Before you drop your opinion, care to think atleast think about it. The problem with two party systems is that both often parties stand for things that you like and are against. But you need to chose one. The problem with multiparty system that consists of more parties then two is that they use to form coalitions of two fronts. In most cases Left and Right, but sometimes the big VS the small. An example is Finland where the biggest left party and the biggest right party forms a coalition together consisting of 70% of the total votes. Not really what the voters have hoped for. A one party system where the people decides whats going on in the country is probably a much better decision if it's rightly implemented. The Soviet Union had a hierarchial council system consisting of low-level councils communicating district or city councils communicating with region councils communicating with republic councils which communicated with the government. Each council decided which member would represent them in the one step above council. The only problem was that the toplevel had too much power of the underdog councils. They fired those that they didn't like and replaced them with some puppets. However, if the members are only manipulated from the downlevel, I see no problem in this theory. People can come with their ideas to the lowlevel councils which can make a decision or pass it up to some upperlevel council. They can also vote for who to sit in the lowlevel councils(much easier when the one you are voting for are someone from your local area than someone you personally don't know a shit about). If it's rightly implemented, it can be a pure democratic system.
The discussion sounds quite interesting and I must say that latehorn has started a nice thread. Democracy is described as for the people, of the people and by the people... there are a lot of loop holes in whatever system of demcracy is implemented, but untill a utopian culture is not found its difficult to find a solution to this problem. the problem is not the system of democracy the problem are the people who run the functions of the democracy. Untill n unless people are taught about the ethics of democracy, it is difficult for the world to find the real democratic state.
Democracy just means you get to choose which asshole will rule over you. Politians are so crooked in every country now days. Still better than a dictatorship because then you almost always have a suckful country. Sometimes you can get lucky with a dictatorship if the dictator does good by the people... like Singapore and United Arab Emirates.
Democracy is not viable in a human society. Humankind has been in existence for around 6500 years and what a mess we have made. Does anyone really believe we are going to behave any differently, going by what we have done already? One government wordlwide is the only solution and also for that government not to be ruled by a man. Our Bible says that this is going to happen and there is nothing we can do to prevent it. We can either accept it and work with it, or be affected by it indefinitely. There is little time left to be sitting on the fence. Make your stand now and realise what beholds us all in the very near future.
Good thread, Latehorn. I don't think a one-party system is a good alternative to some of the weaknesses of either a two-party, majority based system (England or United States) or pluralist, multi-party systems, such as the coalition governments of the nordic countries, as well as a good many other European States. In the end, I am a fan of pluralist systems and coalition governments, provided the voter competition is in the right direction. Where coalitions tend to the center, I think the fruitful alliance of what would seem on the surface to be ideological or material foes - such as the urban working class with the rural middle class of the larger family and commercial interests - can obtain a situation where ideology becomes less salient than simply getting things done for the good of the country (your own country being a great example, post-WWI). Reforms made on pragmatic, and not radical or revolutionary, grounds. On the other hand, where the center is locked up - as in Italy, for a good many post-WWII governments, then voter competitition necessarily goes outward - to reach increasingly radical elements. Ideology becomes extremely salient and nothing gets done. The unrest and collapse of numerous governments, and the extra-parliamentary political violence exhibited from both left and right is testament to this.
May I ask you why? Probably because the history tells us that one-party regimes ain't effective. But that was communist regimes. I was thinking about keeping the economical structure, but replacing the powerstructure. A one party system may sound limited, but it's exactly the opposite. A party for all thoughts and all suggestions. 100% of the people get political power, instead of having 52% of the peoples votes to decide who's the few guts that can make decisions and suggestions in 4 years. Coalition governments sets a brake for development and reaction, making the government a sluggish force.
Your bible, not my bible, not the chinese bible, not the middle east bible, not the jewish bible, not the african bible. Why do you use your bible as a universal book? The bible is fake, just as the quoran and other crappy religious book, any person with half a brain knows this. You might one a dictator like bush ,because he is republican-conservative-christian thats why, what about a democrat atheist liberal dictator? how about that? how about a muslim dictator? how about a catholic dictator? stop thinking about yourself you neo-con and I pooh on your bible.
The term "Paris Commune" (French: La Commune de Paris) originally referred to the government of Paris during the French Revolution. However, the term more commonly refers to the socialist government that briefly ruled Paris from March 18 (more formally from March 26) to May 28, 1871. In a formal sense the Paris Commune of 1871 was simply the local authority (council of a town or district — French "commune") which exercised power in Paris for two months in the spring of 1871. But the conditions in which it was formed, its controversial decrees and tortured end make it one of the more important political episodes of the time. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Commune Governments represent economical interest of different groups in the society, if this government suppose to represent the majority, how are you going to keep the same economical system?
1. goverment by the people? where? 2. "political or social unit", no such a thing. 3. "The common people" ?? are you talking about rich people? 4. "Majority rule" riiiiiiightttttttt 5. "social equality" hahahaha what a joke.
And there is where I see a problem. Too often, we abstract economic models from power (political) models, believing that the one can operate independently of the other. It doesn't work this way - even now, "neo-classical" economists are starting to acknowledge the historical legacy of things like institutions, etc., that may impact upon the economy in ways not predicted by pure economic modelling and econometrics. The bottom line, is that a one-party system cannot be constructed, as far as I can tell, that will not do what it needs to do to sustain the aggregated pods of power in the system. This aggregation will not willingly "go gentle into that good night" when faced with the inevitable exigencies of economic transitions. Let's look at your country, during the interwar years, 1930's. The institutions that represented urban workers - the Social Democrats and allied trade unions - worked out substantial agreements with what would normally be their class "enemies," the Family Peasantry. The agreements worked out were, in many ways, in fact, antithetical to a radical socialist program - in fact, the rural smallholders and proletariat were smacked. We can argue whether the substance of the solutions worked out - broadly, Keynesian programs bolstering both rural interests and urban social programs to soften business cycle downturns - were normatively "good" from a classical economic perspective. My point is that this coalition stabilized a regime in crisis, and avoided the solution found elsewhere - such as Nazi Germany. The country "got back on track again," and it was done when two ideologically opposed camps decided to coalesce in their own interests and that of their country. In other words, coalitions are not always "a sluggish force." I maintain it depends on the direction that parties must compete for constituency. Outwards, as the center is locked up, and you have, at best, stagnation and, at worst, extra-governmental political violence, such as when the Red Brigade left parliamentary politics altogether and took to assassination and the streets. Inwards, or "centripedally," and you have parties moving out of the realm of ideology and onto the realm of practical problems to be solved in common. Not a bad thing, in my book.
The socialistic trend is on the way out. More and more small companies and selfbusiness are taking over, while big industries can handle the same production with 8 people instead of 2000. It forms a population that doesn't see as sharp lines between the upper and the lower class. Therefore, a majority system would led to a economical liberal society with less beurocracy.
From an historic perspective, we have seen that from all kinds of powerstuctures. It's usually a result from a national crisis, not the powerstructure itself. The Saltsjö agreements, was a document signed between SAF and LO without any government interventions. Therefore, I take this argument as irrelevant. However, the reason why this worked out was because the employers agreed with the employees, the right and left came together and formed a singular force.
Any data for your statement? If 8 people can do the work of 2000 people, it will most likely mean that you will have 1992 unemployed people. I know in Sweden there is difference between being on welfare and minimum pay work but in USA, you will end up in the street and believe me that contrary to your imagination, the roads in USA are not paved with gold. If we can see any trend in the last decades, is the fact that the wealth difference between poor and the rich is increasing and not decreasing.
You are confusing agreements. The agreements I am speaking of were consummated in 1933, long before Saltsjöbaden - between two political parties, the Social Democrats and the Agrarian Party, across a host of reforms: expansion of public employment; prohibition against strikes and lockouts, and a wage freeze; social welfare reforms; reduction in agricultural property taxes; reduction of agricultural interest rates and state assistance in re-structuring existing, overly burdensome rural loans; expansion of earlier programs of debt relief for farmers; devaluation; others. The Saltsjöbaden Agreement took place in 1938 - in recognition of that which took place long before. It was an acknowledgment of the shift in political economy, on the part of Swedish big, industrial/urban producers: an acknowledgement of the strength of the governmental, Social Democrat-Agrarian Party coalition/balance of power as established by the earlier 1933 accord and after, not the cause nor marker of that coalition. Thus, precisely relevant as the 1933-era reforms were a function of the partisan, governmental coalition of two parties. Now, your argument appears to be that that this coalition (and others like it), constitutes a governmental hegemonic force that shuts some out (in fact, with the 1933 Agreement in Sweden, the class allies of the Socialists, the small peasantry and others, got burned - leading the Communists to rail against the accord), I would agree - the urban working class and the rural middle class won, while the rural working class got screwed. But I would say I find this kind of hegemony a far better option than the hegemony that would inevitably come from a one-party system, for two reasons: (1) it cut across ideological lines, and moved Sweden to enact practical measures irrespective of class, ethnic, religious, or other ideology (compare with the fascist countries, Italy, Germany, Spain); (2) it was a public accord, worked out transparently, and subject to electoral purview and legitimacy. (1) In other words, what this part of Scandinavian history has showed me (the same general trend held true in Denmark and Norway) is that a coalition built on centrist competitition mitigates against some of the more strident, ideological cleavages and radical programs that might take place under other structures, including your one party system. The example of the 1933 Swedish accord shows that the structure of coalition government can, in essence, force everyone to the table to hammer out concrete, pragmatic programs - irrespective of ideology. Additionally, regarding the Swedish example, look at the marriage again - not only was it a cross-class marriage of working class with middle class, it was across the historically divisive chasm of urban-rural competing interests. It was a smart, forward-thinking coalition of pragmatists willing to let go of ideology in embracing a concrete program. (2) Additonally, regarding the public nature of coalition government (and private nature of one-party systems): Nothing so dramatic as a national crisis need precipate action by those threatened by any shift. The defining line is whether in a one-party system there can be the kind of pluralist competition that exists in other systems. In other words, by this definition, whether there can be democracy in a one-party system. I don't believe the kind of "pluralism from below" you muse on is possible in a one-party system, for reasons I earlier stated, and continue with below; I hear and can appreciate what you are asking for but don't believe such a model possible - it presumes a "pure" pluralist modelling that doesn't exist once political is married to economy. Here's something from Giovanni Sartori, who wrote a good deal on party systems and their theoretical possibilities. He said it better than I ever could: [note: here, by "monocentric polities," Sartori is talking about a verified one-party system, as opposed to a system where one party is hegemonic over many others - which many also call a "one-party system."] Now, many have said that this kind of natural "squabbling" within ranks provides for a kind of ersatz democracy, even in one-party systems. But the fact that this kind of factional squabbling exists, under any political system, including a one-party system, does not equate to democracy - because in a one-party system, the struggles for power are necessarily private, direct, party member to party member - in your model, even if from the ground up, the channels of power exist as a party function and ultimately, cadres and power holders at every level confront each other directly, privately - outside the pale of public scrutiny and review. Intra-party competition is of necessity the only kind of competition that exists, inter-party, public competition does not exist and this necessarily results in the kind of power entrenchment I spoke of earlier - it prevents a true kind of pluralist democracy. Sartori goes on, and again, says it far better: - All quotes from Giovanni Sartori, Parties and Party Systems, Cambridge University Press, 1978, pp. 47-50. In your system, even if politics come from below (which I don't believe is actually achievable, by the way - the higher in the chain, the more centralized the instruments of state power; and those pods of power, like I said earlier, don't readily cede authority to lower levels - why would they?), there is one structure of competition - within the party. Above and beyond the fact that history has not shown intra-party factionalism to be a precursor, or sustainer, of democracy (in fact, quite the opposite), this kind of competition is necessarily private, and outside the legitimizing process of public oversight. In multi-party systems, there are two kinds of competition - intra-party factionalism, and inter-party competition. This latter aspect defines the public nature of electoral competition. In other words, it defines democracy. Still, I think what you pose is an important theoretical question. Thanks for bringing it up - interesting discussion.
No, I was just genarilising. But all industries out there are kicking people out and replacing them with machines. Lot's of unempleyed people here have worked in the industry before, I know a several myself. 1992 people doesn't have to be unemployed, they can start (2000/8)-1 new factories