The Illusion of Choice - 10 Reasons Why Democracy Fails

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This my translation of an article written by Frank Karsten.

Many people will tell you that democracy is the best system out there. They would name it in the same sentence as words like peace, freedom, and Prosperity. But why suffer many Western democracies from high debt, unemployment, and social tensions? Here are ten reasons why democracy doesn't bring what it's supposed to.

1. Short Term Action Is Embedded

Elected politicians only have power for a short term. Therefore, they know that they will enjoy the temporary advantages of spending money, raising taxes or printing even more money. But their successors will have to deal with the negative consequences, who are possibly their political enemies as well. Unfortunately, they also tend to avoid the problems they face during their terms, because they experience the same impulses.

Because of this, politicians behave like messy tenants instead of responsible owners. They don't seem to be able to protect our borders, security, autonomy, economy or finances for a long term, as opposed to their rhetoric of course. They shove problems under the carpet, trivialize them, buy them off by spending more money or tackle them with more laws and prohibitions.

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2. Democracy Is Not Neutral

You would think that anything is possible in a democracy: left, right, liberal, socialist or conservative. But a democracy is in essence always collectivist. It's the idea that we could make any choice collectively and that the outcome of the process has to be obeyed by everyone, including the people that are against it.

Thus, in a democracy a person is subject to the desires of the collective. No wonder that all parties are collectivist and that even the VVD (Dutch liberal party) has a party program that the SDAP (the old Dutch Workers' Party) would be jealous about.

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3. Democracy is Totalitarian

The problem with democracy is that there is no fundamental limit over what the majority can vote about. In other words, the state can decide. Whether it's about the design of offices (labor laws), floors in restaurants, wages, healthcare, education, free plastic bags in stores, soda in large bottles, or smoking in your car, democracies have laws about it.

Democracy allows the government to regulate, control, and steer our lives in every detail. Of course with the excuse that it's better for us. Who doesn't obey gets a ticket or gets thrown in jail. No money, property or individual freedom is safe in a democratic state, and the constitution is just a piece of paper that apparently can't protect us from it.

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4. Democracy Is A Giant Restistribution Machine

In a democracy, everyone tries to live at the expense of others, and that is allowed. By voting, people try to put their own desires and goals on another person's bill. Politicians happily anticipate this desire. Explicitly or implicitly they say: "Vote for me and I'll take away some else's money and rights in favor of yours".

This redistribution isn't necessarily about 'from the rich to the poor'. It's always about the 'powerless, the productive, or the responsible people to the powerful, the layabout, or irresponsible people'.

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5. Democracy Leads to Moral Decay

The democratic redistribution machine, and especially the welfare state, punishes successful people through higher taxes and give their wealth to people who are in trouble. But alas, what you tax, you get less, and what you subsidize, you get more.

That way, the redistribution machine stimulates hedonism, lazyness, anti-social behavior, irresponsibility, and it discourages good traits. It weakens family ties and the sense of community, and replaces values like self-sustainability with victimhood and dependency. In a free society, a person has to behave in a social, responsible, and honest manner, otherwise he'll lose the support of his family, friends, neighbors, and colleagues.

But people that pierce their whole face full with rings and can't find a job because of it, parents who raise their children badly, or rude neighbors who cause disturbances are helped by the welfare state through assistance, subsidies, and welfare. The organizations within the welfare state don't spend their own money, but other people's money, and thus they are looking for more 'customers', not less.

6. Democracy Is Not about Minority Rights

Often people think that a democracy protects the rights of minorities, but that is not true because democracy is by definition about majority rights. The basic principle of a democracy is that the majority decides. The majority does have the right to give more rights to minorities, but this is subject to fashion, not morality. Groups that yell, intimidate or that are aggressive are mostly able to obtain more rights, sometimes even at the expense of majority rights.

For example, people who smoke used to be protected, not anymore. Homosexual people used to have very few rights, now many. Rich people and entrepreneurs have always been a minority with few rights. Individual freedom, not democracy, is about minority rights, because the individual is the smallest minority.

7. Democracy Protects The Powers That Be Against the People

Democracy doesn't defend the people against the state, but the other way around. Our elected politicians can start wars under false premises, break election promises, print as much money as they want, but they never end up in jail because of it. Their excuse is that this was the result of the democratic process and that this is their interpretation of it.

If they spend €5,000 of tax money on themselves they're in danger, but they can easily waste 5 billion on a megalomaniac project. The worst that can happen to a failing government is that you won't vote for them anymore, but the choice for the citizen is very limited and voting on someone else is only useful when you can get the majority to do so as well. Democracy is a bad way to control power, so no wonder that democratic states constantly grow in wealth and power.

8. Democracy Makes Moral What Is Immoral

If someone robs you on the street, everyone thinks that's immoral. But magically a similar act is called 'social justice' when 50% + 1 of the voters want to see it happen. However, 'majority' is not the same as 'justice' or 'morality'.

Morals are determined by principles of good and evil, not numbers. If 99% of the people think that homosexuality is wrong, it should still be allowed. If 99% of the people thinks someone should be robbed, it's still theft.

9. Voting Is Useless

Lenin could have said: "Voters are the useful idiots of a democracy". Voting is wasted effort and gives the wrong impression that the people in power are legitimate. In a big election there is a higher chance you have a traffic accident on your way to the voting booth than that your vote sways the result of the election.

And if your vote actually determines the outcome of the amount of seats in parliament, it probably won't influence policy. Moreover, politicians can break their promises without punishment. Voting is more or less as effective as cheering on your favorite football team.

10. Democracy Leads to Oligarchy

Being able to choose one party like in North Korea is a dictatorship. But being able to choose between two parties, like in the US, is somehow seen as freedom. One single vote doesn't influence much, but a vote for a small party makes that vote worth even less.

That's why people often vote strategically. They don't choose the party of their preference, but the least bad biggest party, a party that actually has a chance to come to power.

This mostly leads to two or three parties forming a sort of oligarchy. For political newcomers it's often difficult to break that, regardless of the possible electoral threshold.

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