[lit-ideas] Re: Giving Thanksgiving/Adorno and TAP

  • From: Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx>
  • To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Mon, 6 Dec 2010 05:19:11 -0800 (PST)





It seems to me that the people who voted for "dictatorship" would in effect be 
voting for authoritarian government. The concept of dictatorship entails ruling 
without the consent of the people, which means that the people cannot logically 
give consent to being ruled without their consent. Similarly, I can empower 
another person to act on my behalf (e.g. Power of Attorney) but I cannot 
logically agree to something being done against my will. 
 
It is, of course, possible to imagine such a vote taking place, but the result 
would not be what was intended, i.e. the elected "dictator" would in fact not, 
at that point in time, be a dictator. He would only become a dictator when and 
if the consent ceased to exist.
 
O.K.


--- On Sun, 12/5/10, Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:


From: Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Giving Thanksgiving/Adorno and TAP
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Sunday, December 5, 2010, 6:53 PM




> Quoting Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx>:
> 
> > Is it even possible to "vote for dictatorship" ? 

Many years ago, I wrote to Popper giving an overlong argument to show that P's 
'paradox of democracy' is not a logical paradox. By implication, I suggested, 
it is logically possible to "vote for dictatorship".

He politely described my argument as "perhaps a little too sophisticated" 
-others might have described it as over-involved. As to whether his 'paradox of 
democracy' is a logical paradox, Popper answered that his paradox of democracy 
was essentially "a practical affair". Athough Hitler did not attain 50% of the 
vote, it was possible that he could have attained 50% of the vote - it is 
possible for a democracy to commit suicide. There are, he added 
parenthetically, "still some suicidal tendencies in Germany".

I think his reply is correct: just as it is possible to commit suicide, it is 
possible to vote for dictatorship. The 'paradox of democracy' is not a logical 
paradox but a practical affair. Voting for a dictatorship is not a 
contradiction in terms either: it is not a contradiction to take an action that 
removes the further power to take that action. Suicide is an example. So is the 
action of a body that votes to permanently dissolve itself or hand its powers 
over to another body. So is making a gift to another.

But should a democrat ever vote 'suicidally' - for a dictatorship? Never, in 
Popper's view, because such an action is in conflict with democratic 
principles. It is in this "practical" sense that such a suicidal action is a 
paradox - though it is not a paradox or contradiction in terms in any strict 
logical sense.

There is a deeper issue here. Popper is against the widespread 'majoritarian' 
theory of democracy and wishes to replace it with a theory of democracy that 
sees democracy not as 'majority rules' but as the ability to vote out the 
government. It is the majoritarian or 'majority rules' theory of democracy that 
gives rise to the paradox: for, in a state where over 50% have voted for 
dictatorship, a 'majoritarian' democrat would seem bound by their theory of 
democracy to accept the dictatorship. For those democrats who see democracy as 
the ability to vote out the government, their theory of democracy does not 
require them to accept the dictatorship. In fact, just as bloodshed is 
justified to overthrow a dictatorship, it is seemingly justified on Popper's 
view to resist or overthrow a dictatorship* - even one elected by the majority. 
If this seems 'paradoxical', it is only paradoxical given a 'majority rules' 
theory of democracy. It is unparadoxical and indeed
self-consistent within a theory of democracy that sees it as constituted by the 
ability to get rid of the government without bloodshed but where violence is 
justified in defence of this.

That democracy is based on 'revocable consent', as opposed to 'irrevocable 
consent', is linked to the fallibilism. Just as fallibilism in the field of 
knowledge leads us to search out possible errors in our theories in order to 
correct them, in the field of politics it leads us not to commit irrevocacbly 
to what may be mistaken as we therefore diminish our ability to correct our 
mistakes.

--- On Sun, 5/12/10, Walter C. Okshevsky <wokshevs@xxxxxx> wrote:

> > More like a self-referential paradox. 

Not in a strictly logical sense. Again it is no more a self-referential paradox 
than suicide [which might be described as depending on life so as to end life].

Donal
*Library took back volume 1 of OS, so cannot now check this





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