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Joining and leaving the EU is a good example of a situation where direct democracy fails hard. Even politicians, who ostensibly get selected for their ability in understanding complicated political and economic situations barely had any idea what would happen after joining. Popular referendums for something no normal person has a hope of understanding are a really terrible idea, and direct democracy would just make that same poo poo happen in every complex situation.
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Jun 20, 2020 15:39
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| # ¿ May 11, 2024 19:50 |
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OwlFancier posted:I again find it extremely weird to suggest that representative governments doing both of those things is somehow a problem with direct democracy... My point is that the idea behind representative democracy is that your elected representatives at least should be more knowledgeable than you in extremely complex political situations because that's their entire job. Your average voter has absolutely no idea what the EU even is in practice. e: This is also why I find it a loving hideously cowardly act that Cameron went ahead with the referendum. Making choices like that is literally what his entire government existed for. Same goes for the referendums to join we had in the 90s. Like asking people to choose something they have no hope of grasping the consequences of is some really terrible political attempt at responsibility shifting. Nurge fucked around with this message at 16:52 on Jun 20, 2020 |
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Jun 20, 2020 16:47
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OwlFancier posted:I would suggest that that is because the EU is a structure built by decades of representative governments. So it isn't really surprising to suggest that it is only really understandable to them (if at all) and also that this is indicative of a problem with representative governments, because how can you meaningfully vote for a representative if the thing you are voting for them to do is completely incomprehensible to you? How would you ensure they are knowledgeable or have your best interests in mind if you have no understanding of their job? I agree that it would work just fine in a lot of situations. Tearing down the representative structures isn't something that's realistically going to happen in the foreseeable future though. There could be a tiered system where say international and budgetary issues etc. would be handled by representation and a lot of the more mundane issues could be up to popular vote. But who is going to decide what's too complex for people to vote on directly? I honestly wouldn't be surprised if something like this eventually happens (or possibly even full direct representation on a long enough timeline), but it's not without its problems.
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Jun 20, 2020 17:01
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