Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Can there be such a thing as "too much democracy?" Is there a danger that the digital revolution will give too much power to citizens who aren't compe

I have found that there is a fair amount of polarized opinions on this topic/question. An example of this divergent thinking can be found in the contrast between the sentiments expressed in the book entitled the Citizen Renaissance and the arguments of the political theorist Samuel P. Huntington.

The book Citizen Renaissance, which is presently in draft form, may be an example of a Digital Revolution innovation as it solicits all those who enter its web site to “Please contribute your thoughts and help finish the book”. Might this in itself be an example of too much democracy? Will it become common practice to solicit pubic commentary via the Internet before we publish a book? In any case, I believe it to be a great example of the Internets’ capacity to facilitate sharing and collaboration.

In its’ third chapter: The Digital Revolution and a New Democracy, the author with fervent optimism and assertiveness makes declarations such as the following:

The Digital Revolution has democratized communications in a radical way so that top down messaging has become a thing of the past.

Power now rests with the people and people now expect to be heard as a right.

In the digital democracy, we are inquiring, less respectful, or even trusting of authority.

The audience may be fractured and fragmented but they can coalesce on-line into a force for change because the beauty of the digital is the effective democrat- ization of people and opinions.

In The Crisis of Democracy, Samuel Huntington, et al. argues differently. In his theory of political cycles:

“Increased political participation leads to increased policy polarization within society;

Increased policy polarization leads to increasing distrust and a sense of decreasing political efficacy among individuals;

A sense of decreasing political efficacy lead to decreased political participation.”

Huntington believes that: “There are potentially desirable limits to the indefinite extension of political democracy.” “(T)he danger of overloading the political system with demands which extend its functions and undermine its authority still remains…”

The first two of my links leads to articles that seem, albeit somewhat anecdotally, to support the notion that there may be such a thing as “too much democracy.”

www.metroactive.com/papers/sonoma/05.28.98/election-9821.html


www.loweringthebar.net/2007/09/bulgaria-suffer.html

www.citizenrenaissance.com/the-book/part-one-three-seismic-shifts/chapter-three-the-digital-revolution-and-a-new-democracy/

www.uoregon.edu/~jboland/hntngton.html

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