Blog 2: Commentary on the statement "Democracy Creates Stability in a Society"

A democracy should maintain a government whereby “the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections” (Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, 2008). Alternatively, it may be understood that democracies are representative, since electorates are elected into power by the people through a voting system. For the purpose of this commentary, ‘stability’ shall be strictly limited to social stability only. I believe that adopting democracy as a government system does not create social and political stability.

Firstly, when employing democracy as a form of government system, the assumption is made that humans are inherently rational, and thus possess the ability to make logical and reasonable choices. However, is this really the case? Choices are highly subjective, and may easily be influenced by prejudices and stereotypes present in society. For example, in the case of post-1960 USA, we see that the US government introduced democracy as a form of political government. However, in Southern states, this initiative was abject failure, since African Americans feared harassment by racist whites and did not register to vote. The majority of representatives were whites, and the vast majority of white voters, blinded by racial prejudices, simply voted more whites into power. This triggered the Civil Rights Movement, a period of uncertainty, turbulence and social instability.

Secondly, the fact that a decision is made by the majority (in the case of democracy) does not guarantee that it is the most appropriate and reasonable choice. If the majority’s decision leads to morally questionable happiness, then there can be no reason for us to believe that democracy creates social stability. In this case, the generation of morally questionable happiness would mean that the minority would experience unhappiness and unfair treatment. For example, if unfair voting rights are implemented in a democratic government, as in the case of post-1960 America and Northern Ireland, a biased government is formed, and unhappiness is created among minority groups. After long periods of time, tensions will build and frustrations will mount, which would eventually be expressed as a physical confrontation, which would undeniably generate social instability.

Thirdly, although certain democracies attempt to restrict the power each branch of the government has, there can be no perfect example of a democracy in which all branches of the government possess equal amounts of power. For example, although the US advocates democracy and federalism, the fact still remains that political power can never be equally distributed between the state and federal governments. In the case of the US, it appears that the Federal government has a greater influence. Perhaps, this can be said to be an inherent problem about democracy. Should a particular branch of the government gain absolute or significantly more power than the other, there may be the possibility of internal conflict, in which case the people’s views will no longer be accurately and properly expressed, resulting in social instability.

In conclusion, the concept of democracy is built upon two key assumptions, which is that people are equipped with the ability to make logical and rational choices and that there should be accurate representation of the people’s views in all cases. We see that these two assumptions may not be entirely correct, which casts a doubt on the feasibility of democracy. Should democracy not be a feasible government system, then we are unable to say that democracy creates social stability. Rather, it would be more appropriate to say that social stability may be achieved if perfect democracy is implemented – something which I believe to be highly impossible.