An Interesting Podcast - 'Democracy is Broken'

Dec 21, 2018

Democracy is broken... discuss!

• ‘will of the people’
• voting in dictatorships
• coalition governments
• young people not voting

What do we mean by democracy?

• representative democracy
• how reps are elected - first past the post or PR
• • end up with odd things - Germany in 2018 with Bundestag - 709 

Your vote only counts if:

• you vote for the winning party - or in the coalition
• and your person needs to be in govt
• then senior enough position
• but have to do what the party wants and not your constituents (of which only a small % actually voted for you….)

But who is allowed to vote?

• age limits
• resident v citizen
• non resident citizens
• criminal record

Big issue

• young people do not vote

What are people voting for?

• party?
• rep for the area?
• penalties for lying - none - either do not get in power...

Representing an area - constituency problem

• may only be voted in by a tiny majority, and not 51% - do you represent everyone or just the ones who voted for you

Coalition

• no one voted for the coalition - or its policies - what on earth did people vote for

King for the period - even if the context changes, have the right to rule

• can kill the king…. on the election cycle

Temptation to stay in office

• big benefits if run things
• if tempted to cheat, then even more tempted to stay in power
• those who come in next would have big incentive to investigate and show your past wrong-doing,.. and then do the same with the same incentive