9 ms·

To be fair, inexperience, desperation, and stupid is a very potent and very dangerous mix.

dredmorbius 3y ago
True, and you'll find that sentiment (explicitly or implicitly stated) in many criticisms of democracy going back to Plato's Republic. Runciman's statement that the challenges of electoral politics to the young and poor are deliberate and by design is novel to me, however. And something I thought worth drawing attention to.
- RelativeDelta 3y ago
  I doubt that they are in there by design. Ascribing (or implying through framing) malicious intent to an object of criticism is very trendy these days as audiences are eager for justifications to destroy and rebuild various systems. In computer science (a field I am admittedly only tangentially knowledgeable in) there is a process called 'garbage collection' in which portions of a zero-sum resource base (memory) are periodically freed up by removing the unused/underutilized processes so that the primary program or series of programs can use them to accomplish a directed task. One would imagine that if electoral politics truely was designed maliciously it would have some similar function, yet we have the opposite in the form of various social safety nets which actively seek to prevent this. Humanity most frequently seeks to do good. We fail, surely, but we strive nonetheless. What really worries me is whether this impulse will doom us in the lifeboat of the climate-ravaged future... But that's a topic for another day :)
  - dredmorbius 3y ago
    I also have my doubts as to design. But Runciman's an interesting and thoughtful commentator on politics, political philosophy, and the history of both. I'd discovered his several podcasts ("Talking Politics", "Talking Politics: The History of Ideas", and his current project, "Past, Present, Future", in the past year or so, and they are consistently excellent. I'm among that group of people who puts forward ideas (my own or others) not because they're necessarily true but rather that they're interesting (though I try to note that distinction, I may not have been sufficiently clear here). And I don't think Runciman is ascribing malice to the situation. More a noting of a characteristic. Particularly in long-standing human institutions and/or systems, I myself tend more toward an evolved-systems viewpoint: it's not that these systems were designed in a specific way, but that systems that are durable, persistent, and successful tend to have certain characteristics. In that sense, I suspect Runciman is excessively teleological here. But that still leaves the observation that democratic electoral systems which diminish the political power of the poor, uneducated, and young, appear to have a fitness advantage. Which remains an interesting observation. I'm not sure I'm following your GC comparison. Could you clarify that? As to political intent and outcome: the problem as I see it are local optima which produce negative outcomes. Nash equilibria, prisoners' dilemma, collective action problems, tragedy of the commons, etc.
    - RelativeDelta 3y ago
      Thank you for the considered response. My GC comparison was meant to show how optimized systems remove unproductive consumers of resources. Here 'unproductive' can simply mean consuming more net production than you generate (largely through tax and program subsidy). The poor are, generally, unproductive. The uneducated are, generally, unproductive. The young are, generally, unproductive. I had meant to illustrate that if elections had necessarily been created intentionally to perform a similar action, we would see elements in society that sought to perform a sort of socially Darwinian 'GC'. But we don't, we see the opposite where these groups are somewhat provided for despite their inefficiency and we have active programs that prevent (or attempt to prevent) them falling victim to the human equivalent of 'GC'. I am meaning to use this as evidence that electoral democracies have evident features that developed over time counter to what majoritarian ruthlessness would suggest. Then I threw a jab in at the end suggesting that this altruism can itself be a weakness if it is maintained in an increasingly resource-scarce environment (harder to develop/sustain complexity). I generally agree with your political assesment. Humans are fundamentally seperate individuals, and thus have incentive for selfish strategies, but there are a lot of us and we compete in team because that too is a dominant strategy. Riding the line between group size, group cohesion, resource to power conversion efficiency, and individual vs collective interest is seemingly an eternal task.
      - dredmorbius 3y ago
        I appreciate the kind words. Even (or especially) small HN discussions can be amongst the most interesting. On your GC analogy: the principle objection I have is that the barriers Runciman describes don't remove the poor / uneducated / old, they disenfranchise them. What you're describing sounds far more like eugenics, which has proved quite problematic. In the context here, one additional problem is that removing the young eventually removes the population, as they're where old people come from (eventually). I'll also push back on the poor being unproductive. Often the poor are productive but have limited compensation negotiating power, and as contrasted with, say, the wealthy inheritor class living off rentier income and/or trust funds, probably compare quite favourably in actual economic productivity. Those lacking formal education may also be quite productive or capable (another podcast I'm listening to just mentioned Michael Faraday, whose formal education ended early; he was apprenticed to a bookbindary by age 14), and the young are typically at the early end of both their productivity and wage-bargaining curve. So a few of your premises may require revisiting. Again, what Runciman is describing isn't a culling of portions of the population, but of deciding whose voices are heard and/or influential politically. I'm also thinking of the long history of the spread of the electoral franchise over time, in multiple countries. Typically from propertied males (often restricted by ethnic or cultural origin) which dates back to the original democracy in Athens, then typically more inclusive classes of cultural-majority males, women, and finally various ethnic / cultural minorities. Even in what's generally considered an advanced democracy, the United States, there are current attempts to exclude specific groups from the franchise, either by law (e.g., convicted felons, even after their sentence has been served), or through other restrictions (limited polling places and times, restictions on vote-by-mail or other remote / early voting options, registration limitations and requirements, etc., etc.).

True, and you'll find that sentiment (explicitly or implicitly stated) in many criticisms of democracy going back to Plato's Republic. Runciman's statement that the challenges of electoral politics to the young and poor are deliberate and by design is novel to me, however. And something I thought worth drawing attention to.

RelativeDelta 3y ago
I doubt that they are in there by design. Ascribing (or implying through framing) malicious intent to an object of criticism is very trendy these days as audiences are eager for justifications to destroy and rebuild various systems. In computer science (a field I am admittedly only tangentially knowledgeable in) there is a process called 'garbage collection' in which portions of a zero-sum resource base (memory) are periodically freed up by removing the unused/underutilized processes so that the primary program or series of programs can use them to accomplish a directed task. One would imagine that if electoral politics truely was designed maliciously it would have some similar function, yet we have the opposite in the form of various social safety nets which actively seek to prevent this. Humanity most frequently seeks to do good. We fail, surely, but we strive nonetheless. What really worries me is whether this impulse will doom us in the lifeboat of the climate-ravaged future... But that's a topic for another day :)
- dredmorbius 3y ago
  I also have my doubts as to design. But Runciman's an interesting and thoughtful commentator on politics, political philosophy, and the history of both. I'd discovered his several podcasts ("Talking Politics", "Talking Politics: The History of Ideas", and his current project, "Past, Present, Future", in the past year or so, and they are consistently excellent. I'm among that group of people who puts forward ideas (my own or others) not because they're necessarily true but rather that they're interesting (though I try to note that distinction, I may not have been sufficiently clear here). And I don't think Runciman is ascribing malice to the situation. More a noting of a characteristic. Particularly in long-standing human institutions and/or systems, I myself tend more toward an evolved-systems viewpoint: it's not that these systems were designed in a specific way, but that systems that are durable, persistent, and successful tend to have certain characteristics. In that sense, I suspect Runciman is excessively teleological here. But that still leaves the observation that democratic electoral systems which diminish the political power of the poor, uneducated, and young, appear to have a fitness advantage. Which remains an interesting observation. I'm not sure I'm following your GC comparison. Could you clarify that? As to political intent and outcome: the problem as I see it are local optima which produce negative outcomes. Nash equilibria, prisoners' dilemma, collective action problems, tragedy of the commons, etc.
  - RelativeDelta 3y ago
    Thank you for the considered response. My GC comparison was meant to show how optimized systems remove unproductive consumers of resources. Here 'unproductive' can simply mean consuming more net production than you generate (largely through tax and program subsidy). The poor are, generally, unproductive. The uneducated are, generally, unproductive. The young are, generally, unproductive. I had meant to illustrate that if elections had necessarily been created intentionally to perform a similar action, we would see elements in society that sought to perform a sort of socially Darwinian 'GC'. But we don't, we see the opposite where these groups are somewhat provided for despite their inefficiency and we have active programs that prevent (or attempt to prevent) them falling victim to the human equivalent of 'GC'. I am meaning to use this as evidence that electoral democracies have evident features that developed over time counter to what majoritarian ruthlessness would suggest. Then I threw a jab in at the end suggesting that this altruism can itself be a weakness if it is maintained in an increasingly resource-scarce environment (harder to develop/sustain complexity). I generally agree with your political assesment. Humans are fundamentally seperate individuals, and thus have incentive for selfish strategies, but there are a lot of us and we compete in team because that too is a dominant strategy. Riding the line between group size, group cohesion, resource to power conversion efficiency, and individual vs collective interest is seemingly an eternal task.
    - dredmorbius 3y ago
      I appreciate the kind words. Even (or especially) small HN discussions can be amongst the most interesting. On your GC analogy: the principle objection I have is that the barriers Runciman describes don't remove the poor / uneducated / old, they disenfranchise them. What you're describing sounds far more like eugenics, which has proved quite problematic. In the context here, one additional problem is that removing the young eventually removes the population, as they're where old people come from (eventually). I'll also push back on the poor being unproductive. Often the poor are productive but have limited compensation negotiating power, and as contrasted with, say, the wealthy inheritor class living off rentier income and/or trust funds, probably compare quite favourably in actual economic productivity. Those lacking formal education may also be quite productive or capable (another podcast I'm listening to just mentioned Michael Faraday, whose formal education ended early; he was apprenticed to a bookbindary by age 14), and the young are typically at the early end of both their productivity and wage-bargaining curve. So a few of your premises may require revisiting. Again, what Runciman is describing isn't a culling of portions of the population, but of deciding whose voices are heard and/or influential politically. I'm also thinking of the long history of the spread of the electoral franchise over time, in multiple countries. Typically from propertied males (often restricted by ethnic or cultural origin) which dates back to the original democracy in Athens, then typically more inclusive classes of cultural-majority males, women, and finally various ethnic / cultural minorities. Even in what's generally considered an advanced democracy, the United States, there are current attempts to exclude specific groups from the franchise, either by law (e.g., convicted felons, even after their sentence has been served), or through other restrictions (limited polling places and times, restictions on vote-by-mail or other remote / early voting options, registration limitations and requirements, etc., etc.).