True Democracy Does Not, Has Never, and Will Never Exist

Democracy arguably originated in the Greek city-state of Athens in the year 507 BC when Cleisthenes, the leader at the time, enacted a series of political reforms known as demokratia. The principle behind these reforms was to allow for “rule by the people”, according to Greek historian Herodotus, through the formation of several branches of government with decision-making capability that the public were invited to participate in. Due to the low population of Athens (approximately 100,000), this system was capable of allowing for participation from a high percentage of the public without sacrificing too much efficiency. In today’s world, such direct democracy, although perhaps good in principle, would undoubtedly serve to slow down the already-tedious processes of government in large countries like the USA. This is why such nations have representative democracies – a system where people elect politicians to make decisions on their behalf. Consequently, people are free to spend more of their time on work and less on pondering government policy. Furthermore, because fewer people need be consulted before making a decision, government operates more efficiently than if it were a participative democracy.

However, as we know, the representatives that end up being elected are not always the most popular, nor do they always stick to their campaign promises. Some examples of exceptionally unpopular democratically-elected leaders today include President Enrique Peña Nieto of Mexico, with an approval rating of about 6%, and President Michel Temer, with an approval rating of 3.4%. The current president of the United States, Donald Trump, has a low level of support too, with recent approval rating polls averaging about 38%. We may delve into the reasons why or how democracies elect such terrible leaders in the first place, but that is aside from the point; representative democracies often violate a core tenet of democracy itself – creating a government that the majority of people can approve of.

The question arises then; how democratic really are democracies today? It must be noted that even Athens had a branch of government (the Boule) that consisted of a few members of each of the ten tribes of the state. However, once again, the small size of Athens meant that despite this, the Boule consisted of 0.5% of its total population and 1.25% of its total voting-eligible population. Compare this to the mere 0.000002% (approximately) of the US population that make up the Congress and it is easy to see which system is more democratic.

Still, going back to the core principle of democracy, one could argue that even Athens did not fit the description of the perfect government. Let us explore what a state that adheres completely to these standards would look like. First of all, government would certainly be required to practice participative democracy to gauge public opinion on every matter. It would also need to ensure that every person is involved in the political system and that every person’s voice is heard and treated equally.

The thing is, none of these three aspects exist to the extent that they should (to achieve true democracy) in any nation today. I have already covered the fact that we mainly have representative democracy, especially in big countries. To reiterate, it often leads to disapproval of government by the majority of people because representatives will not always make popular decisions after being elected; this is antithetical to democracy itself. In fact, there are many government positions with great influence that are not elected and instead appointed by someone of greater authority. Also, having long gaps between elections arguably does not reflect public opinion in real time. In a previous post, I briefly covered the fact that apathy rates are as high as 40% in some cases and only increasing. This certainly debunks the second necessity to maintain democracy (high participation rate). And finally, my post about campaign finance laws explains how government decision making can be influenced by outside money and lobbyists. This means that in some cases, large businesses are favored over other stakeholders, violating the final requirement for pure democracy.

It should be obvious by this point that the principle behind demokratia was never realized. However, there is one question we must still ask ourselves: do we even need perfect democracy?

There are undoubtedly aspects of democracy that are necessary to maintain, the foremost of these being the need to ensure that all voices are heard as equally as possible. Violating this easily leads to either discrimination or corruption. This mostly exists in western democracies except, again, when it comes to money in politics.

On the other hand, we do not need to ensure zero apathy and a participative system. There is the standard argument against making voting mandatory which takes a constitutional approach, saying that implicit in the right to vote is also the right to avoid voting. While I agree, I believe another, perhaps stronger, argument is that many, if not most, people are not very well educated in politics and do not keep up with government affairs. Mandated voting would only lead to more uneducated people voting than do now. Democracy is a great system only if everyone participating understands what they are voting for and why.

The argument against participative democracy is simple and one I briefly mentioned earlier: decision making would become highly inefficient. There is already a very long process to introduce legislation to government and allowing every person in a nation to give their input on every matter that arises would be needlessly tedious. For this reason, representative democracy does need to exist, at least to some extent. Of course, a case could easily be made to say that there is too much disconnect between the general public and their elected officials at any point in time. While I agree, I will choose to go down that rabbit hole at a later date. 

Overall, I would say that the perfect Greek democracy has not, does not, and never will exist – but nor does it need to. It is simply too impractical and counterproductive to establish such a government, especially at the scale of massive nations like the USA. Thus, although many people may see the lack of true democracy as a bad thing, in reality, it is only natural that we govern ourselves in a more bureaucratic way. However, some values of it will always be necessary to avoid infringing upon basic rights. And while it is still true in some cases that modern nations have expanded the role of government far too much by allowing for numerous appointed public positions and other borderline authoritarian policies, in general, the system that we practice today ensures efficiency and stability of state decision making.