[lbo-talk] The "Rational" Voter

Tayssir John Gabbour tayssir.john at googlemail.com
Sun Mar 25 02:22:39 PDT 2007


On 3/25/07, Shane Mage <shmage at pipeline.com> wrote:
> How much brain power does it take to recognize that the democratic
> system of choosing public officials without the stupidity of elections
> is simply random selection by lot, as practised by the Athenian inventors
> of democracy (of course with the sanction of ostracism by popular
> referendum in case of misconduct)?

Dunno about that... One useful mental device I use is to think from the perspective of a corporation, because they're unusually empowered in society to make decisions. So how do they deal with representatives, in some partnership, standards-making body, or whatever? Are they resigned to reps who either "lead" them like some president, or are chosen randomly?

Corporations reserve the right to fire or at least pull their reps. None of this "impeachment" lunacy. If the rep somehow gets away with being unaccountable to the corporation, due to political connections or whatever... that's a problem, as far as a rational corporation is concerned.

So in applying this to polity, what if you could easily fire your reps, so they no longer represent you? Or for that matter, what if you could fire your workplace manager? Etc.

Tayssir



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