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民主是歷史上最悠久的政治制度之一。在芸芸眾多政治制度當中，民主亦是最受世人重視的選項。世人對民主作為制度，耳熟能詳。但究竟民主的本質是甚麼、局限在哪，相信很少人能說得出箇中原委。
本書作者是政治學權威，在大學任教多年，對民主這個課題覃思精研。作者集思廣益，從正反兩方面探討民主的真諦，而在局限方面，着墨尤多。作者對民主抱持正面態度，他想在書中闡釋的是，我們在討論和反思民主這個課題時，應有多元思考，不應有既定立場，也不應劃地自限，在分析民主時，尤應考慮其他相關因素。
本書作者是政治學權威，在大學任教多年，對民主這個課題覃思精研。作者集思廣益，從正反兩方面探討民主的真諦，而在局限方面，着墨尤多。作者對民主抱持正面態度，他想在書中闡釋的是，我們在討論和反思民主這個課題時，應有多元思考，不應有既定立場，也不應劃地自限，在分析民主時，尤應考慮其他相關因素。
244 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2010
12 people are currently reading
189 people want to read
About the author
Adam Przeworski
45 books47 followersAdam Przeworski is the Carroll and Milton Professor of Politics and (by courtesy) Economics at New York University. Previously he taught at the University of Chicago, where he was the Martin A. Ryerson Distinguished Service Professor, and held visiting appointments in India, Chile, France, Germany, Spain, and Switzerland. A member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences since 1991, he is the recipient of the 1985 Socialist Review Book Award, the 1998 Gregory M. Luebbert Article Award, the 2001 Woodrow Wilson Prize, the 2010 Lawrence Longley Award, the 2010 Johan Skytte Prize, the 2018 Sakip Sabanci Award, and the 2018 Juan Linz Prize.. He recently published Why Bother with Elections? (London: Polity Press 2018).
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
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December 7, 2022I'm in class rn and the girl next to me- her laptop fan is going CRAZY right now like close even a single window please
February 7, 2018
Este libro cambia la forma idealizada que uno tiene de ver la democracia que es nada más que el folleto publicitario de la misma.
April 28, 2021
some notes
* classical and modern democratic theorists disagree strongly on political parties: now hard to see how we thought we could do without them. Kelsen: "the ideal of a general interest superior to and transcending interests of groups, thus parties, the ideal of solidarity of interests of all members of the collectivity without distinction of religion, of nationality, of class, etc. is a metaphysical, more exactly, a metapolitical illusion, habitually expressed by speaking, in an extremely obscure terminology,
of an ‘organic’ collective or ‘organic’ structure."
* fun tidbit from classical small-population solution of rotation: "the ceremonial office of the epistates, who held the seal of Athens and the keys of the treasuries and represented Athens in relation to other states, could be held for only one night and one day in one’s life"
* why majority rule? one justification is May’s theorem: "simple-majority rule is the only rule of collective decision making that satisfies four axioms: equality, neutrality, responsiveness, and decisiveness." equality just means anonymity in the sense that any two individuals can interchange preferences and collective decision is unchanged. neutrality means decisions don't depend on the names attached to alternatives. decisiveness means it's clear what we must do when collective decision is made. responsiveness means at least one person changing preference could flip the decision.
* why majority rule? another view: it's a proxy we use to gauge and minimize potential of successful violent opposition to collective decision.
* why majority rule? third answer is Rae's theorem: "simple-majority rule maximizes the number of people who live under the laws they like."
* problems with majority rule: Condorcet's paradox and its generalization, Arrow’s theorem.
* deep equivalence between equality before the law and anonymity: "The law has to treat all citizens equally because as citizens they are indistinguishable"
* summary of palmer's Age of the Democratic Revolution: "democracy was not a revolution against an existing system but a reaction against the increasing power of aristocracy. It was aristocracy that undermined monarchy; democracy followed in its footsteps." also check out John Dunn's Democracy: A History.
* why historically equality just meant anonymity: "Abolishing all distinctions [is] a logical outcome of the struggle against aristocracy. The fact is that democrats turned against all distinctions. The only attribute of democratic subjects is that they have none as such. The democratic citizen is simply without qualities. Not equal, not homogeneous, just anonymous." comes across strongly in Rousseau quotations.
* suffrage eligibility rules tricky in principle: kids, the insane. unclear to me why these are not negligible rounding errors, random noise, and low cost to include.
* levelers, babeuf, marx, ricardo and many other socialists and conservatives all agree: material inequality not compatible with democracy -- and yet!
* why not more economic redistribution with democracy? initially suffrage restriction replacing aristocracy with what was effectively competitive oligarchy. but universal suffrage leads to puzzle. possible explanations include (1) deluded populace, (2) power elite, (3) marx's explanation (see below), (4) przeworski's explanation (see below).
* marx on limits of bourgeois rights: "The state abolishes, in its own way, distinctions of birth, social rank, education, occupation, when it declares that birth, social rank, education, occupation, are nonpolitical distinctions, when it proclaims, without regard to these distinctions, that every member of the nation is an equal participant in national sovereignty... Nevertheless the state allows private property, education, occupation to act in their way – i.e., as private property, as education, as occupation, and to exert the influence of their special nature."
* przeworski's explanation: "governments of all partisan stripes must anticipate the trade-off between redistribution and growth. Redistributing productive property or even incomes is costly to the poor. Confronting the perspective of losing their property or not being able to enjoy its fruits, property owners save and invest less, thus reducing the future wealth and future income of everyone. This 'structural dependence on capital' imposes a limit on redistribution, even for those governments that want to equalize incomes" but he admits empirically there is reason to doubt this trade-off.
* american institutional setup pretty weird, madison based it on hunches and reading of philosophers. the checks and balances stuff in particular has problems: empirically it doesn't seem more stable, and even in theory doesn't make much sense
* true democracy likely has to be representative setup with universal suffrage, unicameral parliament, strict majoritarian rules. author makes simple but subtle point that non-unicameral setup is mathematically equivalent to supermajoritarian rules.
* there is nothing very natural about the government schematized into branches like executive, legislative, etc. after all, their powers supposedly overlap to intentional check ambition with ambition (in american setup), which implies the powers do not themselves delineate the branches. also, they are not exhaustive of components necessary to govern: eg, education system pretty different and arguably more fundamental for self-rule. important not to forget we inherited some stupid categories scribbled out by philosophers who had no experience with actual democratic government.
* there is some accomplishment in having replaced aristocracy with competitive oligarchy: elites imposing themselves different from elites proposing themselves. even autocrats pay respect to need for democratic mandate by bothering to hold sham elections.
* still, we must wonder if this is best we can do? america in particular had a lot of obviously cobwebbed and busted institutions designed by people who knew little about democracy, and the checks and balances and bicameral legislature should be first things we scrap.
* classical and modern democratic theorists disagree strongly on political parties: now hard to see how we thought we could do without them. Kelsen: "the ideal of a general interest superior to and transcending interests of groups, thus parties, the ideal of solidarity of interests of all members of the collectivity without distinction of religion, of nationality, of class, etc. is a metaphysical, more exactly, a metapolitical illusion, habitually expressed by speaking, in an extremely obscure terminology,
of an ‘organic’ collective or ‘organic’ structure."
* fun tidbit from classical small-population solution of rotation: "the ceremonial office of the epistates, who held the seal of Athens and the keys of the treasuries and represented Athens in relation to other states, could be held for only one night and one day in one’s life"
* why majority rule? one justification is May’s theorem: "simple-majority rule is the only rule of collective decision making that satisfies four axioms: equality, neutrality, responsiveness, and decisiveness." equality just means anonymity in the sense that any two individuals can interchange preferences and collective decision is unchanged. neutrality means decisions don't depend on the names attached to alternatives. decisiveness means it's clear what we must do when collective decision is made. responsiveness means at least one person changing preference could flip the decision.
* why majority rule? another view: it's a proxy we use to gauge and minimize potential of successful violent opposition to collective decision.
* why majority rule? third answer is Rae's theorem: "simple-majority rule maximizes the number of people who live under the laws they like."
* problems with majority rule: Condorcet's paradox and its generalization, Arrow’s theorem.
* deep equivalence between equality before the law and anonymity: "The law has to treat all citizens equally because as citizens they are indistinguishable"
* summary of palmer's Age of the Democratic Revolution: "democracy was not a revolution against an existing system but a reaction against the increasing power of aristocracy. It was aristocracy that undermined monarchy; democracy followed in its footsteps." also check out John Dunn's Democracy: A History.
* why historically equality just meant anonymity: "Abolishing all distinctions [is] a logical outcome of the struggle against aristocracy. The fact is that democrats turned against all distinctions. The only attribute of democratic subjects is that they have none as such. The democratic citizen is simply without qualities. Not equal, not homogeneous, just anonymous." comes across strongly in Rousseau quotations.
* suffrage eligibility rules tricky in principle: kids, the insane. unclear to me why these are not negligible rounding errors, random noise, and low cost to include.
* levelers, babeuf, marx, ricardo and many other socialists and conservatives all agree: material inequality not compatible with democracy -- and yet!
* why not more economic redistribution with democracy? initially suffrage restriction replacing aristocracy with what was effectively competitive oligarchy. but universal suffrage leads to puzzle. possible explanations include (1) deluded populace, (2) power elite, (3) marx's explanation (see below), (4) przeworski's explanation (see below).
* marx on limits of bourgeois rights: "The state abolishes, in its own way, distinctions of birth, social rank, education, occupation, when it declares that birth, social rank, education, occupation, are nonpolitical distinctions, when it proclaims, without regard to these distinctions, that every member of the nation is an equal participant in national sovereignty... Nevertheless the state allows private property, education, occupation to act in their way – i.e., as private property, as education, as occupation, and to exert the influence of their special nature."
* przeworski's explanation: "governments of all partisan stripes must anticipate the trade-off between redistribution and growth. Redistributing productive property or even incomes is costly to the poor. Confronting the perspective of losing their property or not being able to enjoy its fruits, property owners save and invest less, thus reducing the future wealth and future income of everyone. This 'structural dependence on capital' imposes a limit on redistribution, even for those governments that want to equalize incomes" but he admits empirically there is reason to doubt this trade-off.
* american institutional setup pretty weird, madison based it on hunches and reading of philosophers. the checks and balances stuff in particular has problems: empirically it doesn't seem more stable, and even in theory doesn't make much sense
* true democracy likely has to be representative setup with universal suffrage, unicameral parliament, strict majoritarian rules. author makes simple but subtle point that non-unicameral setup is mathematically equivalent to supermajoritarian rules.
* there is nothing very natural about the government schematized into branches like executive, legislative, etc. after all, their powers supposedly overlap to intentional check ambition with ambition (in american setup), which implies the powers do not themselves delineate the branches. also, they are not exhaustive of components necessary to govern: eg, education system pretty different and arguably more fundamental for self-rule. important not to forget we inherited some stupid categories scribbled out by philosophers who had no experience with actual democratic government.
* there is some accomplishment in having replaced aristocracy with competitive oligarchy: elites imposing themselves different from elites proposing themselves. even autocrats pay respect to need for democratic mandate by bothering to hold sham elections.
* still, we must wonder if this is best we can do? america in particular had a lot of obviously cobwebbed and busted institutions designed by people who knew little about democracy, and the checks and balances and bicameral legislature should be first things we scrap.
April 13, 2020
A must read for anyone interested in understanding the promise and limits of democracy as a political system. The author is one of the world's leading authorities on this subject and writes in clear analytical if scholarly style that eschews jargon. The complex arguments are worth the extra effort.
July 17, 2019
Un clásico de la Ciencia Política. Un libro que debería estar en los currículums de muchas carreras. Imperdible!
October 8, 2021
Great book for grasping a deep understanding where democracy comes from, how it evolved to what we understand as democracy nowadays and knowing what to expect from it. However I wouldn’t recommend it to someone who doesn’t like politics since rich in concepts and references to other authors and historical events. Przeworski leaves wanting to read another of his books and rating him as one the most relevant authors when it comes to democratic theory.
January 18, 2023
difficilement compréhensible, PK des maths dans un bouquin de politique svppp
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews