British tabloids have fed the public a steady stream of half-truths and distortions painting the picture of an undemocratic out-of-control bureaucratic behemoth in Brussels that needs to be discarded as quickly as possible, lest it grabs the last remnants of ancient British liberty.
As a consequence, throughout the run-up to the Brexit referendum, it was impossible to have informed public debates on the costs and benefits of Britain’s membership in, or exit from, the European Union
For example, Alexander Hamilton believed in America but not in Americans when he said in a June 1788 speech defending the ratification of the U.S. Constitution: “That a pure democracy if it were practicable would be the most perfect government. Experience has proved that no position is more false than this. The ancient democracies in which the people themselves deliberated never possessed one good feature of government. Their very character was tyranny; their figure, deformity.”
Hamilton participated in the American Revolution, an event that left him with a deep fear of mob rule and made him question the wisdom of the masses after witnessing revolutionary excesses in New York City (including witnessing how a mob tried to lynch the headmaster of his university). As a result of his experiences, he firmly believed throughout his life that it was often necessary to leave the public in the dark during important political deliberations.
However, the Founding Fathers had it right. There is an inherent danger coming from direct democracy when combined with an uninformed and manipulated public that has to decide the policy of a country, as we saw on June 23 when 36 percent of eligible voters in the UK chose to exit the European Union. Again, this should not come as a surprise. In one sense, the Brexit referendum illustrates as much the failure of the experts and elected politicians as it shows that relying on the masses and populism can lead to suspect and potentially damaging decisions.
今回のイギリスのEU離脱騒動の教訓。
大衆に十分な情報が行き渡らず、したがって、十分な議論もできず、さらに、大衆はそもそも、信頼できず、暴挙に出ることもあるので、アメリカ建国の父たちは、直接民主制ではなく、アメリカの政治制度として、代表民主制を選んだのだ、と。
ここらへんは、どうかな。
じゃあ、議会の代表者が、十分な情報を得ているのか、というとアメリカの対日本慰安婦決議やら、イラク侵攻など、必ずしもベストな選択とはいえなかった。
マイノリティーの人権侵害という点で、大衆による民主主義は歯止めをかける必要があるが、国のあり方や方向を決めるのに直接民主制が必ずしも悪いとはいえず、今回の選択とて、その評価は、ひとそれぞれで、決定的なものがあるわけでもない。
