Disappointing Democracy
Is Democracy all it’s cracked up to be?
We are used to thinking very highly of democracy, the majority of us live in democracies and we think their quite nice, far better than any of the alternatives. And while that may be true, are we just being naïve and blindly optimistic, ignoring the inherent flaws of democracy? Democracy was achieved by such a long, arduous, heroic struggle that it can feel embarrassing, even shameful, to be disappointed by it. But democracy is not perfect and a couple of major historical figures thought so too.
Socrates
Democracy is inherently linked with Ancient Athens — the civilization that gave rise to it. The Parthenon has become almost a by-word for democratic values. Hence, it is very surprising to discover that one of Ancient Greece’s greatest achievements, philosophy, was highly suspicious of its other major achievement, democracy. The founding father of Greek philosophy, Socrates is portrayed in the dialogues of Plato as hugely pessimistic about the whole business of democracy. In Book 6 of ‘The Republic’, Plato describes Socrates falling into conversation with a character called Adeimantus (Plato’s brother) and trying…
