On Plato's Criticism of Democracy
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By Aaron J. Biterman. September 11, 2000. Democracy is a system of majority rule, which excludes the opinions of those not in the majority, and for that reason I agree with the thesis of the ancient philosopher Plato. He believed that because the desires and possessions of some inevitably interfere with the desires and acquisitiveness of others, the end result of all democracies would inevitably be an undisciplined and chaotic society. According to the philosopher Plato, electing someone into a position of power is pointless because democracy is a system of elections which leads to the famous words of Lord Acton: "Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely." Indeed he is correct because under democracy, issues are decided by vote totals. How someone conducts his or her life can be substantially determined by how other people vote. Taxes can be imposed and raised by vote. Decisions about your children's education can be made by vote. Rules governing how you may use your land can be made by vote. Much of your life can be affected by how your neighbors vote. Those who vote in the minority are stuck with what those in the majority choose. In other words, democracy is that system of political governance in which the ayes have it and the nays get it. Why would we want to leave important matters to a vote? We don't vote on what jobs each of us want or which morning cereals will be produced or what kind of automobiles we will own. But we do vote on our elected officials - Assembly members, Congressional members, Senatorial members and the President of the United States. Why? One reason people have strong feelings towards democracy is that they have been sold the false notion that the only alternative to democracy is dictatorship. The choice, they have been led to believe, is between majority rule and rule by a powerful individual or group. Somehow, self-rule is never considered. The original American system largely embodied self-rule. Throughout the Nineteenth Century you could pretty much live your life without encountering a single government official. Sure, people voted for officeholders, but those officials didn't do much. Even so, Americans generally did not trust their elected officials. Politicians were always the butt of ridicule in the United States, even when their power was small. To those who advocate democracy, I have some simple questions for you: how would you like democratic religion, democratic hobby selection, democratic doctor selection and democratic restaurant selection? Imagine if other people were choosing your own religion for you by popular vote. And while one might argue that democracy is the American way, I beg to differ. For the American way, as I have been brought up to believe, was a land where self-rule and freedom were part of the American dream. The fact that anyone could be in any position or of any class group in any other country around the globe, but once in America, that individual could be free to pursue his or her dreams freely. In conclusion, self-rule and democracy are incompatible, and that is why I recognize the validity of Plato's writings in The Laws. Either you will make decisions for yourself or you will wait to see what the majority thinks you should do. Either you own your own life or everyone owns a fraction of everyone else, giving each person a claim to the resources of every other person. If that sounds horrendous, that's the logic of democracy. |
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