General Politics Thread

If I recall correctly, Khomeini and his ilk were also opposed to the democratic government of Iran, so it's not that surprising.

Edited by DrunkenNordmann on Aug 8th 2019 at 11:08:39 AM

Welcome to Estalia, gentlemen.

Technically, they are a democracy but that got exposed as a sham when they ignored the results of an election.

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.

This is an ironic question given that there were democratic movements and regimes all over the place after WWII and during the initial stages of the Cold War. The Western democracies put paid to most of them.

I figured. Russia is technically a democracy as well, and China... actually, I don't know if China even tries to cover up its authoritarian-ness, or if it just avoids addressing that particular elephant in the room when dealing with the West.

I was also going to mention Turkey as a technically-a-democracy, but I'm not sure if it's reached that stage yet, since Erdogan failed to win back Ankara even after he ordered a recount. The point being that these are all ostensibly democratic non-Western countries that still receive internal criticism for not being democratic enough.

So in that event, doesn't it mean it's doubly ironic now that authoritarian leaders criticize new pro-Democracy groups as attempts at Western subversion? Or is that just a side-effect of them characterizing all internal resistance against them as Western subversion, perhaps?

I want to say that modern Western governments wouldn't try to suppress these movements since overt colonialism has been discredited and the countries I've mentioned are now major powers in their own right as opposed to just pawns in a wider game against an untouchable enemy (the Soviet Union - to put it another way, I doubt the West would have lift a finger if a major opposition movement arose in the USSR proper, and they didn't do anything to stop the Prague Spring in Czechoslovakia - granted, they didn't do anything to help, either, but that was probably because they wanted to avoid getting nuked in retaliation, and the CIA's previous attempts at subverting communist rule in Albania had backfired horribly), but I'm open to being surprised on that front.

Edited by PresidentStalkeyes on Aug 8th 2019 at 11:59:32 AM

"If you think like a child, you will do a child's work."

Most modern dictatorships claim they're democratic because being openly anti-democratic isn't as popular nowadays.

Watch me destroying my country

Honestly, democracy is more of a sliding scale than a black-and-white divide. Even countries that we take for granted to be democratic, such as the UK and USA, have blatantly undemocratic features in their systems (e. g., electoral colleges and FPTP constituencies) that can result in governments with little to no democratic mandate. Like (ahem) both their current ones.

Turkey and Russia are countries where there is a democratic structure but various aspects of their systems (notably media coverage) has very much been gamed to give one side an advantage. Erdogan's double loss in Istanbul shows that democracy in Turkey hasn't been totally eradicated, just eroded.

To be fair, it's not that uncommon for people to declare America "not a true democracy" because of things like the electoral college and the like. Though, as you point out, this is false in large part due to it being a sliding scale.

For example, even though in the US the most popular-voted person doesn't always win, it should be noted that it is at least 2nd place.

"Any campaign world where an orc samurai can leap off a landcruiser to fight a herd of Bulbasaurs will always have my vote of confidence"

I mean, that's what the term "flawed democracy" was coined for - and I've encountered many supporters of the current flawed system that defend it with "America is not a democracy, it's a republic".

You can probably see the flaws with that statement immediately.

Edited by DrunkenNordmann on Aug 8th 2019 at 1:47:30 PM

Welcome to Estalia, gentlemen.

Being a republic is a pretty meaningless qualifier. North Korea is also a republic, and nobody uses that word to complement it.

The electoral college is something I strongly support as the only true way of guaranteeing equal representation for all — but it has been blatantly played with no attempts to fix it so we might as well switch to popular vote until its destroyed exactly the same way.

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.

I don't think I'd call North Korea a republic, it's for all intents and purposes a defacto absolute monarchy.

A better example of an authoritarian republic would be the Peoples Republic of China, which is both non-democratic and non-monarchal.

"Sandwiches are probably easier to fix than the actual problems" -Hylarn

The difference - as I've been taught over where I live - is that democracy is a form of government, while a republic is a form of state.

For example, the United Kingdom is a monarchy and a democracy, while North Korea's a republic and a dictatorship.

The US is both a republic and a democracy, but you always find some people who think the two are mutually exclusive - which is laughable, considering many republics are democratic.

Edited by DrunkenNordmann on Aug 8th 2019 at 2:20:07 PM

Welcome to Estalia, gentlemen.

This is all true - I wasn't trying to deny that Western nations have their own issues with being insufficiently democratic, they most certainly do - and their human rights records aren't spotless, even if they're pretty good on a global scale. But when internal dissent arises, they're not likely to instantly dismiss it as foreign meddling.

...Although, now that I say that, a lot of folks (both politicians and otherwise) here in my native Britain have of course been cooking up conspiracy theories about the EU sabotaging the Brexit process. I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out that the US Republicans decided to somehow conclude that the Democrats were in cahoots with Russia, which would be hilariously ironic.

"If you think like a child, you will do a child's work."

In politics, I notice, projection happens a lot. The things one is guilty of, are denied, and turned back on the very people who accuse you of it.

Yeah it does. Often it is also disguised by bothsiderism.

As for new democracies, to bring an example, Hungary. Currently nominally still a democracy but "illiberal" to quote the prime minister (The Other Wiki deems it a dominant party system), we've been in our third republic since 1989/1990. This is the longest we've been a republic, to be honest, the previous 2 attempts (shortly after WWI and shortly after WWII) petered out within 1.5 years (the first into a Soviet republic then into a kingdom without a king lead by an admiral without a sea or navy for a steward... the second into Communism), and the switch from Communism was actually fairly peaceful here unlike in Romania, which lends itself to Meet the New Boss.

For years, elections always went to the previous opposition, with each getting a victory but never supermajority so real huge overhauls were difficult. This has not been the case since 2010^note It does not help that when the Socialists, MSZP, won in spring 2006, a few months later in October a speech by then PM Gyurcsány was leaked which admits to them lying their arses off in campaign and, to quote, "we fucked up. Not just a bit, a lot." This was followed by outrage and demonstrations and has tarnished the guy's image even though he's since left the Socialist party and started his own., when Fidesz won over 2/3rds of the seats, and they quickly proceeded to reshape the system (from gerrymandering to election laws to media empire) to make sure they will win again. Which they did. And then again.

Edited by akanesarumara on Aug 8th 2019 at 3:53:26 PM

The term you are wanting is iliberal democracy, russia have all the structure of democracy, not but the culture for it, in part because everytime it wanted it, something scale back.

And yet in political cutlture there is always element of authocracy and democracy in every system, it is more a scaling nature of it.

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"

Yeah I did use that term in my post, I'm just unsure of it because to me the two halves mean the opposite.

You know, those dudes who say "we're not a democracy, we're a constitutional republic" almost always follow up with mentioning something the term "mob rule" when people point out that maybe the needs (and wishes) of the majority should outweigh those of the minority, and I've had to come to the conclusion that that phrase is nothing more than an anti-democratic dogwhistle that is usually employed by right-wingers who don't want a more proportional system that might vote against their interests and political beliefs.

"...in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach."

Yeah it's given me the same feeling too. Speaking of, some joked/were terrified because we technically aren't even a republic anymore since that word was dropped from the official name of the country a few years back (Hungary instead of Republic of Hungary).

I see you were the People's Republic of Hungary before that, so I guess they just wanted to drop the Communist connotations to start with but keep the Republic bit since I see you had (sort of) royalty up till the mid-20th century.

It's the Republic of Ireland, the Republic bit is there to be in pointed contrast to the UK's constitutional monarchy.

"...in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach."

Yep we were people's republic and we were monarchy till pretty late in the 20th century. The things about the points made make sense, I was just surprised because for me it said "republic" because well that was the "form of state" as we call it.

Using the fear of "mob rule" as an argument for checks on democratic representation isn't even a dogwistle. It's quite explicitly an anti-democratic sentiment. Those kinds of arguments have been used to argue against democratic government since at least Ancient Greece, if not longer.

Indeed, most arguments for things like FPTP systems or electoral colleges are explicitly anti-democratic in nature, not implicitly.

You're right about the explicit nature of it. A cursory reading of the Federalist Papers makes that clear.

Which isn't to say of course that mob rule is a good thing. Or that it's actually democracy.

Disgusted, but not surprised

Yes, but I've always been hazy on what the actual distinction between the two is. It doesn't help that I've mostly the heard the term out of the mouths of people who brazenly conflate the two in order to dismiss concerns about processes or systems not being democratically representative.

"...in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach."