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The U.S. Was Just Downgraded from a 'Full' to 'Flawed Democracy'

 
 
 
RavenSky said:
While U.S. citizens could once claim to be part of the 9% of people in the world governed by a “full democracy,” they are now part of the near 45% who live in a “flawed democracy.”
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http://fortune.com/2017/01/25/us-democracy-downgrade/
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I agree with this and as the article stated that it preceded Trump. By a lot. There is only one place to blame and that is the American people themselves. They have allowed themselves to be misinformed. Sure their ignorance is exploited by conservative media and by politicians like Trump, but the responsibility lies with the individual citizens.
 
Tristan Scott said:
I agree with this and as the article stated that it preceded Trump. By a lot. There is only one place to blame and that is the American people themselves. They have allowed themselves to be misinformed. Sure their ignorance is exploited by conservative media and by politicians like Trump, but the responsibility lies with the individual citizens.
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That means democracy is working. You get the kind of system you deserve.
 
Guys, but don't forget the majority didn't vote for Trump and the electoral system is rigged to work for conservatives. Certainly, I don't deserve this and my hope is that Twitler will break the Republican Party.
 
Jayjay said:
Tristan Scott said:
I agree with this and as the article stated that it preceded Trump. By a lot. There is only one place to blame and that is the American people themselves. They have allowed themselves to be misinformed. Sure their ignorance is exploited by conservative media and by politicians like Trump, but the responsibility lies with the individual citizens.
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That means democracy is working. You get the kind of system you deserve.
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Tracing reports of the downgrade back to their source, a Jan. 2017 Economist article, what I find is

Declining trust in government is denting democracy...

The downgrade was not a consequence of Donald Trump, states the report. Rather, it was caused by the same factors that led Mr Trump to the White House: a continued erosion of trust in government and elected officials,...

A similar pattern of declining popular confidence in political elites and institutions has also been evident in Europe. Such disaffection helped cause the scores of more than 70 countries to decline compared with 2015. Although Britain is one of the leading exemplars of this trend, it was one of only 38 countries to record an improved score, thanks to the robust turnout of 72.2% in the June 2016 Brexit referendum.​

Surely the same factors that led Mr Trump to the White House led Britain to Brexit, so it's not clear why those factors downgrade the U.S. and upgrade Britain. Moreover, it's not clear why anyone would think public cynicism is evidence that a democracy is flawed. If the U.S. has less trust in its rulers than, say, Canada has, that might mean U.S. democracy is less successful at putting trustworthy people into power; but it equally might mean that Canadian democracy is less successful at revealing the truth about its political elites to the Canadian people. Declining trust in government is denting democracy's reputation. That doesn't mean it's denting democracy. Perhaps it is those who trust their rulers more who have allowed themselves to be misinformed.
 
Bomb#20 said:
Jayjay said:
Tristan Scott said:
I agree with this and as the article stated that it preceded Trump. By a lot. There is only one place to blame and that is the American people themselves. They have allowed themselves to be misinformed. Sure their ignorance is exploited by conservative media and by politicians like Trump, but the responsibility lies with the individual citizens.
Click to expand...
That means democracy is working. You get the kind of system you deserve.
Click to expand...
Tracing reports of the downgrade back to their source, a Jan. 2017 Economist article, what I find is

Declining trust in government is denting democracy...

The downgrade was not a consequence of Donald Trump, states the report. Rather, it was caused by the same factors that led Mr Trump to the White House: a continued erosion of trust in government and elected officials,...

A similar pattern of declining popular confidence in political elites and institutions has also been evident in Europe. Such disaffection helped cause the scores of more than 70 countries to decline compared with 2015. Although Britain is one of the leading exemplars of this trend, it was one of only 38 countries to record an improved score, thanks to the robust turnout of 72.2% in the June 2016 Brexit referendum.​

Surely the same factors that led Mr Trump to the White House led Britain to Brexit, ...
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Isn't one of the factors Trump and his campaign? I mean they sowed a lot of distrust in institutions: govt, education, the press. Drain the swamp! Lock her up! Buttery males! Ben Gozzy! Obama was born in Kenya. Liberal media! Alternate facts are okay. Alex Jones. Rush Limbaugh. National Enquirer. Breitbart. Sean Hannity.
 
That article's source is the Economist Intelligence Unit, and that organization rates nations by how democratic they are, using these criteria:
  1. Electoral process and pluralism
  2. Functioning of government
  3. Political participation
  4. Political culture
  5. Civil liberties
 Democracy Index has recent ratings. The US is flawed because it is now below 8.0 out of 10.0. It is now 7.98, and tied with Italy at ranks 21 - 22. The best-scoring nations are northern-European ones along New Zealand, Canada, and Australia.

The ratings:
10 - full democracy - 8 - flawed democracy - 6 - hybrid regime - 4 - authoritarian regime - 0

 Fragile States Index has ratings  List of countries by Fragile States Index Here again, northern-European countries and NZ, CA, and AU outscore the US.
 
Bomb#20 said:
Jayjay said:
Tristan Scott said:
I agree with this and as the article stated that it preceded Trump. By a lot. There is only one place to blame and that is the American people themselves. They have allowed themselves to be misinformed. Sure their ignorance is exploited by conservative media and by politicians like Trump, but the responsibility lies with the individual citizens.
Click to expand...
That means democracy is working. You get the kind of system you deserve.
Click to expand...
Tracing reports of the downgrade back to their source, a Jan. 2017 Economist article, what I find is

Declining trust in government is denting democracy...

The downgrade was not a consequence of Donald Trump, states the report. Rather, it was caused by the same factors that led Mr Trump to the White House: a continued erosion of trust in government and elected officials,...

A similar pattern of declining popular confidence in political elites and institutions has also been evident in Europe. Such disaffection helped cause the scores of more than 70 countries to decline compared with 2015. Although Britain is one of the leading exemplars of this trend, it was one of only 38 countries to record an improved score, thanks to the robust turnout of 72.2% in the June 2016 Brexit referendum.​

Surely the same factors that led Mr Trump to the White House led Britain to Brexit, so it's not clear why those factors downgrade the U.S. and upgrade Britain. Moreover, it's not clear why anyone would think public cynicism is evidence that a democracy is flawed. If the U.S. has less trust in its rulers than, say, Canada has, that might mean U.S. democracy is less successful at putting trustworthy people into power; but it equally might mean that Canadian democracy is less successful at revealing the truth about its political elites to the Canadian people. Declining trust in government is denting democracy's reputation. That doesn't mean it's denting democracy. Perhaps it is those who trust their rulers more who have allowed themselves to be misinformed.
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The question is about how democratic countries are, not how successful or sane. The US has seen falling turnout, and worse, turnout that is biased towards the supporters of one party, and against certain identifiable demographics; The UK, but contrast, shot itself in the foot with an across the board high turnout of people who wanted to have their say, despite not having a clue what they were actually voting for or against.

Whether that's a fair and reasonable measure of democracy I cannot say, but it seems to be the key measure they are using that leads to the declining 'democracy score' for the US, and the rising score for the UK.
 
Jolly_Penguin said:
USA was never a full democracy.
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Yes. It was seriously flawed from day one.

But it did introduce the modern world to the concept of democracy again and many other nations have created much better democracies than the US oligarchy that talks about democracy and has a few democratic trappings.
 
The USSR had elections every so often. You could theoretically vote no for a candidate or leave the space blank. On occassion a candidate would get more no votes than yes votes or the space left blank not reaching the 50% mark.

Anyone can have elections, even non-fraudulent ones. The big kicker is do those elction results result in changes in policy or creation of new policies the people want to be made? If the government just ignores the public then it isn't democracy no matter how many elections you have.
 
BH said:
The USSR had elections every so often. You could theoretically vote no for a candidate or leave the space blank. On occassion a candidate would get more no votes than yes votes or the space left blank not reaching the 50% mark.

Anyone can have elections, even non-fraudulent ones. The big kicker is do those elction results result in changes in policy or creation of new policies the people want to be made? If the government just ignores the public then it isn't democracy no matter how many elections you have.
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Like if the UK government ignored the Brexit vote.
 
While this has been a long time coming, the fact remains that half the ruling political parties in the U.S. think that government by definition is evil and next to useless and they have major media arms daily reinforcing their point with the citizenry.
 
Trausti said:
BH said:
The USSR had elections every so often. You could theoretically vote no for a candidate or leave the space blank. On occassion a candidate would get more no votes than yes votes or the space left blank not reaching the 50% mark.

Anyone can have elections, even non-fraudulent ones. The big kicker is do those elction results result in changes in policy or creation of new policies the people want to be made? If the government just ignores the public then it isn't democracy no matter how many elections you have.
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Like if the UK government ignored the Brexit vote.
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Or refused to call a second vote, once the actual details of what Brexit entails are known.

The Brexit referendum was ridiculous; Nobody, neither the voters nor the politicians, had a clear idea of what a 'leave' vote might mean, because the idea that 'leave' might win was never seriously considered. It was entirely a cynical exercise intended to secure David Cameron's position within the Conservative Party, and no thought was given to the possibility that his faction might not win.

Since the vote, a small but vocal group of 'leave' supporters have declared that democracy would be destroyed if there was a second vote - presumably these people also think that Robert Walpole should still be Prime Minister.

After all, voting once, and then making a semi-permanent change, with no future voting to be allowed for at least several decades, is the epitome of democracy. :rolleyes:
 
bilby said:
Trausti said:
BH said:
The USSR had elections every so often. You could theoretically vote no for a candidate or leave the space blank. On occassion a candidate would get more no votes than yes votes or the space left blank not reaching the 50% mark.

Anyone can have elections, even non-fraudulent ones. The big kicker is do those elction results result in changes in policy or creation of new policies the people want to be made? If the government just ignores the public then it isn't democracy no matter how many elections you have.
Click to expand...

Like if the UK government ignored the Brexit vote.
Click to expand...

Or refused to call a second vote, once the actual details of what Brexit entails are known.

The Brexit referendum was ridiculous; Nobody, neither the voters nor the politicians, had a clear idea of what a 'leave' vote might mean, because the idea that 'leave' might win was never seriously considered. It was entirely a cynical exercise intended to secure David Cameron's position within the Conservative Party, and no thought was given to the possibility that his faction might not win.

Since the vote, a small but vocal group of 'leave' supporters have declared that democracy would be destroyed if there was a second vote - presumably these people also think that Robert Walpole should still be Prime Minister.

After all, voting once, and then making a semi-permanent change, with no future voting to be allowed for at least several decades, is the epitome of democracy. :rolleyes:
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Good grief. So keep having votes until you get the result Bilby and the unelected autocrats in Brussels want. You really don't care for democracy, do you? The arrogance and snobbery you display here is why Brexit won and Trump was elected.
 
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