What if We Let Majoritarian Democracy Take Root?
Our collective suspicion of majority rule rests on the legitimate observation that a majority can be as tyrannical as any despot. As Alexis de Tocqueville wrote, “When I see the right and the ability to do everything granted to any power whatsoever, whether it is called people or king, democracy or aristocracy, where it is exercised in a monarchy or in a republic, I say: there is the seed of tyranny, and I seek to go live under other laws.”
Americans take for granted the idea that our counter-majoritarian Constitution — deliberately written to constrain majorities and keep them from acting outright — has, in fact, preserved the rights and liberties of the people against the tyranny of majority rule, and that any greater majoritarianism would threaten that freedom.
Well, what if that’s not true? Yes, majorities acting through our representative institutions have been overbearing and yes, the Supreme Court has occasionally protected the rights of vulnerable minorities, as well as those of the people at large. But there have been just as many, if not more, examples of the reverse: of majorities safeguarding the rights of vulnerable minorities and of our counter-majoritarian institutions freeing assorted bullies and bosses to violate them.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/21/opinion/minority-rule-majoritarian-democracy.html
Soft Despotism - Overrun by a Network of Small Complicated Rules
Soft despotism is a term coined by Alexis de Tocqueville describing the
state into which a country - overrun by "a network of small complicated
rules" - might degrade. Soft despotism is different from despotism
Soft despotism gives people the illusion that they are in control, when in fact they have very little influence over their government. Soft despotism breeds fear, uncertainty, and doubt in the general populace. Alexis de Tocqueville observed that this trend was avoided in America only by the "habits of the heart" of its 19th-century populace.
Concept
In Volume II, Book 4, Chapter 6 of Democracy in America, de Tocqueville writes the following about soft despotism:
"Thus, After having thus successively taken each member of the community in its powerful grasp and fashioned him at will, the supreme power then extends its arm over the whole community. It covers the surface of society with a network of small complicated rules, minute and uniform, through which the most original minds and the most energetic characters cannot penetrate, to rise above the crowd. The will of man is not shattered, but softened, bent, and guided; men are seldom forced by it to act, but they are constantly restrained from acting. Such a power does not destroy, but it prevents existence; it does not tyrannize, but it compresses, enervates, extinguishes, and stupefies a people, till each nation is reduced to nothing better than a flock of timid and industrious animals, of which the government is the shepherd.
"I have always thought that servitude of the regular, quiet, and gentle kind which I have just described might be combined more easily than is commonly believed with some of the outward forms of freedom, and that it might even establish itself under the wing of the sovereignty of the people.
"Our contemporaries are constantly excited by two conflicting passions: they want to be led, and they wish to remain free. As they cannot destroy either the one or the other of these contrary propensities, they strive to satisfy them both at once. They devise a sole, tutelary, and all-powerful form of government, but elected by the people. They combine the principle of centralization and that of popular sovereignty; this gives them a respite: they console themselves for being in tutelage by the reflection that they have chosen their own guardians. Every man allows himself to be put in leading-strings, because he sees that it is not a person or a class of persons, but the people at large who hold the end of his chain.
"By this system the people shake off their state of dependence just long enough to select their master and then relapse into it again. A great many persons at the present day are quite contented with this sort of compromise between administrative despotism and the sovereignty of the people; and they think they have done enough for the protection of individual freedom when they have surrendered it to the power of the nation at large. This does not satisfy me: the nature of him I am to obey signifies less to me than the fact of extorted obedience. I do not deny, however, that a constitution of this kind appears to me to be infinitely preferable to one which, after having concentrated all the powers of government, should vest them in the hands of an irresponsible person or body of persons. Of all the forms that democratic despotism could assume, the latter would assuredly be the worst.
"When the sovereign is elective, or narrowly watched by a legislature which is really elective and independent, the oppression that he exercises over individuals is sometimes greater, but it is always less degrading; because every man, when he is oppressed and disarmed, may still imagine that, while he yields obedience, it is to himself he yields it, and that it is to one of his own inclinations that all the rest give way. In like manner, I can understand that when the sovereign represents the nation and is dependent upon the people, the rights and the power of which every citizen is deprived serve not only the head of the state, but the state itself; and that private persons derive some return from the sacrifice of their independence which they have made to the public."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soft_despotism
It Takes a Village of Bureaucrats to Implement Despotism
According to Hamburger, writing in his short book, The Administrative Threat,
“Administrative power is a preconstitutional mode of governance— the very sort of power that constitutions were most clearly expected to prevent.”
American bureaucrats are not fundamentally different from their counterparts in totalitarian societies. They are both unbounded by constitutional constraints; the only difference is in degree...
The normalization of administrative power. In The Administrative Threat, he is clear:
“The Constitution establishes only regular avenues of power, and thereby blocks irregular or extralegal power. To be precise it blocks extralegal lawmaking by placing legislature powers exclusively in Congress, and it prevents extralegal adjudication by placing judicial power exclusively in the courts.”
Administrative mandates and rules are unconstitutional. “Through administrative power,” Hamburger argues,
there now exists a third but “unconstitutional” way by which the “the executive purports to create legal obligation.” Administrative lawmaking is not justified as “delegated power.” Congress has no power to subdelegate its responsibilities to bureaucratic administrators.
In short, administrative power, Hamburger writes, is “the very sort of power that constitutions were expected to prevent.” He warns that power wielded through government bureaucracies “binds Americans and deprives them of their liberty.”
https://www.aier.org/article/it-takes-a-village-of-bureaucrats-to-implement-despotism/
The Paradox of Democracy
Over a century-and-a-half ago, Alexis de Tocqueville stepped back from his observations of American politics in his book Democracy in America to look at the broader threats to democracy. His conclusion rested in an apparent paradox, asserting that despotism lurked in the shadow of democracy. He called this “soft despotism,” or tyranny with the illusion of popular control. Tocqueville foresaw a significant threat to democracy possessing unclear hazard and form. Surprisingly, there is very little written about the dangers of soft despotism in today’s international political environment.
Yet a shift away from democracy can come about quite easily: Rights and freedoms can become diametrically opposed through rampant individual self-interest; Bureaucracy, flush with revenue from commodities and not ultimately beholden to any man, can institute a form of administrative tyranny.
We may not readily see these elements in today’s world, but I would argue that they are all round us and offer a crucial warning for today’s democracies.
Despotism in the Shadow of Democracy
- Democracy is willed into being by the individual acting in concert with society, and a democratic government is bound to the polity through the principle of consent.
- State, society, and individual are all tied to a social fabric through the liberal notions of individualism, consent, and liberty.
Yet, Tocqueville posited that if these elements failed to act in concert, especially if a longing for individualism and security prevailed over all others, then the social fabric would rend and give way to a tutelary, paternal power that softly bent the individual will. No tyranny of the majority, no brutal dictatorship.
This would be a society marked by individual contentment, unaware of the velvet fist quashing the associative, civic, and intellectual capacities of social man. Such is soft despotism. Upon becoming wards of this paternal power, citizens would console themselves with the thought that they had at least elected their new masters.
Tocqueville knew that elections were not the ultimate goal for democracy – his vision consisted of the far broader notion of a liberal democracy. Such a democracy depends on the social fabric, or perhaps better termed a civic fabric, that binds citizen to citizen and citizen to government in “a vibrant network of associations.”
What Allows for the Rise of Soft Despotism?
At the heart of the rise of soft despotism lies a combination of collective individualism and limited property rights. Tocqueville first painted a picture of the individual’s place in a civic society being torn asunder by the competing desires to be led and to remain free. Individuals would assume that others, especially those perceived to be elite, know best when it comes to political decisions. Each citizen would be content but individual, choosing to maintain an independent existence from society. When citizens would interact with one another, their conscious calculations for individual advancement would undermine the prerequisites for cooperation, leading to what economists deem suboptimal outcomes. In essence, citizens in such a state are equal but atomized. An almost corrosive individualism erodes the civic fabric and ties the loose ends to the government. The citizen chooses to do this, and so appears to still be independent. Yet, the individual merely becomes dependent upon the only social entity left standing – the state.
Tocqueville also looked at property rights, and in this he began to address the economic foundations for soft despotism. He foresaw that the balance of property would begin to determine the balance of political power in the lead-up to soft despotism. Only limited rights would be accorded to individual private property and the populace would display a general equality of condition. With few rights or terms of private ownership accorded to property, only elites or the government could truly hold power. Aristotle and Montesquieu said much the same thing, recognizing the danger in legal property being dispersed at the discretion of an administrative state. The tendency is that the allocation of property leads to an industrial and financial aristocracy, or oligarchy. The oligarchy then develops mechanisms that underpin its influence and ultimate rule, continuing the form but not the substance of democracy.
What Does a Softly Despotic State Look Like?
In Tocqueville’s description, the softly despotic state first of all provides for most of the citizen’s wishes, but ensures that it is the only source to satisfy. It provides for individual needs, including security. Yet its modus operandi is to divide and rule, inducing passivism at best and fear at worst. The state creates a network of petty regulations, often for corrupt profit or cronyism. Industry is directed and societal decisions are guided, even for good. In essence, soft despotism displays an elected government providing for individual needs (but not social needs), a free press (but only state press), allowing markets (funded by state capital), and offering security (but at the price of liberty).
Ultimately, what people are left with is a distant democracy, where a large space exists between citizens and decision-makers. Civil institutions, which would normally fill this gap, are left out of the circle of public interests. Without individuals even realizing it, decision-making is removed from effective civilian control and civil oversight. Essential powers are united at the top, allowing the state to sway incentives, monitor activities, and choose societal winners, all for the “good” and seemingly at the behest of the people. Once power is centralized and made distant, institutional inertia kicks in, such that devolving power or recreating intermediate civil institutions is nearly impossible.
So What? What Next?
Coups, putsches, and power plays are all too easy to see. A gradual unwinding of the civic fabric is much harder to spot, but just as dangerous to democracy. Nevertheless, the warnings of Tocqueville allow us to at least shine a light on despotic elements lurking in democracy’s shadow. Ian Bremmer recently noted a slouching toward tyranny in the four primary actors of what he termed “state capitalism”: national oil corporations, state-owned enterprises, privately owned national champions, and sovereign wealth funds (SWFs). “One essential feature of state capitalism is the existence of close ties binding together those who govern a country and those who run its enterprises,” meaning that the “domestic instabilities that threaten ruling elites…begin to take on greater importance for businesses.” Niall Ferguson pointed to hidden dangers in the modern social welfare state: “The police state has a natural ally in the nanny state, born in 1945 to replace warfare with welfare. If the former replaces individual freedoms with patriotic duties, the latter offers entitlements in exchange for responsibilities.”
Fortunately, Alexis de Tocqueville also offered a solution together with his warnings. He argued that strengthening the social fabric through the binding power of associations served as the essential counter to soft despotism. “Governments, therefore, should not be the only active powers; associations ought, in democratic nations, to stand in lieu of those powerful private individuals whom the equality of conditions has swept away.” “In democratic countries the science of association is the mother of science; the progress of all the rest depends upon the progress it has made. Among the laws that rule human societies there is one which seems to be more precise and clear than all others.” Building a democracy that delivers through vital political and civic institutions stands as the greatest bulwark against the corrosive threat of soft despotism.
https://www.cipe.org/blog/2009/06/01/the-paradox-of-democracy/
Alexis de Tocqueville: Democracy, Freedom, and Despotism
According to Tocqueville, freedom, specifically the freedom of the press and association, have a decentralizing characteristic which helps to prevent despotism. However, he also shows how freedom can actually lead to form despotism. It is often thought that when there is nearly unfettered freedom, tyranny can emerge from the collective will of the majority who form associations (91). When the majority-representing groups use their freedom of the press, it is of greatest difficulty to root out ideas held by the masses once they are accepted (178). Thus, freedom has the narrow potential to descend into despotism through the free acts of people assembling and voicing their stances.
In defense of democracy, and more specifically democracy in America, Tocqueville wrote, “I am persuaded that if despotism ever comes to be established in America, it will find more difficulties in defeating the habits to which freedom has given birth than in surmounting the love of freedom itself” (233). This means that in a democratic state, such as that of America, it is easier to quash the love of freedom than it is to get the ideas out of the minds of the masses of all of the enjoyments that freedom brings with it. Tocqueville believed that democratic freedom was already well established in America and that despotism was unlikely to ever come about (251).
The form of despotism most likely to take hold in America, according to Tocqueville, is that of ‘administrative despotism’ (661–665). It is seen as being a decision by the sovereign people of society by requesting to be led by a few rather than living freely (664). This ever-changing administration grows over time to become the ultramonarchical monster which initially prompted the American Revolution from the portrayed despot of England. To continually vote for additional powers to be granted to the administrative government takes from the powers of the people as free individuals and limits the capacity society has in order to be free (665). The purpose of democracy was to have decentralized powers equal to all, as opposed to providing unrestricted rights to that of a central body. The outcome of people freely coming together in association maintains the decentralization of government within a democracy.
Tocqueville’s main solution for combating despotism is through a free democracy with decentralized powers where individuals form associations with one another in large numbers for particular causes (489–492). These associations are first brought about through self-interest where it does not necessarily require self-sacrifice, but rather small amounts of self-denial from regularity, foresight, self-command, etc. (502). With the doctrine of self-interest in liberty, in conjunction with democratic virtues, government is not required to coerce people into sacrificing themselves for the beneficence of their fellow creatures because the moral gauge of free people tends to suggest helping others voluntarily (500–503). Tocqueville goes on to say, “The doctrine of self-interest well understood seems to me of all the philosophic theories the most appropriate to the needs of men in our time, and that I see in it the most powerful guarantee against themselves that remains to them,” (502–503).
Once free people of self-interest find commonality with others, they form associations for causes and solutions. Where governments are not providing for these causes and solutions, people voluntarily do so in a democratic society. As long as these associations do not relinquish their tasks to that of a centralized governing body, despotism is kept at bay. The more a government does for society the less free a people are, and the less democracy or equality of conditions there is (491). The essential difference between an association accomplishing a goal versus a government doing so is that an association does so through peaceful and voluntary means whereas a government does so coercively through the use of force and the potential threat of violence, i.e. fines, imprisonment, death, etc. Tocqueville did not hold vast anarchist views, instead he held that government should be restricted to prevent despotism from arising from a state or through society.
In conclusion, Alexis de Tocqueville believed in democracy along with the concepts of ‘liberty,’ and ‘freedom’ where individuals can freely express themselves through speech or writing, and associate as they see fit. These principles, he saw, were what limited despotism from forming as a centralized power. Although he was able to point out flaws in even his own convictions of ‘democracy’ and ‘freedom,’ he was able to demonstrate that together these are the best alternative to ‘aristocracy,’ ‘centralized powers,’ and ‘despotism.’
https://medium.com/@JoshuaGlawson/alexis-de-tocqueville-democracy-freedom-and-despotism-bb1b7156d8d2
The Rise of Despotic Majoritarianism in: Democratic Theory Vol 9 Issue 1
Abstract: Two maladies that have been incipient in Liberal Democracy since its birth have finally struck at once. The “tyranny of the majority” and “administrative despotism”—first identified by Alexis de Tocqueville almost two centuries ago—have combined in the form of a new, much more threatening democratic mutation. We are witnessing the rise of “despotic majoritarianism,” in which citizens are simultaneously given less and less say in the political process, just as more and more is being done in their name. This new strain of democratic disease threatens not just the United States but societies across Europe, Latin America, and South Asia. This article explores the nature of despotic majoritarianism, its manifestation today, and how we might combat it.
.................................................
To say that “democracy doesn't always work” is a truism, but it does rather seem to have been actively malfunctioning as of late. One might be tempted to tie this statement to the recent election-related debacles faced by the United States, but this is but one instance of a far broader, global trend. In fact, the past 14 years of observational data show us that elected politicians are not only seizing more unregulated power but also becoming less attentive to the complex and diverse voices and interests of their citizens (Diamond 2020; Freedom House 2019). The long-dominant “liberal” model of democracy promised to deliver unto citizens a system characterized by regular elections, plebiscites, and other intervals for public input amid a backdrop of inclusive, egalitarian citizenship, with strong—legally or constitutionally enshrined—protections for individuals and clear majoritarian procedures for political participation. And yet, with democracies around the world leaving their citizens less free and less well represented than they have been in decades, it appears that the once heralded “golden age of liberal democracy” is giving way to an era of “despotic majoritarianism.”
A broad spectrum of global political observers has noticed a trend (e.g., Meyer 2021; Norris 2020; Serhan 2020a)—political problems much bemoaned in the United States between 2016 and 2021 bear a startling resemblance to strife in parts of Europe, Latin America, and South Asia. Yet contemporary analyses have focused predominantly on charting “the rise of populism” (Calléja 2020; Cox 2018; DeHanas and Shterin 2018; Inglehart and Norris 2016; Lochoki 2018) and rather fewer have sought to explain how the progressive degradation of democracy has occurred, and why it has done so in such a remarkably diverse array of countries. Even fewer have sought to comprehend the specific changes which democratic societies have undergone, and the direction in which they are headed (see Schäfer 2021).
In what follows, I lay out the case that we are witnessing not merely a widespread degradation of “liberal democracy”—argued convincingly in Democratic Theory by Simon Tormey (2014)—but moreover a transition in the form of democracy in many countries around the world, toward a mode of government that I call “despotic majoritarianism.”
Despotic majoritarianism refers to a form of democracy in which powerholders draw on majoritarian victories (such as in elections or referenda) to claim political legitimacy, while engaging in administrative despotism that constrains political expression and participation. In this system, powerholders rely on procedural indicators of majoritarian support to transgress political boundaries (tyranny of the majority), while simultaneously curtailing the political space available to ordinary people by increasing state supervision over individual or community affairs (administrative despotism). This, in turn, creates space for political powers to establish or maintain far-reaching substantive authority over their populations. The reason I call despotic majoritarianism a “form of democracy” rather than a political ideology, or style, is that—although certain regimes may express more or less majoritarian or more or less despotic behaviors—both steadily increase over time, in tandem, to effect the shift in the character of democracy to which we are now bearing witness.
To understand this shift, and why I call it “despotic majoritarianism,” we would do well to begin by revisiting how one of history's most celebrated observers of democracy—Alexis de Tocqueville—once noticed some very similar problems amid nascent democratic politics.
What Is Despotic Majoritarianism?
The Dual Maladies of Democracy
A little less than two hundred years ago, American politicians sought to refashion their republic along democratic lines. A charismatic president, Andrew Jackson, widely expanded suffrage, strengthened executive power, and introduced a litany of elected offices to public life. Amid these reforms, a young Frenchman, Alexis de Tocqueville, made passage to the United States and composed one of the most enduring and important critiques of Western-model democratic life in the history of political thought.
Tocqueville's account of Democracy in America was largely exuberant about the novel experiments being conducted in the New World, but his enthusiasm was marred by two latent political forces, which the budding political sociologist feared would spark a shift from democracy to dystopia: majoritarian tyranny and administrative despotism.
Most famously, Tocqueville expressed fears about a “tyranny of the majority,” through which democratic politics would cease to serve the interests of all citizens but instead only advance the interests of the majority of citizens. This problem was—in Tocqueville's view—fundamental to the makeup of (then) modern democracy: it was embedded in the majoritarian voting systems on which democracies depended and thus posed a perpetual danger for their citizens. While majoritarianism was endemic in all democratic life, Tocqueville observed that at its most extreme, this tendency could manifest as outright tyranny: total omnipotence afforded to politicians ruling in accord with the majority of voters, paired with the total disregard for the political, civil, and moral rights of electoral and demographic minorities. As Tocqueville (2012a [1835]: 417) put it: “There is no monarch so absolute that he can gather in his hands all of society's forces and vanquish opposition in the way that a majority vested with the right to make and execute laws can [at will, vested with the right and the force].”
Majoritarian tyranny was not the only evil that Tocqueville thought might befall the fledgling democracy he had encountered in America. He also feared the emergence of “administrative despotism,” in which voters would willfully equip regimes with extensive coercive power over society, inspired by rulers’ promises to provide citizens with bulwarked protection from internal and external affairs—ranging from international security to domestic well-being. Over time, citizens would become desensitized to government encroachment and grant greater incursions into their personal liberties while giving up more democratic autonomy. The most dangerous consequence of this phenomenon, for Tocqueville (2012b [1840]: 1258), was the total regression of democratic society into something resembling an authoritarian dictatorship, in which citizens “who have entirely given up the habit of directing themselves … would soon return to stretching out at the feet of a single master.” Concerns about this kind of despotism have been less frequently raised than critiques of majoritarian tyranny but have nonetheless represented an increasing concern as of late. A little over a decade ago, the historian and political theorist Paul Rahe (2010) pronounced on the back cover his book Soft Despotism1 that “such an eventuality, feared by Tocqueville in the nineteenth century, has now become a reality throughout the European Union, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the United States.” More recently, John Keane (2020: 239–240) has complained of how “in countries such as India, Britain, France, Japan, and the United States, the style and substance of [Tocquevillian] despotic power are evidently alive and well … with just a touch of exaggeration, we could say that democracies are beginning to resemble proto-despotisms.”2
In the wake of the American democratic experiment, subsequent decades saw similar systems of democracy adopted in a variety of forms throughout the globe, often complemented by principles of modern liberalism: full suffrage for all adult citizens, diverse representative institutions, a balance of powers, and an independent judiciary. Such a model has been widely exported and promoted by Western powers for almost a century and persists as the backbone of global democratization discourse (Dryzek and Holmes 2002; Huntington 1991; Olimat 2011). This liberal democratic order was not without its political tumult, and following each global democratic wave, there arose steadily recurrent relapses into one, or another of democracy's Tocquevillian woes. At their most untamed, democracies have slid into majoritarian excess, legitimizing persecution, discrimination, and civil injustice. This has been frequently evidenced by the periodic rise of populist and nationalist politics in countries around the world. Sometimes, this shift has been relatively mild, yet at others, it has underpinned the engineering of democratic “apartheid states” in which majorities enjoy enshrined rights far beyond minority groups (seen in Canada, the United States, and countless European countries at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries). At its most extreme, such lurches have culminated in wholesale ethnic cleansing, as documented in Michael Mann's (2004) comprehensive study of the phenomenon in Armenia, Rwanda, Cambodia, Yugoslavia, India, and Indonesia—as well as Europe.
In contrast to instances of majoritarian tyranny, at their most restrained democracies have instead become gently despotic, leaving ordinary citizens much more detached from political life and giving way to smothering governmental authority. Alongside Keane and Rahe's various contemporary examples detailed in the prior paragraphs, some other recent cases include the curtailment of civil society enacted by neoliberal administrations in the 1970s and 1980s, the Italian Ciampi government of the 1990s, the highly surveilled security states that took form during the War on Terror, and the Greek, Italian, Czech, and Tunisian episodes of technocratic democracy in the wake of the 2008–2011 period of global political-economic instability (Busch 2015; Sanders et al. 2016). In these instances, tremendous power was afforded to administrators and governing powers, while the rhythms of democratic accountability or active citizenship were encouraged to take a backseat. Such an arrangement seldom sat quietly with those exposed to it once the perceived necessity of their gently despotic elements faded: popular protest, political challenges, and electoral demands were liable to swell in response.
The Hybrid Malady of Despotic Majoritarianism
At first glance, what is occurring today looks neither wholly identical to the “tyranny of the majority,” nor entirely akin to “administrative despotism.” Accordingly, many commentators have been successfully tempted to instead think of contemporary challenges to democracy in acutely “populist” terms, and “the rise of populism” has been decried by commentators speaking about autocratizing regimes around the world (Bröning 2016). Indeed, populism has historically proven an effective vehicle for all sorts of majoritarian appeals, and such appeals can and often do play a partial role in what I call despotic majoritarianism today. However—as we shall see—claiming that the serious political peril in which democracy finds itself is simply yet another instance of populist politics conceals the complexity at the heart of the issue.
While it is not untrue that many troubled democracies today can be categorized as having populist politics in a broad sense, to identify them exclusively as such would be something of a category error. Accounting for populism in its many forms means that we must also concede that populist politics presumes very little about the authority demanded by the governments, and in no way necessitates an authoritarian agenda. A rising trend of left anarcho-populism (Gerbaudo 2013), for instance, fundamentally rejects not only the entire electoral hypothesis but also the notion that popular power should bolster the legitimacy of the state. Instead, its model assigns much greater popular legitimacy to instances of mass-mobilization and direct action. Likewise, while a populist mode of politics holds a great affinity to the majoritarian political demands made by the leaders of many democracies in retreat, this too is only one potential form of populist articulation. While in many forms of populism electoral majorities often stand in for “the people” in an abstract sense, other sorts of populist ideologies (such as revolutionary populism) consider those very same majorities to be an irrelevant calculation, alleging that the true “people” cannot be effectively represented electorally (Brock 1977).
Setting the applicability of the “populism” diagnosis to one side gives us space to reexamine the virtue of a Tocquevillian model—albeit with one notable amendment. Democracy's two malicious Tocquevillian tendencies have generally been regarded by analysts as opposing dangers, corrected by either tempering or reasserting the popular sovereignty of the democratic citizenry (Schleifer 2000). This has long been envisaged as a balancing act between two kinds of democratic liberty: the participatory liberty associated with democracies in classical antiquity and the civil liberties more conventionally associated with modern democracy (famously described by Tocqueville's intellectual precursor Benjamin Constant (1819) as the liberties of the “ancients” and the “moderns,” respectively). Yet, when we cast our eye across democracies today, this is indeed not the case. Rather, in countries such as the United States, Hungary, Poland, Brazil, and India, we see each of Tocqueville's worst fears simultaneously coming into view: the dual threats of majoritarian tyranny and administrative despotism proceeding hand in hand. It appears that we are on the cusp of a more peculiar democratic transformation: an age of despotic majoritarianism, in which citizens are increasingly excluded from political life, while elected officials simultaneously claim more power in their name. In this new arrangement, even when the procedural structures of democracy remain in place, neither civil nor political liberties are guaranteed.
In contrast to the more mixed phenomenon of populism, despotic majoritarianism's programmatic attributes are characterized exclusively by the pursuit of far-reaching substantive authority for the governing entity. This program is underpinned by two intertwined means of legitimation. First, electoral or national poll victories backed by some plausible majority, and second, the need to shield citizens from political complexity. Its ultimate consequence is to simultaneously restrict citizens’ participation in the political process while also extending the power that governments have over them.
The encroachment of despotic majoritarianism poses a much more substantial threat to citizens than democracy's past—often temporary—lurches toward one Tocquevillian ill or another: cases that have often been successfully combated or curtailed by civil rights movements, conscientious elites, or international pressure. By contrast, the double nature of despotic majoritarianism's core attributes problematizes the otherwise straightforward solutions that the lessons of history instruct us to adopt. Simply reasserting popular sovereignty by means of renewed elections or referenda would do little to assuage the tide of majoritarian rule. Promoting efforts to curtail the democratic space, meanwhile, would only further solidify the position of potentially despotic political elites. In other words, democratic citizens find themselves increasingly in a double bind, in which they are trapped between actively legitimating majoritarian governments and passively accepting them...
Defending Democracy?
While populist politics has recently dwindled in its appeal, democracy's worldwide mutation into despotic majoritarianism is still gaining pace. Indeed, if—as Tocqueville feared—its constituent parts are intrinsic to Western-liberal model representative democracies, then the potential for such a trajectory has always been structurally preordained. At the very least, by reflecting on the character of this new danger, we might be able to chart a provisional agenda for those seeking immediate measures for the regeneration and fortification of democracies globally, and thus stem the tide enough to build a better democratic system in the longer term.
Despotic majoritarianism relies on overemphasizing the importance of the procedural moments in democratic life (elections, referenda, etc.) to legitimate political action, while simultaneously enacting substantive increases in governments’ administrative power over populations. This “dual-track” form of despotism imperils conventional solutions to majoritarian tyranny or administrative despotism—in which “one path to democratic despotism … [is] blocked, but another … opened wide” (Schleifer 2000: 269) In view of this, the most effective antidote to such a political tendency is likely to be one that enriches the substantive power of citizens while simultaneously calling politicians’ procedural mandates into question (Fawcett 2014). It is thus imperative that citizens seeking to defend their democracies do more than merely return to the ballot box and hand a potentially despotic majoritarian mandate to their favorite political force. Citizens, politicians, and NGOs can and should go further, working to invigorate the more substantive, plural elements of their democracies, such as civil society, social action, and public debate. Bolstering and restoring these elements of modern democracy may well hold the key to defending societies against this era of democratic decline in the short run, and “recouple” citizens and the state (McCaffrie and Akram 2014)...
Democratic Despotism and Democracy’s Drift: Tocqueville’s Validity Today
...In Tocqueville’s time, the outcome was the nobility losing their power. They cut themselves off from the middle class and peasantry. When the regime passed to democracy, new and dangerous tendencies emerged that were different from the ideals that drove the movement. These included an excessive drive for equality, individualism, materialism, a preponderance of legislative power, centralisation, direct election of representatives, and an excessive love for equality.
Tocqueville believed that an excessive drive for equality had an evil effect on democracy. He stated that the desire for equality was too strong in democratic countries, and this passion often led to despotic rule; he felt that absolute equality was the true enemy of democracy (1969: 57). Tocqueville considered individualism to have democratic roots, and it was this phenomenon that gave rise to equality (1969: 507); this was based in people’s interests. Individuals tend to focus on themselves, avoiding the societal bonds and duties that link people together and force them to realize their dependence on one another. If citizens are too individualistic, despotism becomes a dangerous possibility because individualists can either choose to fulfil their civic duties or exercise their freedom.
For Tocqueville, excessive equality also led to materialism and selfish individualism in the bourgeoisie. The dangers of materialism are derived from the desire for equality because people believe that they deserve as much wealth as they can acquire. Materialism also stems from the philosophical tendencies fostered by democracies, the scorning noble ideas and thoughts of immortality. Materialism allows people to become so interested in their personal pursuit of wealth that they neglect to use their political freedom. They may even give up their freedom intentionally in exchange for a “good” despotism that provides them with material prosperity.
The preponderance of legislative power was considered yet another threat to new democracies. The legislature is the most direct representative of the will of the people, and democracies tend to give it the most power of all the governmental branches. Yet if there are insufficient checks on this power, it can easily become tyrannical. Tocqueville wrote that liberty is in danger when this power encounters no obstacle that can check its course and give it time to moderate itself (1969: 252). He asserted that democracy leads to centralisation and that this tendency is one of the worst in newly democratic societies. He believed “that there are no nations more at risk of falling under the yoke of centralised administration than those whose social state is democratic” (1990: 152). According to Tocqueville, it is democratic governments that arrive most rapidly at administrative centralisation, losing their political liberty.
A related constitutional issue that Tocqueville identified was the weakening of the independence of the executive branch, and therefore an increase in the power of the legislature. The president must be re-elected, and if he hopes to accomplish this, he loses much of his ability to make independent decisions based on his judgment. Instead, he must bow to the whims of the people, and constantly try to make them happy even though they may not have the knowledge necessary to properly judge what is best for the country as a whole. Indirectly, therefore, allowing the President to run for re-election increases the danger of the tyranny of the majority. A related problem is the direct election of representatives and short duration of their time in office. These provisions result in the selection of a mediocre body of representatives and the prevention of their acting according to their best judgment, since they must constantly defer to public opinion.
Tocqueville believed that these dangerous democratic tendencies could be controlled, even in the midst of despotism. Institutional and non-institutional factors that Tocqueville regarded as preservers of liberty included the township (a mark of local self-governence and decentralisation), freedom of political association, an independent judiciary, freedom of the press, and the presence of religion (in a positive role) in the U.S.
https://behorizon.org/democratic-despotism/
............................................................................
Core Arguments For & Against "The Establishment"
(Tocqueville's administrative
despotism)
.............................................................................
The New Despotism of Bureaucracy
https://www.heritage.org/commentary/the-new-despotism-bureaucracy
Administrative Despotism in Peasant Societies
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/330535421_Administrative_Despotism_in_Peasant_Societies
Bureaucracy and democracy : a political dilemma - Eva Etzioni-Halevy
Summary: Although a powerful, independent bureaucracy poses a threat to democracy, it is indispensable to its proper functioning. This book provides an overview of the complex relationship between bureaucracy and the politics of democracy and is essential reading for students of sociology, political science and public administration. It is designed to guide students through the maze of classical and modern theories on the topic, to give them basic information on the historical developments in this area and the present them with case histories of the actual relationship between bureaucrats and politi
https://www.worldcat.org/title/bureaucracy-and-democracy-a-political-dilemma/oclc/842265894
Index - Basic Definitions
Majoritarianism
Majoritarianism is a traditional political philosophy or agenda that asserts that a majority (sometimes categorized by religion, language, social class, or some other identifying factor) of the population is entitled to a certain degree of primacy in society, and has the right to make decisions that affect the society. This traditional view has come under growing criticism, and liberal democracies have increasingly included constraints on what the parliamentary majority can do, in order to protect citizens' fundamental rights...
Advocates of majoritarianism argue that majority decision making is intrinsically democratic and that any restriction on majority decision making is intrinsically undemocratic.
If democracy is restricted by a constitution which cannot be changed by a simple majority decision, then yesterday's majority is being given more weight than today's.
If it is restricted by some small group, such as aristocrats, judges, priests, soldiers, or philosophers, then society becomes an oligarchy.
The only restriction acceptable in a majoritarian system is that a current majority has no right to prevent a different majority emerging in the future; this could happen, for example, if a minority persuades enough of the majority to change its position. In particular, a majority cannot exclude a minority from future participation in the democratic process.
Majoritarianism does not prohibit a decision being made by representatives as long as this decision is made via majority rule, as it can be altered at any time by any different majority emerging in the future.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Majoritarianism
Majoritarian Democracy
In the majoritarian vision of democracy, voters mandate successfully-elected politicians to enact the policies they proposed during their electoral campaign. Elections are the focal point of political engagement, with limited ability for the people to influence policymaking between elections.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Majoritarian_democracy
Consensus Democracy
Consensus democracy, consensus politics or consensualism is the application of consensus decision-making to the process of legislation in a democracy. It is characterized by a decision-making structure that involves and takes into account as broad a range of opinions as possible, as opposed to systems where minority opinions can potentially be ignored by vote-winning majorities. The latter systems are classified as majoritarian democracy.
Consensus democracy also features increased citizen participation both in determining the political agenda and in the decision-making process itself. Some have pointed to developments in information and communication technology as potential facilitators of such systems.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consensus_democracy
Supermajority
Supermajority rules in a democracy can help to prevent a majority from eroding fundamental rights of a minority, but they can also hamper efforts to respond to problems and encourage corrupt compromises in the times action is taken. Changes to constitutions, especially those with entrenched clauses, commonly require supermajority support in a legislature. Parliamentary procedure requires that any action of a deliberative assembly that may alter the rights of a minority have a supermajority requirement, such as a two-thirds vote.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supermajority
Tyranny of the Majority
The tyranny of the majority (or tyranny of the masses) is an inherent weakness to majority rule in which the majority of an electorate pursues exclusively its own objectives at the expense of those of the minority factions. This results in oppression of minority groups comparable to that of a tyrant or despot, argued John Stuart Mill in his 1859 book On Liberty.
The scenarios in which tyranny perception occurs are very specific, involving a sort of distortion of democracy preconditions:
--Centralization excess: when the centralized power of a federation make a
decision that should be local, breaking with the commitment to the
subsidiarity principle. Typical solutions, in this condition, are concurrent
majority and supermajority rules.
--Abandonment of rationality: when, as Tocqueville remembered, a decision
"which bases its claim to rule upon numbers, not upon rightness or
excellence". The use of public consultation, technical consulting bodies,
and other similar mechanisms help to improve rationality of decisions before
voting on them. Judicial review (e.g. declaration of nullity of the
decision) is the typical way after the vote.
In both cases, in a context of a nation, constitutional limits on the powers of a legislative body, and the introduction of a Bill of Rights have been used to counter the problem. A separation of powers (for example a legislative and executive majority actions subject to review by the judiciary) may also be implemented to prevent the problem from happening internally in a government.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority
Mob-Rule - Ochlocracy
Mob rule or ochlocracy is the rule of government by a mob or mass of people and the intimidation of legitimate authorities. Insofar as it represents a pejorative for majoritarianism, it is akin to the Latin phrase mobile vulgus, meaning "the fickle crowd" from which the English term "mob" originally was derived in 1680s, during the Glorious Revolution.
Ochlocracy is synonymous in meaning and usage to the modern informal term "mobocracy", which arose in the 18th century as a colloquial neologism. Likewise, the ruling mobs in ochlocracies may sometimes genuinely reflect the will of the majority in a manner approximating democracy, but ochlocracy is characterised by the absence or impairment of a procedurally civil and democratic process.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mob_rule
Criticism of Democracy
Critics of democracy have often tried to highlight democracy's inconsistencies, paradoxes, and limits by contrasting it with other forms of governments such as epistocracy, plural voting, or lottocrative alternatives. They have characterized most modern democracies as democratic polyarchies and democratic aristocracies; they have identified fascist moments in modern democracies; they have termed the societies produced by modern democracies as neo-feudal; while yet others have contrasted democracy with fascism, anarcho-capitalism, theocracy, and absolute monarchy. The most widely known critics of democracy include Plato and the authors of the Federalist Papers, who were interested in establishing a representative democracy in the early United States instead of a direct democracy. The authors of the Federalist papers explained why the Constitution was based on a certain type of democracy, also called an American republic or liberal democracy.
