The problem with the first past the post system of voting is that it tends to reduce the amount of viable parties to just two. The reason for this is that voters react to how they expect the rest of the electorate to vote and they end up supporting candidates which are already popular. But this is bad for freedom and it is bad for democracy. Democracy tends to reduce the size of the state (if it doesn't it serves no purpose) and so then if the choice is reduced to just two parties this will be detrimental to freedom.
Liberals on the right tend to prefer freedom and they like democracy but this means that a centre-right party which opposes democracy (and supports first past the post) will be unappealing to liberals who would naturally support such a centre-right party. First past the post makes both of the main parties unappealing to liberals because they support democracy and then by definition oppose fptp. Because liberals will generally reject a party which supports fptp and because (as a rule) both parties in a fptp system support fptp... liberals will be more disenfranchised by fptp than the left. It is the left who do better with fptp because liberals who would tend to be on the right are repulsed by the two-party system and so those votes are lost meaning that the left take power. First past the post is helpful to the left because liberals will reject (both) fptp parties meaning that only non-liberals remain. First past the post is bad for liberalism which means it makes no sense for anyone but a socialist to support it. In a first past the post duopoly there is only one party which truly benefits from the lack of choice and it is the party of the left. There is no benefit to the right to be derived from first past the post... not even for the party of the centre-right (such as the Tories) because their support for fptp will drive liberal voters away... only Labour benefit from first past the post.
If there is enough land then everyone has a right to at least some of it sufficient that they are able to sustain themselves
Monday, 28 October 2013
Saturday, 26 October 2013
Civilisation doesn't work without property rights
To have property rights requires the consent and agreement of other people. It means nothing to have property rights in isolation. If a single person claims to own the world then this is clearly meaningless because other people will disagree... so then property rights are meaningful only in the context of a state or something approximating to a state. And because civilisation doesn't work without property rights then the state is good and necessary. Anarchism (defined by statelessness) is not a valid approach because it yields no property rights so then we must have government and by implication we must have democracy.
But there are two kinds of democracy there is proportional democracy and there is the two-party first-past-the-post system. Because the state is good it makes no sense to deprive people of their democratic rights... it makes no sense to exclude some voters from the democratic process. It is generally voters who support the minority parties who are excluded by first-past-the-post and there is no reason to exclude these voters from government (since government is good). If government is good it is inconsistent for the government to arbitrarily exclude some voters from the government due to their support for a minority party.
Anarchy is a false concept because it does not yield civilisation and property rights and it is for this reason that proportional representation is preferable.
But there are two kinds of democracy there is proportional democracy and there is the two-party first-past-the-post system. Because the state is good it makes no sense to deprive people of their democratic rights... it makes no sense to exclude some voters from the democratic process. It is generally voters who support the minority parties who are excluded by first-past-the-post and there is no reason to exclude these voters from government (since government is good). If government is good it is inconsistent for the government to arbitrarily exclude some voters from the government due to their support for a minority party.
Anarchy is a false concept because it does not yield civilisation and property rights and it is for this reason that proportional representation is preferable.
Friday, 25 October 2013
A lack of choice is more consistent with illiberalism
If the left is defined by authoritarianism and specifically economic authoritarianism then it is clear that people who hold this ideology will be less offended at a lack of democratic choice. If the left is illiberal and authoritarian there will be less difficulty for people of the left to vote for the Labour party than for the rest to vote for the Tories. It is more difficult for someone who is anti-authoritarian to vote for the Tories than it is for someone on the left to vote for Labour since a lack of choice is more consistent with economic illiberalism. And it is for this reason that first past the post elections tend to favour the left.
Saturday, 19 October 2013
Without democracy we have dictatorship
If anarchy is not possible then we need a government but there are many different kinds of government. Principally governments can either be democratic or undemocratic. If anarchy is impossible then we might think of government as a necessary evil and so then we would want to make it as democratic as possible. For a government to not be democratic is equivalent to a dictatorship which is a crime because it is a form of government which is not democratic. To have a government which is not democratic is similar in nature to slavery in that the people are owned without their permission. At least with democracy the objects of the state (the people) are able to in some sense refuse. They cannot refuse on an individual level but they can refuse collectively which is as much as is possible. Democracy is like a free market in that people can refuse what they are being offered and in contrast dictatorship is like communism in that people cannot refuse. Dictatorship is a crime because (we must assume) government is a requirement and to have less democracy than is possible is a form of slavery since it is through democracy that the people are able to free themselves from the state. Without democracy we have dictatorship which is a form of slavery and a violation of our natural rights and a crime. Dictatorship is a crime because it is possible to have democracy and clearly democracy is more liberal than dictatorship (the people have a choice). Democracy is more liberal than dictatorship and so then we can deduce that dictatorship is a crime.
Tuesday, 15 October 2013
Proportional representation is good for property rights
Democracy is the means by which the people are able to protect themselves and their property form the state. And so then if there is not sufficient democracy the state will be able to violate the rights of the people. If we assume that property rights are derived from the state then without adequate democracy the people will be subject to violations of their property... which is crime. Democracy protects the people from crime... perpetrated either by the state in the form of communism or by individual criminals. It is the state which we expect to protect us from crime in a democracy and so then if democracy is compromised then so too is our property compromised. Democracy is synonymous with strong property rights and so then the more democratic the state in which we live the better the property rights. If we do not have fully-proportional elections then we do not have the most strong property rights possible. A lack of democracy (such as first past the post) is helpful to criminals either public (the government) or private.
Property rights are synonymous with democracy and so then the most democratic system (proportional representation) will preserve property to the greatest extent. To support the first past the post (fptp) system is to damage democracy and damage property rights.
Property rights are synonymous with democracy and so then the most democratic system (proportional representation) will preserve property to the greatest extent. To support the first past the post (fptp) system is to damage democracy and damage property rights.
Sunday, 13 October 2013
First past the post is not democratic...
We can only be in government if we have been elected democratically... if we seek to form a government then we must seek (and secure) a mandate from the people. If we do not hold elections and gain a mandate from the people then we are not a government we are a tyrant. To rule people without elections is arrogant tyranny. It is arrogant because we have assumed that the people (who we treat as subjects) are our subjects. We assume that we are the government even though we have held no election. Only with democracy is government valid and so to oppose elections and yet still claim to be a government or to endorse government is authoritarian and arrogant. All governments must be elected democratically. True government is that which is democratic and has a mandate from the people. Government without democracy is tyranny.
Politicians support proportional representation
It makes no sense for a politician or an aspirant politician to support anything other than a proportional voting system. If someone seeks elected office then we can assume they are not an anarchist and that they endorse the validity of the state. A politician is a hypocrite if they claim to be an anarchist so we must assume all politicians are statists and not anarchists. All statists must be in favour of proportional representation because it is the most democratic system available to the legislature and democracy is the only valid form of government. Statists support pr and so then the Tories are being hypocrites (denying their statism) when they claim to support first past the post. Only a hypocrite politician could argue that fptp is a preferable system.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)