"The government of the world’s oldest democracy is, in fact, not democratic." The United States is not, never has been, and was never intended to be a Democracy. We know that from the mouths of the very men who drafted its anti-democratic constitution:



"All communities divide themselves into the few and the many. The first are the rich and the well-born; the other the mass of the people … turbulent and changing, they seldom judge or determine right. Give therefore to the first class a distinct, permanent share in the Government … Nothing but a permanent body can check the imprudence of democracy."(Alexander Hamilton, Speech to the Constitutional Convention, June 1787)



"Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide. "(John Adams)



"Between a balanced republic and a democracy, the difference is like that between order and chaos." (John Marshall)



"We are now forming a Republican form of government. Real Liberty is not found in the extremes of democracy, but in moderate governments. If we incline too much to democracy, we shall soon shoot into a monarchy, or some other form of dictatorship." (Alexander Hamilton)



"…democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths." (James Madison, Federalist No. 10)



One might ask just how many democracies Madison and his colleagues had examined in coming to these sweeping conclusions, or how many other systems of government had not eventually been “violent in their deaths”. But it is clear from their language that they regarded “democracy” as something to be avoided at all costs. And they went about doing just that.



The modern Orwellian use of “democratic” to describe non-democratic government arose only in 1798, paradoxically as a response to Hamilton’s pejorative use of the term against Jefferson’s “Republican Party” (the so-called “Democratic Republican Party”, not to be confused with the modern Republican Party).



In response to the Republicans' claims that Hamilton's Federalists harboured aristocratic attitudes, the Federalists in turned tried to brand Jefferson’s followers as “Democratic-Republicans”, the worst slur they could think of. But the Republicans countered by simply adopting the label as part of their official name.



And so, ten years after ratification of a deliberately non-democratic constitution (in the historical sense), a political party can be seen appropriating the title “Democratic” safe in the knowledge that there was no real threat of actual democracy.



This strategy has been used ever since. The German Democratic Republic (the former East Germany) was in fact a police state. Likewise, to this day the brutal North Korean dictatorship chooses to style itself “The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea”.



Just because an Elite chooses to style its regime “Democratic” doesn’t mean that it's actually Democratic.



And we know with some confidence what the citizens would prefer if ever they were given a free choice in the matter.



To begin with, we know from our Game Theory that citizens' consent for non-democratic "elective" government can NOT be inferred from their strategy of sullen acquiescence. That would require demonstrating that citizens are not acting under conditions of Prisoners’ Dilemma in the face of entrenched political parties and other powerful elite interests opposed to genuine Democracy.



We know from work such as that of Bower et al ("Enraged or Engaged? Preferences for Direct Citizen Participation in Affluent Democracies", 2007) that:



a) in almost all countries a clear majority of respondents agree or strongly agree with the statement “Thinking about politics in [COUNTRY] . . . . Referendums are a good way to decide important political questions”;



b) in countries where there is no outright majority support, a strong plurality of respondents agree or strongly agree (with some having no view); and



c) support is STRONGEST in that country (Switzerland) where people have the MOST experience of such decision-making.



We know from the historical record that in the few cases where citizens HAVE been given a free choice in their system of government (half of US states, German lander, a handful of other jurisdictions) they almost invariably vote for genuine Democracy with the right of recall, veto, initiative and referendum.



(Admittedly in the United States, the democratic States must still operate under the anti-democratic provisions of the Federal constitution and its Supreme Court which - in the name of the "Rule of Law" - insists that Money is Speech and overturns attempts to regulate the role of money in the democratic process. But that's hardly a shortcoming of Democracy.)



Finally, and most importantly, we know that where citizens DO enjoy truly democratic rights they NEVER vote to repeal them, even though it's a straightforward process to initiate a referendum for that purpose. (And indeed in some jurisdictions the attempt has been made . . . and defeated at the ballot box!)



Unlike the system of elitist elective government, genuine Democracy demonstrates the ongoing consent of the citizens being governed.



The last great wave of Populism (that's big-P Populism, not the pejorative small-p populism) in the early 20th century had the legacy of introducing Democracy to almost half the US States.



So, If you want to address the democratic shortcomings of the United States' system of government in the current Populist environment, perhaps a good first step would be to . . . . . campaign for the introduction of Democracy!

