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The Party's Over!

Entry 2237, on 2022-09-15 at 13:36:20 (Rating 2, Politics)

I think most people would agree that our political systems - and by "our" here, I mean most people who live in Western democracies - work adequately at best. Very few people would claim that any system is perfect, or even good, but the majority just seem to grudgingly admit that this could be about as good as things are likely to get.

But could political systems actually be made better? Well, having a democratic system where the majority, or the representatives of the majority which is far more common, decide seems to be a good initial concept, at least. There is the problem though, which has become more prominent recently, of the "tyranny of the majority". If the majority want to follow policies which favour them, but are detrimental to minority groups, is that still a good thing?

I think most people would say no, but what is the alternative? If a minority group seems to be getting a "bad deal" from a pure democracy, is it better to override the majority view and introduce policies they might not support, in order to protect the smaller groups?

Superficially, this seems like a fair idea, but it does lead to a potentially dangerous situation where politicians might ignore the majority view they were elected to enact, just to favour another group which they see as being unfairly disadvantaged.

And that phrase "they see as" is the problem. An individual's assessment of fairness is always influenced by their own personal biases, philosophical perspectives, and self-interest. At least going with a majority view, which is the theoretical advantage of democracies, removes individual bias, and although group bias does become a problem instead, at least that represents a widely held view.

So I think we need to follow the majority view, even if that might occasionally produce outcomes unfair to groups outside the majority.

There is one other point worth mentioning here too. I have seen several surveys which seem to indicate that people actually have a fair and rational view of what they can and cannot reasonably ask for through political processes. For example, few people would ask for zero tax, or even lower tax for their particular economic group, because they realise the consequences of that would be problematic, even if the idea is superficially attractive.

So if we are going to trust the population in general to choose a government, we should also trust them to the extent that the government needs to carry out their wishes. What point is there in a political system which says "you can choose who to vote for, based on their stated policies, but once they get into power those politicians can ignore your wishes". The whole point of democracy is destroyed by that.

There should also be (and there almost always are) basic rights which cannot be overridden, even by the majority. For example, everyone should have the same political and social rights, irrespective of what group they belong to. This limits the damage a malicious majority might be able to inflict on minorities.

So I think we could agree that democracy, despite its limitations and deficiencies, should be accepted as the best compromise as a political system. There is one part of most modern democracies which I find problematic though: political parties.

When I vote for a person to represent me in government, I should expect that their primary responsibility should be to me, and the other people in that politician's electorate, but that is rarely the case. I just about every case, the politician's allegiance is mainly to their party, and that might not correspond to my best interests.

In New Zealand we occasionally have a "conscience vote". In these situations, the members of parliament vote based on their own values rather than following what the party tells them. The fact that these are known as "conscience votes" implies to me that the other votes do not involve any conscience, and how can that be a good thing?

So when I allow a representative to govern on my behalf I'm not really getting that. Even if the person involved has good motives, they cannot always act to uphold their values if that would be contrary to what the party they belong to requires. And parties - especially in recent times - are often identified with a single politician, and that is almost always the leader. That person has a lot of control over party policy, and therefore how my representative votes.

New Zealand's current prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, is probably the best example of this "cult of personality" where the party is only thriving because the leader is popular - or, at least, was at the previous election. And individual popularity is a fickle thing, as the PM is finding now that more people are finally realising that superficial outward appearances of proficiency don't always translate into true competence.

So the leader controls the party, because she is essential to it, and the party controls its members, including the democratically elected person who is representing me. It seems that the power relationships here have got rather mixed up. In fact, this is close to being an autocracy or dictatorship.

The other problem with parties is that certain large ones tend to become dominant and prevent new parties with fresh ideas from gaining any power. For example, I know people who would like to see more libertarian leaning people in the US government, but almost everyone there votes for either the Democrats or the Republicans, even if they would not otherwise be their preferred choice.

Things are slightly better here in New Zealand because we have the MMP electoral system. This ensures that parties are allocated seats in parliament based on the total number of votes. Unfortunately we have a threshold where a party needs to get 5% of the vote before they can be included, which makes it almost impossible for new parties to get started.

So why not ban parties completely? Just elect individual people into government and let them negotiate amongst themselves to get the most widely accepted policies enacted. That should provide a better chance for the people's wishes to be acted on, and for individuals with new and original ideas to gain some degree of power, and for the influence of charismatic yet superficial people to be minimised.

Of course, there would be nothing to stop collections of individuals creating unofficial groupings which might be similar to the parties we have now, but that would be seen as illegitimate, instead of an annoying but common way of acting, like we have now.

The problem we would have here in New Zealand is that our electoral system, MMP, is specifically designed to work with a party-based system. The seats in parliament are allocated to people on their party's list based on the votes the party got. So, no parties means no MMP, which is a system I often indicate approval for.

But remove parties and we don't even need MMP any more. We could go back to just having electorate MPs with no party affiliation, and I think this would ensure proper representation and diversity in government, like MMP (theoretically, at least) does now.

I have also mentioned in the past that I favour binding referenda to decide on big issues. Whatever form of election we use, this would help prevent groups from carrying out actions the majority disagree with.

But combine binding referenda with a party-less system and we really are starting to get towards a better form of democracy... the party's over!

Comment 2 (7301) by OJB on 2022-09-16 at 17:56:32: (view earlier comments)

Well in theory you vote for the person who you think provides the best policies and (probably more importantly) has a philosophical perspective you can agree with. But in a party system they are usually told what to do, even if that goes against their own moral position.

I see your point that we vote for the party, not the person, but I think if we voted for individuals instead there would be a greater variety of perspectives, and a more obvious mechanism for responsibility.

I know the party system is well entrenched now, and is unlikely to ever be replaced, even if it was possible, but I just wanted to offer this perspective as a theoretical improvement.

Comment 3 (7304) by Anonymous on 2022-09-19 at 12:22:11:

Be careful what you ask for, remember Democracy is the worst form of government, apart from all the others.

Comment 4 (7305) by OJB on 2022-09-19 at 12:26:50:

I'm not arguing against democracy; I realise it is the best form of government we can reasonably expect at this time (not necessarily the best without reservation). I'm arguing for a slight modification in how democracy typically works.

Comment 5 (7314) by Ken Spall on 2022-10-06 at 10:49:18:

Would having a system set up where national referenda could take place on important social, economic and government policies be a more democratic solution? As individuals we would then feel that we are actively participating in the running of our country. Just a thought.

Comment 6 (7316) by OJB on 2022-10-06 at 11:59:00:

Yes. That is a system I have been advocating for years. We need a simple on-line system (with an alternative for the decreasing number of tech resistant citizens), and a mechanism (also on-line) to trigger a referendum (at least 10% of the population requesting one, for example). Each person would be able to vote on (say) 3 referenda each year (to avoid it getting out of control). It would be binding on the government. What do you think?

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