1. What is the purpose of democracy?
Democracy has been as natural as breathing air to the well developed countries. We are not at the state of questioning democracy anymore. Ever since democracy was introduced in Greece 2500 years ago it's grown stronger, and the society has become more intellectually aware. Democracy had an incredible boost when book-printing was made possible in the late 15th century, and the combined efforts of book and democracy have given us e.g. the computer and the television.
In democracies you let the people get presented to parties with various ideologies, and choose thereafter. In order to elect a party you must have more than 50% per cent or you will have to team up with others. This is the case of most democracies. The choice the people make should somewhat reflect their opinions. Most people would say this will further the society, and should therefore be it's purpose; to further the society. The obvious question then is; What is of favour to the society? Well that can be wildly discussed.
2. Where can the purpose of democracy fail?
In my opinion a democracy fails when less than 80% vote. It happens in many elections, but should be considered as a minimum. And there should be some kind of proof of political understanding, but then 80% wouldn't vote in the first place. In a democracy there should be basic rules of what can be presented in a political agenda e.g. a Nazi party would install a dictatorship. But there should be other rules all democracies MUST follow e.g. no prefered religion. A democracy should have at least four big parties.
3. Where has democracy failed?
We have seen several elections where the government controls the votes e.g. Iraq under Saddam. But the most important democratic failure happend when USA re-elected George W Bush. A president which has been proven to have mislead its people into war, and murdered innocent civilians. A president who fails to recognize any problems with pollution. A president who puts his religion as the most important factor. A president who use fear to get votes. A president who opposed of UN. A president who has LIED to his countrymen, was re-elected.
The most similar event I can come to think of is when Hitler's NSDAP was elected, only people didn't know very much about him, and he was considered as the man to face Stalin. However you (should) know about Bush after four years, but obviously you approve of his serious lies that have cost the lives of about 100,000 men in Iraq. Yet people often complain about how the germans could be so stupid to elect Hitler. Such irony.
Now, you really didn't have more than two candidates to choose between, which is a great failure in itself. And both are devoted catholics. But even if you had ten serious candidates you would probably still choose Bush. And that's a proof democracy really can fail.
Many americans don't even know who was your first president. How can such people vote? I met a then 28 year old american women about a year ago, and she believed europeans used Fahrenheight, and americans used Celsius... She was going to vote Bush... I doubt most americans are THAT stupid, but you get the point. You have access to such much information, yet know so little, that's really sad.
4. Is there a better alternative to democracy?
Well I don't really know, but something must be done. The only option I see as of now is to develop democracy further, and I'm talking about a huge leap. There are way too many problems with the current state. I have written some of my ideas in the text. Democracy should still be considered natural, but I would be very glad if the media wouldn't take it's current form for granted, but instead started discussing a more advanced basic form of democracy (yes, advanced basic form). UN should make a new definition of how to apply democracy. And then every nation that approves of this international form will have obvious benefits.
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Topic: State On Democracy (Read 286 times)