and given the right conditions, it could work smoothly, no?

No, it could not work to guarantee liberty.  It is irrelevant how the politicians are chosen.  What would there be to stop them from doing whatever they want?

Not only that, but any elected official that did not get 100% of all the votes and if everyone that could vote did not vote, then the politicians authority is illegitimate anyways.

At most, I think only 5% of the adult population would need to stop cooperating to have real change.

  • | Post Points: 35
Not Ranked
Male
Posts 12
Points 75
Reply
Luis Ramirez replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 9:44 PM

By the way, wasn't this fundamentally the same system used in the Soviet Union?

  • | Post Points: 5
Top 200 Contributor
Male
Posts 418
Points 7,525
Reply
Justin Spahr-Summers replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 10:11 PM

I think that, even if politicians in this system would honestly try to represent their constituents (and many wouldn't), it would be like a game of political telephone. Your political inclinations would be drowned out by any greater majorities at the local, state, federal, AND presidential level, or severely distorted if they actually made it that far.

Life and reality are neither logical nor illogical; they are simply given. But logic is the only tool available to man for the comprehension of both.—Ludwig von Mises

  • | Post Points: 5
Top 500 Contributor
Posts 203
Points 5,305
Reply
TelfordUS replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 10:23 PM

Spideynw:

TelfordUS:
A radical theory, yes. But it works in theory, and given the right conditions, it could work smoothly, no?

No, it could not work to guarantee liberty.  It is irrelevant how the politicians are chosen.  What would there be to stop them from doing whatever they want?

But you can change the balance of power. Town councils should have more power, since they deal with the small and personal issues in the area. More power in that area would mean a more satisfied population, since there would be more population to the more intricate detail. That's just one example of

  • | Post Points: 35
Top 50 Contributor
Male
Posts 2,124
Points 37,405
Reply
Angurse replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 11:05 PM

TelfordUS:
But you can change the balance of power. Town councils should have more power, since they deal with the small and personal issues in the area. More power in that area would mean a more satisfied population, since there would be more population to the more intricate detail. That's just one example of

I already hate the local police more than the federal police, more local power seems like a terrible thing.

"I am an aristocrat. I love liberty, I hate equality."
  • | Post Points: 5
Not Ranked
Male
Posts 12
Points 75
Reply
Luis Ramirez replied on Sun, Aug 16 2009 11:46 PM

True, but an argument could be made that local governments could impose more of a threat on liberty because of the fact that they are a local governments (being a political embodiement at any rate).

  • | Post Points: 5
Page 1 of 1 (22 items) | RSS

Ludwig von Mises Institute | 518 West Magnolia Avenue | Auburn, Alabama 36832-4528

Phone: 334.321.2100 · Fax: 334.321.2119

contact@Mises.org | webmaster | AOL-IM MainMises

Mises.org sitemap