This statement (re. majoritarianism, not me being nuts) is simply not true. US is one the few systems thath requires a majority (as opposed to getting a proportional number of votes) to get to any political office. That is majoritarianism, pure and simple - not to be confused with "representativeness" which is a bit fuzzier.
True, the Supreme Court is appointed, but that is not such a bad thing, at least in theory. But if you add state and local governments to the mix, you will find that most political offcies are elected by the majority rule. That is an undeniable fact.
It also an undenibale fact that people who get elected received the majority of the popular votes most of the time, although it is theoretically possible (but extrememly rare) that a candidate receiving a slightly fewer than the majority votes (cf. Bush) can also get elected due to gerrymandering or the electoral college system. But such manipulations of the popular vote may alter the results of this or that election, not a trivial thing, but they do not alter the basic fact that elected representatives do have the support of the majority of the voters. This would not change even if we factor in the non-voting population, since ther is no reason to belive that non-voters as a group are much different fromvoters (in fact, those who registered under the Motor Voter bill tended to so so as Republicans).
Of coursem we can debate whether such political choices do or do not represent "true" political preferences of the population. I am inclined to belive that there is no such a thing as "true" political preference existing outside the actually existing political alternatives and choices that people make (just as there is no ideas or essences of things outside the existing material objects). That is to say that under most circumstances the voters will tend to give their support to one of the existing political alternatves rather than opting for non-existing ones that may (or may not) better represent their "true" prefrences. People genrally do not demand what they cannot see as possible or available - 20 years ago nobody demanded mobile phones because the supply was simply not there - even though the idea of a CB communication or a walkie talkie was there. The demand was created by the supply and marketing. Ditto for the demand for political representatives. In other words, political choices are a supply -dirven not a deman-driven phenomenon.
>
> Yes, in the face of overwhelming propanda, people often adapt
> reactionary views.
> And in general, I suspect popular opinion is as reactionary
> as it is in
> response to reactionary circumstances. There is a tendency of
I was already labeled misanthropic crank for espousing similar opinions on this forum, so I do not have much to loose from seconding your opinion. I would only add that such views are not a result of propaganda in the meaning of something implanted in their minds against their will, but rather a product of what some sociologists call "stock knowledge" or conformity to the conventional views and the status quo. People generally do not demand something that they do not see as being within the range of options available to them.
>
> You will note that capitalism never relies totally in the shaping of
> popular opinion - it alsways incorporates some means or another of
> thwarting popular will. Reactionaries fear democracy.
Most regimes do that, no? The Roman Catholic church was quite skillful in incorporating local religious beliefs as it expanded its spehere of influence, and re-defining them as "christian." The Soviets did the same thing with peasant communitarianism, taylorism, and cartelization of industry - which they re-christend "marxsim-leninism" (Karl must have been turning in his grave).
>
> We will never have direct democracy - either face to face or
> electronic
> - because there is not world enough and time for everydody to be
> involved in every decision that affects them, let alone to be
> involved
> intelligently and thoughtfully. But you don't want a "Roberts
Yes, it is called bounded rationality and high transaction cost of obtaining full information. Oliver Williamson used it to argue against the supposed efficiency of the markets (i.e. interaction among independent agents) - and claiming that hierarchies are more efficient. Judging form the ubiquity of hierarchies and scarity of egalitarian forms of interaction, he must have been up to something.
> And there is something Doug said I want to deal with:
>
> > There's a strange conception of democracy you often hear
> among direct
> > action types. We need more of it - less mediated, less
> blunted, more
> > spontaneous. But it seems to apply only to a small, preselected
> > population. Democracy in the U.S. could mean more theocracy
> and fewer
> > civil liberties. But surely the direct democrats don't want
> that. So
> > how can this direct democracy or consensus model apply to any
> > population with significantly divergent interests or beliefs?
I tend to belive that the problem is with the question, not with the answer. The "How do we select leaders who will best represent public interest?" is NOT the right question to ask. It implies a ceratin form of teleology or at least a superhujman ability to foresee the future. It is like asking "Whate were the best traits to predispose reptiles to evolve into primates?" - you cannot answer it, excpet form the hindsight.
A better question is "How do we get rid of the leaders who harm public interest?" The fear of being fired for non-performance is what supposedly keeps employees performing their duties to the organization - so it is reasonable to expect the same in politics. Our political system would be much more responsive to public demands (i.e. representative) if, say, we randomly selected or representatives from a pool of qualified candidates, and redirect all the resources and energies now consuked by elections to building an institution of no-confidence vote that would allow sacking or suspending any representative at any time, if enough people cast their no-confidence vote.
Wojtek