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Paddy Murray is really down on democracy. (see his post here) Seems that most democracies right now are not working that well. That does not mean that they can’t it just means they are not right now. I left him a comment to encourage him that all is not lost. Democracy can work – if we are willing to work at it. Here are my comments:
Everything you say about greed ruling the world was just as true two months ago, but today you are talking about it. In my book that makes this “crisis” one of the best things to happen in a long time.
The few people that “run” the world, do so because no one else cares. Everyone is too busy making money and buying stuff to care about anything else.
I am hoping that this “crisis” will make people start to care. And when they start to care, a democracy will be the best system for them as they try to make changes.
Democracy is not a solution or even a path to a solution, but it is a great tool to be used by the people if the people care to use it.
You are right that as long as no one cares to be part of government, the form of government does not matter, but when they start to care again the form will matter very much.
It is also important to remember that democracy is more than just voting for the top national leaders. To practice true democracy you need to pick local representatives that really represent you and talk to them regularly. If the only feed back is occasional election you do not have real democracy.
Conversation with your representatives is far more important than voting. We have let the media become our proxy in this conversation and have lost our voice in the process.
Related posts:
Do you think that democracy needs a basic Christian world view or a least Christian values to work?
I think that any society with any form of government can benefit from Judeo-Christian values, but I would not say that democracy in particular is more dependent on them than other forms.
There is a long history of monarchies, oligarchies, bureaucracy, and other forms working while some or all of these values were followed and then collapsing as these values were forsaken.
The key to any society working is actually the people not the government. Although most people think that monarchy and dictatorship are all about the leader, the fact of the matter is that no leader can lead if no one is willing to follow.
I think the key to Judeo-Christian values as related to government is the teaching of individual responsibility for community well-being as opposed to:
Individual responsibility for individual well-being (traditional western viewpoint – very rare after mid-1900′s)
Community responsibility for community well-being (traditional eastern viewpoint)
Community responsibility for individual well-being (socialist and modern western viewpoint)
Or, nature/multiple-deity responsibility for individual and community well-being (third-world and ancient east and west viewpoints)
Which interestingly leaves Christianity as the most complete opposite of socialism and modern democracy quite close to socialism with traditional western only being a partial opposite. That’s a light-bulb.