Tuesday, September 20, 2016
Expertise or Popularity?
Plato criticizes democracy throughout The Republic. In Chapter 8, for example, he compares the state to a ship. He argues that it is better to have a captain knowledgeable about navigation steer the ship rather than untrained crewmembers. The crewmembers may be able to persuade the owners to let them sail the ship, but without the proper expertise, the ship will not reach its destination. In other words, Plato argues that democracy rewards popularity over expertise, but it is expertise that is essential for good government. Is he right? Consider some examples from class. Can democracy deal with such long-term issues as global warming when most people would prefer to ignore them? Can it deal with economic recovery when most citizens don't understand economic theory? Or can you give a point in democracy's favor?
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ReplyDeleteIn Chapter 8 of The Republic Plato demonstrates one of democracy’s flaws, which is that it can allow decisions to be made or people to be elected based on popularity instead of merit. One example Plato gives which shows the need for expertise in government is the comparison of government to a ship. The captain must be chosen over the crew members to steer the ship simply because he has knowledge of navigation while the crew doesn’t. Therefore, Plato argues, we can’t allow democracy to let unqualified leaders make important decisions that will negatively affect us, and expertise should determine who runs government. I certainly agree with Plato that we should only let qualified personnel run our government, as they’re the only ones who can ‘steer us in the right direction’. An example we discussed in class which illustrates this point is the global warming issue. One candidate who is knowledgeable of the effects of global warming would stress the need to address it immediately and implement change to fight it, while a candidate who knows nothing about global warming would try to persuade people to ignore it. As mentioned in class, the latter candidate may win an election because voters may find avoiding a complex issue appealing. In this case, popularity winning over expertise directly contributes to the harming of the planet. To further support Plato, I will consider a potential situation within Hawken. Hawken Senate elections are right around the corner, and I want to run for a vacant position. In order to get elected, I will run on a platform of bringing back crispitos and eliminating the dress code. To most if not all students, these ideas are attractive. However, I have no prior experience in student government or anything that might help me succeed in the Senate. My popular yet unrealistic platform might be enough to get me elected over someone who is much more qualified than I am, which would be detrimental for the community. While Plato’s critique is very sound, I think on some level it underestimates the ability of human beings to make a collectively beneficial decision through common sense. For example, I don’t envision any situation where we might as a whole choose the crew members to sail the ship instead of the captain despite the protests of the crew members. Similarly, you might expect Hawken students to realize that my campaign promises aren't very feasible and vote for another candidate. This common sense isn’t always reliable though, and we can never be sure democracy will make the right decision.
ReplyDeleteWhile there is no doubt that expertise is essential for an effective government, democratic principles are also essential in maintaining accountability towards the citizens. In the Republic, Socrates concludes that the best form of government is an aristocracy run by moral philosophers. His reasoning for this is that the average citizen is not ruled by reason, and those who are ruled by reason will enact the best policies for the good of the entire community. However, as I mentioned in my first blog post, the person who is ruled by reason is inherently selfish and immoral because reasonable people will be concerned with benefitting themselves, not others. When talking about government, the practicality of these theories is important. While Socrates’s perfect government looks good on paper, it will be very easy for these philosopher kings to turn into dictators. There are numerous examples of this. One only needs to look at people such as Hitler, Stalin, Kim-Jong Un, Fidel Castro, Trujillo, Bashar Al-Assad, etc, to know that bad things tend to happen when people are given too much power. Socrates would then make the claim that these people were not truly philosophers. However, we have no idea if somebody knows the truth or is ruled by reason. Most of the people who become dictators start out as reformers acting in the interest of the community. When looking at history, the phrase “Absolute power corrupts absolutely” rings true. Another point brought up by Socrates and by Dr. Ialacci in class is that democracy devolves into populism, where the short term and ever-changing desires of the masses control policy decisions, rather than the experts who should be trusted with making the right decisions. When a democracy devolves to this, yes it will be very difficult to deal with long-term issues such as global warming. I agree with Adam that this is a valid concern. But democracy, even with its flaws, is the best government form because this the only system that ensures accountability to the citizens. In class, Dr. Ialacci brought up China, which is dealing with global warming because its government is not elected. I think China is an excellent example. I am reminded of an article I read in the Economist a few months ago that talked about this phenomenon. China, which is not by any means democratic, still suffers from corruption, pollution, crippling equality, and daily infringements on the freedoms we take for granted in the United States. However, in recent years, citizens have been more comfortable speaking out against the government and have been demanding a more democratic government. This is what prompted the Chinese to take these small reforms. The benefits of a democracy far outweigh the negatives because this system is the only way to ensure that the rulers always act in the common good.
ReplyDeleteThe debate over democracy is a debate that has existed for decades. Not only has it existed for decades, but sides have been swapped for almost as long as it has been debated. Plato starts his argument, in Chapter 8 of The Republic, with the idea that democracy - compared to other forms of government - simply isn’t good enough. Although we do live under a democratic government here in the United States, I do find the concerns stated by Plato to be quite surprisingly accurate in their prescriptions for the future of democracy. In The Republic, Plato voices his concerns on democracy through the analogy of the ship. Plato predicts that a completely democratic ship - one run purely by incompetent crew members - is bound to be worse than one run by a competent captain. Although we often see rule by majority as a good thing in our world, I find it often true that the rule of an incompetent majority is just simply wrong. This situation is best illustrated in long term and political and environmental policy decisions. As the question itself asks, the often most difficult part of addressing democracy and its effectiveness lies in the area of participation, particularly on issues that seem to be of no importance to the rest of the general public. The answer is, of course, that democracy cannot deal with such a pitfall - hence our current low 40s participation rate in non-presidential year elections. The unfortunate implication of this is that, even if one is to believe that the opinion of the community is always correct and should dictate the actions of the governing, it's often impossible to gauge the public opinion on an issue - taking away the only benefit of democracy. Some of the most prominent examples of this in action would be in the realm of complex and long term issues - particularly economic issues. This is especially obvious in times of recession, when the entire public seems to have the opinion that it is necessary to save money while economic theorists would suggest that spending is necessary to revive the job market and return the economy to its former state. Of course, all of this assumes a pure voting population - which in reality is also non-existent. In reality, we are often faced with the troubling idea that even in the world of a perfect democratic system, those in use of the system often abuse and shape it such that it fits their interests - not even that of the people. Ultimately, it seems obvious, that Plato is right and democracy, given the combination of an incompetent majority and abysmal voting population that it empirically possesses, can never be the perfect form of government that it is often praised to be.
ReplyDeletePlato’s idea that democracy can never work because it is always the idea or person that is popular among the masses that wins even when the majority of people do not fully understand the relevant issues holds merit as a major weakness of democracy but does not fully debunk it. In reality when a decision is made democratically if that decision does not work out then those people are able to recognize their mistake and go with what the new most popular choice is, eventually they will come around to the choice that the experts already knew was the best. In situations like this where time is not too severely restricted democracy is fully functional. So while Plato’s argument about the inexpertise of the general populace is relevant in times of crisis, during times free of calamity democracy works. The other situation where democracy works is when the voting group is small enough that they either all understand or can quickly learn the information relevant to their vote, this strategy begins to fail even at the relatively small scale of a city state however so it is not an effective counter to Plato’s argument.
ReplyDeleteExpertise as a determinant of who should be in power is also heavily flawed. The first question to ask is, who chooses the experts? If they are chosen by the populace as a whole then we run into the same flaws experienced with democracy and the experts are just as likely to be popular leaders as they are to be experts. If some dictator or council of individuals is assigned to choose them, then it is just another iteration of, how do we know they are qualified? In fact the only people with sufficient knowledge to determine who the experts are is the group of experts themselves. But since the general populace has no way to distinguish between genuine experts and demagogues it comes back done to using some sort of democratic system to choose who is probably the best expert. So while Democracy itself has its flaws it is also the most effective way to achieve the expertise without the use of tyrannical experts.
In chapter 8, Plato makes some bold claims and heavy criticisms about democracy and how his system of government, which is based on expertise, is better. In order to fully be capable of developing a response, we will need to understand Plato’s assumptions and reasoning about a moral society. First, let’s dissect Plato’s own moral society/system of government that he defends throughout The Republic. Plato’s society is based on two premises. The first premise is that each person can truly only be an expert at one job, since people can only do it properly if they focus on one thing(e.g. a shepherd can only be shepherd, a builder can only build things, and a shoemaker can only make shoes). The second premise is that morality is defined as “doing one’s own job” (433a). Expanding on these, Plato describes how the people in the community can fit into three classes: the guardians, which consist of the people who are wise and understand how rule over the community and make big decisions; the warriors, which consist of people who have courage and will protect the community; and the laborers, who are the common folk and do their jobs properly. At the top of the hierarchy is the philosopher king who is able to rule the community since he understands the truth and will always look for it (if you know the truth or are constantly looking for the truth, you will inevitably make the right decisions).
ReplyDeleteWhile this society seems perfect on the surface, in reality this system is fundamentally broken. To begin with, the initial premise that a person can only do one job to do it properly and expertly is simply false, since a person is capable of doing more than one job properly and effectively. For instance, a specific job can require virtually the same skills as another job (i.e. a cab driver and a bus driver) and thus are interchangeable or a certain job (i.e. a consultant who consults for many companies) might require the skills and knowledge from a variety of jobs. In addition, Plato fails to take reality into account. In the real world there will be people in powerful positions who will use the system to their advantage and the disadvantage of their community.
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ReplyDeleteNow let’s take a look at Plato’s view and criticisms of democracy. Plato begins his argument by asserting that in a democracy “The members of the community are autonomous [and] the community is informed by independence and freedom of speech, and everybody has the right to do as he chooses” (296). He goes on to claiming that people can do anything they want and even says that criminals can choose to remain free in the community with nobody caring. Plato then discusses the political system and how anyone can aspire to taking part in the government, despite their expertise. As he states, the system “doesn't care what kinds of provenance people had before coming to government; As long as one claims to be sympathetic to the general populace" (297). Plato’s last point about democracy is that it bad desires are equally valued in respect to good desires. Thus desires like greed, lust and immorality are equal to thee desires for knowledge and morality.
With the Plato’s view on democracy laid out, we can examine the validity of his points. Let’s start with determining how a democracy will be set up. In the context of this problem, we will adopt the system that Plato attempts to explain: a representative democracy. A representative democracy is where individuals of a society vote for elected officials that will govern the society in a vote of majority, or as Plato would describe, popularity. Since government officials are elected need the citizens’ approval, they must make laws that will meet the citizens’ needs and interests. If citizens then do not see that the officials looking after their needs and interests, they will elect different officials that more suited for the job.
Now that we understand the democratic system, we will now evaluate the needs and desires of the citizens and the amount of autonomy an individual will receive. A democracy’s main goal is to balance all the different desires its citizens have. It is obvious though that a person’s strongest desires stem from their basic needs. Although Plato asserts that democracies only care about maximizing freedom, he fails to take into to account the primary function of any government, to offer security and protection for its citizens. Whereas freedom allows people to fulfill their desires and live their lives how they determine, security protects citizens from external and internal threats and risks. Examples of security include an army to protect the citizens, laws to ensure economic sustainability and job security, a justice system to keep criminals off the street and even driving laws to prevent car crashes. While freedom in its pure form can lead to anarchy and as Plato would describe, an inept government controlled by desire and immorality, with the addition of security Plato’s arguments about democracy lose much of their strength. In conclusion, it is clear that democracy is a better form of government than Plato’s “moral society.”