What do we want from democracy?

[Tony L]

You keep making that statement, but it's plain wrong. We live in a democracy. It may not be one that meets your needs / aspirations, but it is one all the same.

It doesn’t meet any rational concept of representation. The only times I have ever received representation in my life is in the EU elections. Every other time my vote was either thrown away at the local constituency level or I was forced to vote tactically against my beliefs and conscience. Literally every time. I’m sorry, but I’m not calling that a “democracy”, even less so in a monarchy. A monarchy FFS!

 

[Seeker_UK]

It doesn’t meet any rational concept of representation. The only times I have ever received representation in my life is in the EU elections. Every other time my vote was either thrown away at the local constituency level or I was forced to vote tactically against my beliefs and conscience. Literally every time. I’m sorry, but I’m not calling that a “democracy”, even less so in a monarchy. A monarchy FFS!

I think branding the UK as not being democratic based on a very small sample set is a bit odd.

 

[Tony L]

I think branding the UK as not being democratic based on a very small sample set is a bit odd.

You maybe need to research your sample sets and explain why the number of votes needed to get a Tory MP into the HoC is so radically different compared to LDs, Greens, UKIP etc. I utterly detest Farage, UKIP and whatever his current vile outlet is, but if people voted for it, and at one point they did in huge numbers, they absolutely deserve representation.

 

[Seeker_UK]

You maybe need to research your sample sets and explain why the number of votes needed to get a Tory MP into the HoC is so radically different compared to LDs, Greens, UKIP etc.

It's just the system adjusting itself from 50+ years of bias in favour of Labour.

https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/electoral-bias-in-the-uk-after-the-2015-general-election/

"At the 2015 election, the problem of electoral bias as far as the Conservatives were concerned not only solved itself, but became a distinct advantage for the party. 2015 is the first election in over 50 years in which the bias in the electoral system has worked substantially more in the Conservatives’ favour than in Labour’s; indeed, it favoured them by as much as it did in the late 1950s."

At some point it will swing back.

I utterly detest Farage, UKIP and whatever his current vile outlet is, but if people voted for it, and at one point they did in huge numbers, they absolutely deserve representation.

They got representation. They had sitting MEPs and we left the EU.

 

[Tony L]

They got representation. They had sitting MEPs and we left the EU.

They got representation under the democratic PR system of the EU. They failed entirely under the UK FPTP system aside from a couple of Tories who defected in a remarkably undemocratic way.

The rest of your post goes nowhere even remotely close to answering my question. I don’t have any use for either Conservative or Labour. I reject both based on over a century of hard evidence. Our electoral process is the equivalent of ignoring the entirety of musical history through to the present and providing the end user with a binary choice between Take That and The Stereophonics. Huge swathes of us very actively want neither. Worse than that there are vast areas of the country that can only have one or the other as they are considered mathematically predetermined/‘safe’. What are you voting for next election, Take That or The Stereophonics? It really is that dumb.

 

[Seeker_UK]

They got representation under the democratic PR system of the EU. They failed entirely under the UK FPTP system aside from a couple of Tories who defected in a remarkably undemocratic way.

You miss the main point of my post. Although unelected in the UK as they were in the UK, UKIP got exactly what it was set up to achieve: force the discussion on EU membership in at least one major party and get the UK out of EU. If that's not being represented, I don't know what is. It also sounds very much like the kind of activism you extol the virtues of, grass roots change, if not delivering the outcome you like.

The rest of your post goes nowhere even remotely close to answering my question.

Well it does insofar as it explains that the pro-Conservative bias in elections is a recent phenomenon.

Our electoral process is the equivalent of ignoring the entirety of musical history through to the present and providing the end user with a binary choice between Take That and The Stereophonics. Huge swathes of us very actively want neither. Worse than that there are vast areas of the country that can only have one or the other as they are considered mathematically predetermined/‘safe’. What are you voting for next election, Take That or The Stereophonics? It really is that dumb.

I'll tell you what I think is dumb, ending up with a government made up of such tiny factions that the only way anything is decided is for coalitions to be made that require compromises you have no control over once you've elected them in. You know, like the LDs did to be in coalition with the Conservatives; LD ended up supporting stuff their voters didn't vote for. PR will give us that every 5 years but on steroids. Personally, I want to know exactly what I'm voting for and if that means voting for the party that only matches part of what I want, I'll vote for them. PR loses that control and won't change the makeup of the UK parliament significantly. Your hated Labour would still have to be part of any "progressive alliance" to beat the Conservatives under PR and so you may as well vote for what they stand for, because as the largest party there, it will almost certainly need to compromise less than the LDs, Greens, PC or SNP to get a sniff of power.

 

[Tony L]

I'll tell you what I think is dumb, ending up with a government made up of such tiny factions that the only way anything is decided is for coalitions to be made that require compromises you have no control over once you've elected them in.

That is consensus. It is how most of reality works outside the cartoon rituals of politics. I’d far prefer to be governed by something with a similar intellect and nuance to science, academia etc. We have to at least think we are better than petty tribalism and work to improve. Be in no doubt, politics here and the USA is dying. The enforced tribalism and division is breaking both countries apart and we look to be heading closer to civil war than reaching any intelligent consensus. You may be perfectly fine with that, but I’m not, and I will continue to speak truth to illegitimate power at every opportunity. I am not alone.

 

[Seanm]

I’ve never understood this stuff about tribalism. Politics is becoming less tribal rather than more as far as I can see.

 

[Seeker_UK]

That is consensus. It is how most of reality works outside the cartoon rituals of politics.

Consensus is what parties are built on. The difference is that compromises and decisions are made before the elections so that the Electorate know what they are voting for.

I’d far prefer to be governed by something with a similar intellect and nuance to science, academia etc. We have to at least think we are better than petty tribalism and work to improve. Be in no doubt, politics here and the USA is dying.

So the LDs choosing their course of action in 2010 that subsequently upset many of their supporters so much they left in droves was nuanced, academic and scientific? Because what you're proposing will be a regular feature of British politics. No thanks.

The enforced tribalism and division is breaking both countries apart

No. The party in power is doing that.

and we look to be heading closer to civil war than reaching any intelligent consensus.

That's just hyperbole.

 

[Seeker_UK]

I’ve never understood this stuff about tribalism. Politics is becoming less tribal rather than more as far as I can see.

ISTM tribalism is OK as long as there's more tribes fighting. The end result is the same though, it only works if the one that comes out on top is the one I support.

 

[Tony L]

So the LDs choosing their course of action in 2010 that subsequently upset many of their supporters so much they left in droves was nuanced, academic and scientific? Because what you're proposing will be a regular feature of British politics. No thanks.

No, they made a mistake, one they have since had the honesty to admit (find another party that owns their errors!).

I will always take a negotiated and balanced compromise over ideological extremism.

The past ten years of Tory rule has proven beyond even the slightest shadow of doubt just how much damage an extreme government without any real checks and balances can cause. Everything they get away with only emboldened them to the extent they now comfortably break laws, both local and international, and line their and their donors pockets at our expense in open view. Boris Johnson and Donald Trump are the end result of the failed binary FPTP system. Leaders so batshit crazy, selfish and destructive they would never be believable in works of political fiction, yet here we are. The systemic failure is absolute. The blue screen has gone, the PSU is on fire. Our hatred of experts now so absolute only a cartoon culture war between Little Lord Snooty and Citizen Smith will do. That is apparently our intellectual level. Well done, thanks for helping getting us here.

 

[Seeker_UK]

I will always take a negotiated and balanced compromise over ideological extremism.

Even if it results in something you didn't vote for?

As for "ideological extremism", I thought you had Labour down as the product of focus groups? Seems they're the exact opposite of that, then. Anyway, it's all relative; the Greens are as ideologically driven as the Conservatives, it's just one ideology you like, and one you don't.

The past ten years of Tory rule has proven beyond even the slightest shadow of doubt just how much damage an extreme government without any real checks and balances can cause. Everything they get away with only emboldened them to the extent they now comfortably break laws, both local and international, and line their and their donors pockets at our expense in open view. Boris Johnson and Donald Trump are the end result of the failed binary FPTP system. Leaders so batshit crazy, selfish and destructive they would never be believable in works of political fiction, yet here we are. The systemic failure is absolute. The blue screen has gone, the PSU is on fire. Our hatred of experts now so absolute only a cartoon culture war between Little Lord Snooty and Citizen Smith will do. That is apparently our intellectual level. Well done, thanks for helping getting us here.

A change to PR, or any flavour of PR on its own will not change that.

 

[Tony L]

Even if it results in something you didn't vote for?

Yes, of course. I accept I am but one voice in a crowd, I just want to be heard, not be a dictator. Like so many millions I currently have no voice. I have no tempering effect on Johnson’s criminality, grift and extreme-right nationalism as my vote did not result in any representation. It really is that simple. My only option is to help fund legal action against this shower of shit as my vote is literally worthless. It is a waste of my time and an insult to my intelligence. My only representation is via Good Law Project, Led By Donkey, Stop Funding Hate, Black Lives Matter, Extinction Rebellion etc. Mainstream politics is totally deaf and irrelevant and irrelevant to me. FPTP results in the total disenfranchisement of millions of us who don’t fit in either establishment box.

 

[eternumviti]

More along the lines of vTaiwan, I think. Deliberative consensus-building, based on Polis software.

Polis software sounds like a bit of a con. I could tell you what large groups of people gathered together think. It's generally written on their placards.

If they're not holding placards, they're thinking 'this band's shit', 'where's the bar' or 'how can I score some MDMA'.

 

[laughingboy]

Polis software sounds like a bit of a con. I could tell you what large groups of people gathered together think. It's generally written on their placards.

If they're not holding placards, they're thinking 'this band's shit', 'where's the bar' or 'how can I score some MDMA'.

Or, more often, why isn't this traffic moving?

The idea - which is what is interesting, rather than the particular implementation - is to seek out areas of begrudging acceptance between groups of people who normally disagree. Not to seek agreement, but to find common areas of 'that's not what I want ideally but I'd be willing to put up with it'.

I can't see how that's a con.

 

[Yank]

Or, more often, why isn't this traffic moving?

The idea - which is what is interesting, rather than the particular implementation - is to seek out areas of begrudging acceptance between groups of people who normally disagree. Not to seek agreement, but to find common areas of 'that's not what I want ideally but I'd be willing to put up with it'.

I can't see how that's a con.

That is brought to a standstill when one side makes an "all-or-nothing no-compromises" stand, such as the US GOP has done over the past 25 years or so.

 

[laughingboy]

That is brought to a standstill when one side makes an "all-or-nothing no-compromises" stand, such as the US GOP has done over the past 25 years or so.

Well, yes, if you have two legislatures, each in different hands, and one side refuses to cooperate, you have a personnel problem disguised as a system problem.

But I was talking about vTaiwan, one of the most interesting experiments in online-offline 'direct democracy' using modern technology. See video upthread or read a description here.

 

[vince rocker]

I will always take a negotiated and balanced compromise over ideological extremism.

"Ideological extremism" could be reframed as "driven by principles". I would rather a party that bases its policies on established and known principles than short-term, focus group "triangulation", shifting about looking for a mythical centre ground or even worse opportunism driven only by personal enrichment. Principles are a good thing for a party, even if you don't agree with them you know where they stand and how they will act in the future.

Yes, of course. I accept I am but one voice in a crowd, I just want to be heard, not be a dictator. Like so many millions I currently have no voice. I have no tempering effect on Johnson’s criminality, grift and extreme-right nationalism as my vote did not result in any representation. It really is that simple. My only option is to help fund legal action against this shower of shit as my vote is literally worthless. It is a waste of my time and an insult to my intelligence. My only representation is via Good Law Project, Led By Donkey, Stop Funding Hate, Black Lives Matter, Extinction Rebellion etc. Mainstream politics is totally deaf and irrelevant and irrelevant to me. FPTP results in the total disenfranchisement of millions of us who don’t fit in either establishment box.

Two things about this.
1. I live in what is I think the next-door constituency to you and in 2017 my vote did count - James Frith was elected with a 12.5% swing. I usually vote Green but on this occasion it was obvious Frith had a good chance of overturning the Tory majority, I voted for him and it made a difference*. It could happen in your constituency too, but not if you remove yourself from the process.
2. Democracy is not just about what happens in Parliament and a vote every 5 years. It is a continuous process that we can support all the time, by funding organisations as you do, local and national campaigning and activity, even talking to neighbours and friends. Some populist right-wing parties recognise this and are always working and making themselves visible on small-scale community issues. For example "Radcliffe First" are big in that area of Bury by doing just this and may well wipe out Labour in May.

I can understand that you feel powerless as an individual, we all are, the answer to that is to be part of collective action. The democracy we have is obviously a long long way from perfect but "All that is required for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing".

* James Frith is a good guy, he canvassed my house in 2017. I opened the door, he saw and heard I was playing vinyl and we talked about music and turntables for 10 minutes, his constituency workers had to drag him away to knock on the next door. Of course my support for him was based on politics

 

[Sue Pertwee-Tyr]

Well, yes, if you have two legislatures, each in different hands, and one side refuses to cooperate, you have a personnel problem disguised as a system problem.

That's an interesting take, and one that resonates with me. It supports my post, upthread, about the dire quality of the candidates we get to vote for. If we want to get principles back into politics, we have to find a way to stop this unprincipled behaviour being rewarded, either electorally or financially.

 

[laughingboy]

That's an interesting take, and one that resonates with me. It supports my post, upthread, about the dire quality of the candidates we get to vote for. If we want to get principles back into politics, we have to find a way to stop this unprincipled behaviour being rewarded, either electorally or financially.

If we cast our mind back to 2014, when the Conservatives were worried about how the threat of UKIP might split their vote in the 2015 election, we find that there were some Conservatives advocating for mandatory primaries (whether open or closed) to select party candidates for each seat. This piece in ConservativeHome.com, for example, calls the rise of UKIP a 'crisis'. It echoes Seeker_UK's arguments in favour of keeping FPTP (see its last two paragraphs) but argues that there is a need to inject more democracy at the candidate selection stage.

We should require parties to hold primaries to select their candidates for each seat, at every election, with any party member able to challenge for their party’s nomination. That way even in the safest seats voters would be able to have their say. MPs would be able to win a much more emphatic democratic mandate to represent their constituents in Westminster.

I'm sure that it would improve the quality of the candidates we get to vote for, and the MP's accountability to their constituents. Are there any downsides?