The Democratic Model: Fundamental Vulnerabilities and their Closure [PCD]

The Standard Definition of Democratic Elections

"Democratic elections are not merely symbolic. They are competitive, periodic, inclusive, definitive elections in which the chief decision-makers in a government are selected by citizens who enjoy broad freedom to criticize government, to publish their criticism and to present alternatives." - Jeane Kirkpatrick, scholar and former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

Democratic elections are competitive.

Opposition parties and candidates must enjoy the freedom of speech, assembly, and movement necessary to voice their criticisms of the government openly and to bring alternative policies and candidates to the voters. Simply permitting the opposition access to the ballot is not enough. Elections in which the opposition is barred from the airwaves, has its rallies harassed or its newspapers censored, are not democratic. The party in power may enjoy the advantages of incumbency, but the rules and conduct of the election contest must be fair.

Democratic elections are periodic.

Democracies do not elect presidents or prime ministers-for-life. Elected officials are accountable to the people, and they must return to the voters at prescribed intervals to seek their mandate to continue in office. This means that officials in a democracy must accept the risk of being voted out of office. The one exception is judges who, to insulate them against popular pressure and help ensure their impartiality, may be appointed for life and removed only for serious improprieties.

Democratic elections are inclusive.

The definition of citizen and voter must be large enough to include a large proportion of the adult population. A government chosen by a small, exclusive group is not a democracy--no matter how democratic its internal workings may appear. One of the great dramas of democracy throughout history has been the struggle of excluded groups--whether racial, ethnic, or religious minorities, or women--to win full citizenship, and with it the right to vote and hold office.

Democratic elections are definitive.

They determine the leadership of the government. Subject to the laws and constitution of the country, popularly elected representatives hold the reins of power. They are not simply figureheads or symbolic leaders.

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Defects in the Definition

Please note that the four freedoms given in the box on the right aren't the only defects, there are many others.  However, those four defects are the ones that constitute the greatest current threat.

Other defects are:

• Freedom of Capital:
  Any economic activity is allowed - except one which leads to the destruction of these 4 freedoms.

  As von Mises pointed out, each society has limited resources, so poor allocation of those resources inevitably leads to poverty and even death.  The Socialist mindset endorses central planning as the panacea to the complex question of the allocation of those resources, in opposition to the Libertarian concept of letting a multitude of individual choices (the invisible hand of Adam Smith) direct where they should go.  So this rule asserts a freedom from government Central Planning, but adds a caveat, in that the government can intervene where the the free market will eventually lead to the death of that economy.

  For example, an industrialist like Dyson can shift production to Malaysia, and increase company profits substantially, with the loss of 10,000 jobs in the UK. But over the long term, this kind of action will lead to the destruction of the UK economy and the death of the society.  The government is permitted oversight on this kind of activity.

  Conversely, Saudi sponsored organisations can acquire assets and build political centres which threaten the independence of the UK (and similarly, Turkish organisations in Germany).  Free market players are happy to co-operate in this process, since they profit by the sale, but long term, it can lead to the extinction of that society.  The government is also permitted oversight on this kind movement of capital.

• Freedom from Debt
  As John Adams said:

  Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.

  Otherwise the people will, for example, just vote themselves more benefits.  The situation has been made worse by the easy availability of international credit, thus allowing a government to borrow to please its current voters, and effectively dump the debt on their children. 

  What is a technical solution to this problem? Well previously, even up until the beginning of the 20th century in America I think, the electorate was defined to be only "property holding mature adults".  So, those that own property have a vested interest in blocking legislation and political movements to "steal" (or to use the politically correct term "redistribute") property.  However, such a restriction is not possible any more.

  You can put constitutional limits on the amount of national debt, as in the US.  But then, Congress can just vote to raise the limit, as it seems to do every year now. Its a very very serious problem, far too big for a short discussion like this. If people can just accept and acknowledge that there is a big problem, I think that is at least a start.

• Freedom from Judicial Over-Reach
  The US Supreme Court has gone beyond interpreting the constitution and legislation, to constructing new law and precedent - negating the possibility of democratic review.  The fix for this is very difficult.

• Freedom from Executive Over-Reach
  The US President is authorised to make executive orders which do not require the approval of Congress.  These were intended to allow the President to make quick fixes in the national interest, without undue delay.  However, the current president has issued a large number of executive orders as a way of dodging democratic control.  One possible fix for this vulnerability is to have a limit to the total number of executive orders in any Presidential term.
• Freedom from Minority Faction (pressure groups)
  Hamilton in Federalist 10 explains the threats from a majority faction, and the restraints put into the constitution to stop them.  However, the framers did not consider seriously the threat from a minority faction.  It was thought that minority special interest groups (SIGs), whether religious or financial would be blocked by a majority vote. They did not foresee that in the age of telephone, internet and social networking, it would be possible for minority SIGs to punch above their weight, and the majority would simply be too busy to keep fighting it.
  
  One example of the result of minority factions gaining power is the onset of 'positive discrimination'.  I'm not sure at what point it became acceptable to discriminate if you just put the word "postitive" in front of it,  but Positive Discrimination is still discrimination on race or gender, and as such it unfairly treats one of those races or genders.  Fundamentally, it is also a rejection of the principle of a Meritocracy, so it is a reversal to a medieval caste based society.  When this attitude extends even into the enforcement of law and order, you obtain the horrific and genocidal results given here.  This vulnerability can be blocked by a rigorous adherence to the principle of equal rights for all.  By doing this , no attempt would be made to compensate for differences by un-levelling the playing field of the meritocracy, in just the same way that no attempt is made (by the state) to un-level the equally unfair distribution of beauty amongst men or women. 
  
  Another example is that small well-organised pressure groups can campaign for a sectarian and discriminatory change in the law or a redistribution of funds, and be turned down after the majority has mobilised its forces. However, if that pressure group is allowed to repeatedly request the same thing, the opposing forces will one day run out of energy and resources to fight the change, or perhaps are busy at that time fighting some other war, and the change will pass. A particular example of this is Mosque planning permission requests. This vulnerability can be blocked by having a minimum time period between repeat requests, of, say, 20 years.

The 4 Freedoms and Islam

This issue has been recognised by the ECHR in its Annual Report of 2003 by the following statement on Islam:

... the Court found that sharia was incompatible with the fundamental principles of democracy as set forth in the Convention. It considered that “sharia, which faithfully reflects the dogmas and divine rules laid down by religion, is stable and invariable. Principles such as pluralism in the political sphere or the constant evolution of public freedoms have no place in it”. According to the Court, it was difficult to declare one’s respect for democracy and human rights while at the same time supporting a regime based on sharia, which clearly diverged from Convention values, particularly with regard to its criminal law and criminal procedure, its rules on the legal status of women and the way it intervened in all spheres of private and public life in accordance with religious precepts.

Note that this judgement was reached without even appealing to the evidence of the Cairo Declaration of Human Rights as Islamic violation of the fundamental precepts of Democracy and Freedom.  The 4 Freedoms as defined on this website are the subset of the key freedoms of secular democracy which are antithetical to 3 of the 4 submissions of Islam.  

1. Freedom of Speech:
   Islam does not accept freedom of speech as anything even slightly blasphemous is forbidden, with severe punishments mandated
2. Freedom of Election:
   Islam does not accept freedom of election, as only parties supporting Islam are acceptable to it (if it even allows elections).
3. Freedom from Religious Intrusion: 
   Islam does not give equal rights to all the citizens of the country, as fundamentally it discriminates between Muslims and non-Muslims, and gives reduced rights to the latter.  Islam is specifically designed to intrude on the public sphere and destroy other cultures and ideologies by that means.   This is not a characteristic of other religions because they accept the principle of  "separation of Church and State", but for Islam, which is fundamentally a political project, the idea of stopping it from taking political action strikes at  its core.
4. Freedom from Voter Importation:  
   Curiously, Islam supports this right, because it will either only allow Muslims to immigrate, or it will bully them into converting once they enter.

History

Previous generations of ours have fought for these freedoms against Nazi or Japanese fascism, and against Marxist Totalitarianism. We recognize that currently, the main threat to those freedoms comes from some of the core teachings of Islam - which teaches and promotes values that are contrary to our 4 freedoms.

Islam intends to unite all Muslims around a common belief, and use the concept of jihad to further its aims. That belief divides the world into good Muslims and inferior Kafir (i.e. non-Muslims) with subordinate human rights. Consequently, in order to survive, non-Muslims throughout the world must unite to defend those basic human rights as expressed in the 4 Freedoms.

Means

The means that we use to achieve this goal is the law. The law applies to people's actions and words, written and spoken. Its should not discriminate on the basis of race or gender or personal belief system. However it should discriminate on the basis of ideology if that ideology itself discriminates and seeks to destroy those latter protections in law, in the same way that a Nazi ideology is illegal. (The confusion with Islam arises because it is a political ideology, covered with a layer of religion).

The application of the law should be restored to being equal, which necessitates correction in two ways.

1. Those people that have been given the special privilege of being 'above the law', should have that withdrawn and be treated just like anyone else. An example is bigamy, which has not only been permitted for a select elite, but is actually being funded by the government.  The full list of corrections required is given in the 12 Point Plan
2. Those people that have had their civil rights withdrawn by a failure to apply their protection in law, should have those civil rights restored. For example, where death threats and intimidation are made against speakers the government is hostile to, the intimidators must be prosecuted and imprisoned by the police - instead of as at present, the government and media waiting gleefully for those 'nuisances' to be silenced or executed. As another example, the first visit of Geert Wilders to the UK was cancelled because of threats made by Lord Ahmed. He should have been prosecuted for this blatant act of mobocracy. The second visit was cancelled by the home secretary, and this action has now been judged to be unlawful. That home secretary should be prosecuted for exceeding his legal powers.

Further Explanation of the Qualification of Freedoms 1 and 2
We are concerned with the founding principles of our democratic system, because those are the ones currently under attack. Please note that these systems are constructed in layers, in just the same way as the bootstrapping method of starting a computer operating system (for further explanation see example 5 in SRS: Self Referencing Systems).  The first layer starts with definitions of basic freedoms.

First of all, why did people start making these definitions in the first place? Well, it was so they could create stable, long lasting institutions and governments, which would preserve as much of the rights of individual people as possible.  So there's no point in constructing a really great system, if it allows itself to be destroyed and replaced by its antithesis shortly afterwards.

The flaw is that we have defined a secular democracy in such a way as to allow it to be destroyed from within, because in trying to make it as 'free' as possible, we have allowed the freedom to operate of forces that cunningly want to destroy it. So why did we bother with the definitions in the first place?

The correction (as with the other instances of SRS), is to start to take account of some of the properties of the parameter in the definition of the function, to limit or correct the behavior of that function itself.

So we need to say:
(a) Any speech is allowed, except that advocating the extinction of these 2 freedoms
(b) Any party is allowed (to canvas for election), except those advocating the extinction of these 2 freedoms.

Now I need to clarify one point. We have not here described the entire system, we have merely constructed a non-contradictory (in the sense of non-self-destructive) base system. From this non-contradictory base, we can then construct a wide variety of complete systems. For example, we can have a democracy where there are no laws of libel or defamation, or we can have a democracy which is so strict on defamation that any humor which might offend anyone is banned. There is a spectrum of choice, and society can decide whereabouts on that spectrum it wishes to position itself. But the point is, wherever you are on that spectrum, you need the base of (a) and (b) or it can still self-destruct.

Car Engine - Speed Limiter
The situation is analogous to a rev limiter on a car engine. You have a rev limiter to stop the engine from destroying itself, by being given too much fuel when it is not under sufficient load to slow it down. You need to have that concept in operation no matter what other things you have in the car, or it just doesn't make sense to make the car.

You can, in addition to the rev limiter, have cruise control to allow the user to control the speed even further, and even a cruise control which applies itself automatically according to speed limits transmitted from the roadside - but those are optional refinements. If you don't have that 'automatic road speed limit enforcer', you may break the speed limit and get fined, but the car will not destroy itself from within by over-revving. You have a choice about the severity of application of limits on car speed in society, but you don't have a choice (sensibly) about allowing the car to destroy itself from within. To do that defeats the whole point of having a car.

There is no point in making an engine that can destroy itself, but you could want an engine that can break the speed limit.  If your wife is dying from a serious medical problem, you may want to break the speed limit to get her to the hospital on time, and take the consequences of breaking the law instead of the consequences of her death.  But there is no way it can make sense for the engine to destroy itself.  The whole purpose of the engine is to provide propulsion (via torque).  If it destroys its essential function, then there's no point in having it.  If you seize up the car engine whilst racing with your dying wife to the hospital, you have clearly failed.  

In just the same way, there's no point in having a democracy, whose essential function (or raison d'etre) is to safely provide freedom, if it is constructed in such a way that it will cease to do that.  

Necessary and Sufficient Conditions

To borrow a phrase from mathematics, these are the necessary and sufficient conditions for defining a non-suicidal system, i.e. its just those 2 conditions and no more at this stage.  Then you have the option of adding more conditions later if you want, but you have that choice later, of which extra conditions you add.

But for these 2 freedom conditions, you have no choice.  The purpose of these 2 freedom pre-conditions, is to stop the function from defeating its own purpose, by being applied to itself.  So, to recap:

• You take away from the foundations of an engine only the freedom to destroy itself, and no more.  (But you can add more restrictions later, in an additional layers, according to personal preference).

• You take away from the foundations of the democratic function only the freedom to destroy itself, and no more.  (But you can add more restrictions later, in additional layers, according to personal preference).

A democracy obviously needs other components like the three arms of legislature-judiciary-executive and a military force to repel outside attack, etc, but whatever further layers are created, it still needs to be built upon the base framework of (a) and (b) above.