# Representative democracy is illogical **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [February 21, 2017, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374 "2017-02-21T02:17:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2017, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374/21 "2017-02-21T21:43:50Z")
> [@snoe](#): > > Totally right - I’ll just add that our Founders (Peace be upon them) were drawing up their plans before political parties and proportional representation were invented in anything close to their modern forms. If they’d known about parties, PR, and any number of other issues we deal with today, the whole thing would’ve been different. It didn’t take them very long. The first parties came about in 1796 (Federalist Party - Alexander Hamilton, Democratic-Republican Party - Thomas Jeffersonian) ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2017, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374/22 "2017-02-22T00:33:10Z")
> [@ISiddiqui](#): > > You may have proportional representation but the party or coalition with 50%+1 gets to decide everything. Well, a two-party system doesn’t have formal coalition governments, just majorities. By contrast, recent Greek governments have involved the plurality “radical left” party, SYRIZA, governing in coalition with a much smaller center-right party, Independent Greeks (ANEL). That implies that they won’t govern as far to the left as if they’d made a coalition with the Communists (KKE). Or look at Australia, an STV country, where the computers that count the votes typically refuse to spit out a majority in the federal Parliament. Over 80% of the seats are Labor or Coalition, but independents and small parties hold the “balance of power,” and that constrains the more grandiose ambitions of the major party leaders. ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2017, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374/23 "2017-02-22T00:45:50Z")
“Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.” - Winston Churchill ---
**Author:** ![penultima\_thule](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/penultima_thule/32/3833_2.png) [@penultima\_thule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/penultima_thule)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2017, 11:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374/24 "2017-02-22T11:49:34Z")
> [@foolsguinea](#): > > Or look at Australia, an STV country, where the computers that count the votes typically refuse to spit out a majority in the federal Parliament. No. The 2010 election produced a hung Parliament (i.e. no party holding a majority in the House of Representatives). The previous instance was in 1940. So it’s not typical at all. There also have been two parliaments since WWII (out of 32 elections) where the government had a single seat majority; 1961 and 2016. Where the confusion may arise is that the minor parties do hold the balance of power in the upper house (Senate) where proportional representation applies. Indeed, under current regulations it is currently almost impossible for either major party to hold a Senate majority. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2017, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374/25 "2017-02-22T21:58:17Z")
:sigh: I misremembered. Clearly I am[not](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RsQqK1zGhsM)Australian. I almost said “Senate” too, and changed it. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2017, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374/26 "2017-02-23T00:06:20Z")
Representative Democracy is the single best thing the human species has ever devised. It recognizes the flaws in our nature, and, to the best possible degree, corrects for this. It is not coincidence that the rich, industrialized, free nations are those that have most embraced democracy. (Churchill got it right.) ---
**Author:** ![Common\_Tater](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/common_tater/32/13846_2.png) [@Common\_Tater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Common_Tater)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2017, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374/27 "2017-02-23T02:44:37Z")
It’s doubtful Churchill was referring to direct democracy? At least I wouldn’t think so. In fact, the word democracy doesn’t even appear anywhere in the Declaration, Constitution, or Bill of Rights. If you read the Federalist or study the authors, it’s pretty clear the whole point was to avoid democracy. Thus the separation of powers. Still, at the time it was pretty “liberal” to actually let people vote on their form of government, as opposed to say, the divine right of Kings, or warlords, and the rest of it. ---
**Author:** ![Malden\_Capell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/malden_capell/32/5274_2.png) [@Malden\_Capell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malden_Capell)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2017, 8:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374/28 "2017-02-23T08:09:15Z")
> [@Sterling\_Archer](#): > > Furthermore, why should the party with 51% of the seats in the government get total control over every decision? That doesn’t seem very democratic either. > [@ISiddiqui](#): > > You may have proportional representation but the party or coalition with 50%+1 gets to decide everything. I’d argue they don’t - even in the current intensely partisan atmosphere, Senators and Representatives will have their own priorities and agendas, be they based on their local support, their experiences or through lobbying or even - shock, horror - listening to debates in Congress. They’ll use their vote to wrangle for such agendas, or at its basest level, secure pork for their funders. That’s also why Congress is bicameral. America is explicitly not a purely democratic state. The Senate is there to put popular but ill-conceived ideas through the wringer and cool them down somewhat. Plus, both Houses have their committee systems, and the federal structure means much power is closer to the electorate. And there’s always the Supreme Court. So America’s representative democracy does not give absolute power to the 51% who have the majority in Congress. In fact, it was deliberately designed to avoid such a thing and disperse power as much as possible. Whether or not it’s succeeding at that is another question, though. ---
**Author:** ![lisiate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f05b48/32.png) [@lisiate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lisiate)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2017, 8:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374/29 "2017-02-23T08:22:05Z")
> [@snoe](#): > > “Furthermore, why should the party with 51% of the seats in the government get total control over every decision? That doesn’t seem very democratic either.” > I’d recommend CGP Grey’s excellent series of short videos on voting systems and their shortcomings for a starting point on thinking about these issues and how various alternative systems address them. Simple and entertaining: > [Politics in the Animal Kingdom — CGP Grey](http://www.cgpgrey.com/politics-in-the-animal-kingdom/) CGP Grey is awesome. The OP really should watch this series. ---
**Author:** ![jz78817](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jz78817/32/1028_2.png) [@jz78817](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jz78817)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2017, 10:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374/30 "2017-02-23T10:37:33Z")
> [@ISiddiqui](#): > > You may have proportional representation but the party or coalition with 50%+1 gets to decide everything. I think the point is that even if you have a coalition government, said coalition is made up of more than one party who- while they can work together- aren’t of a single mind. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2017, 11:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374/31 "2017-02-23T11:28:10Z")
Comments about first-past-the-post seem to me to be overblown, when FPTP is cited as the reason the US has two and only two political parties. If FPTP had that effect, then it would have it in other countries as well, but that’s not the case. The three other major countries that use FPTP are the UK, Canada and India, and in all three of those countries, there are multiple parties represented in the legislature: • [11 parties in the UK House of Commons](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Commons_of_the_United_Kingdom); • [over 30 parties in the Lok Sabha, the lower house of the Indian Parliament](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lok_Sabha) (note that the government coalition alone has 14 parties in it, not counting the Speaker); • [5 parties currently in the Canadian House of Commons](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Commons_of_Canada). Notably, these three countries all use parliamentary systems, where there is less concern about “throwing your vote away” on a third party. In a parliamentary system, there is always the possibility of a minority government or coalition, where the third parties can have considerable influence on government. Even if there is a majority government, the majority government may find it needs to adopt policies proposed by third parties to avoid losing its majority support. Party structure also seems more fluid in these systems, than in the US, meaning that it is easier to start new parties. So if you’re looking for a reason for the US duopoly (two and only two parties), my guess is that it’s because of the unitary nature of the president/executive branch. Since only one person can get elected, there is a greater electoral benefit to having only one candidate on the other side, rather than having numerous candidates. As well, given the separation of powers, the elections in the Congress have no direct impact on the composition of the executive, which is not the case in parliamentary systems. There are no “coalition governments” in the US, with the one notable exception of the National Union Party in the 1864 election, with Republican Lincoln paired with Democrat Johnson. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2017, 11:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374/32 "2017-02-23T11:33:48Z")
> [@Sterling\_Archer](#): > > Furthermore, why should the party with 51% of the seats in the government get total control over every decision? That doesn’t seem very democratic either. So what do you propose? All votes need 60% to pass? but that means that 40% aren’t represented by your measure. So 70% needed? but then 30% aren’t represented. And so on. Majority rule is a good, workable principle that ensures that decisions get made. When that is coupled with regular elections that allow the people to judge their representatives, it is a remarkably robust system of government that balances the need for governments to act with the need for governments to be responsible to the people. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2017, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374/33 "2017-02-24T00:27:12Z")
> [@Common\_Tater](#): > > It’s doubtful Churchill was referring to direct democracy? At least I wouldn’t think so. In fact, the word democracy doesn’t even appear anywhere in the Declaration, Constitution, or Bill of Rights. If you read the Federalist or study the authors, it’s pretty clear the whole point was to avoid democracy. Thus the separation of powers. Still, at the time it was pretty “liberal” to actually let people vote on their form of government, as opposed to say, the divine right of Kings, or warlords, and the rest of it. “Democracy” includes both direct democracy and representative democracy. Other than a few small townships in Maine, there is very, very little direct democracy being practiced on any large scale, anywhere in the world. It’s extremely time-efficient to hire people to govern us (of, by, and for.) ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2017, 6:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374/34 "2017-02-25T06:42:40Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > So what do you propose? All votes need 60% to pass? but that means that 40% aren’t represented by your measure. So 70% needed? but then 30% aren’t represented. And so on. > > Majority rule is a good, workable principle that ensures that decisions get made. When that is coupled with regular elections that allow the people to judge their representatives, it is a remarkably robust system of government that balances the need for governments to act with the need for governments to be responsible to the people. This is a key point. _Unless one favors a neo-anarchism where government is unable to act_, the legislature needs to be able to make decisions with as little as 51% of its members. Higher principles, e.g. as enshrined in a Bill of Rights, exist to protect the 49% from persecution by the 51%. Multi-party systems make it easier for different combinations to sum to 51% on different issues. But this was also possible in the U.S. during the Rational Era. For example, pro-environment Democrats and Libertarian Republicans were able to pass the Clean Air Act despite that both Party establishments were controlled by lobbyists for the polluters. But now we have nonsense like the Hastert Rule, and 51 of 52 GOP Senators delighted to vote for incompetents as long as they have an “(R)” by their names. Despite obvious flaws, American government was fairly effective for almost two centuries. To misquote Cassius in _The Tragedy of Julius Caesar_, “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our election mechanics, … But in ourselves.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/representative-democracy-is-illogical/780374.md?page=1)