capitalism

Democracy 119
Minorities also pose a significant danger in democracies
in the form of special interest groups. Because in democratic
governments one citizen’s vote is unlikely to have much
impact on government policy, citizens in democracies tend
to be rationally ignorant, as Anthony Downs emphasized.
There is little benefit to becoming politically informed
because one’s vote counts for so little, so most people are
unaware of most of what the issues before the voters entail.
Rational ignorance provides the opportunity for special
interest groups to lobby government for concentrated benefits
directed at them at the expense of the general public.
Politicians gain the support of the interest groups they help,
whereas the general public remains rationally ignorant of
the costs they bear to provide these interest group benefits.
Mancur Olson observed that as democratic governments
mature, special interest groups gain an increasing amount
of power and ability to effect transfers to themselves, generating
societies in which people substitute transfer-seeking
activity for productive activity, which ultimately leads to
social decline. Because democratic leaders always run the
risk of being voted out of office, they often pursue more
shortsighted policies, and they tend to favor special interests
over the general interest more than would government
leaders with more secure long-term prospects.
It is apparent that there are many problems with democratic
government. As Winston Churchill observed,
“Democracy is the worst form of government except for all
those others that have been tried.” The biggest advantage of
democracy over other forms of government is that political
leaders require a wide base of support to remain in office,
so public officials cannot ignore popular opinion. In autocratic
governments that are maintained by a small coalition
of supporters, political leaders must provide benefits to
those supporters to keep them from defecting to potential
rivals, which leads to corruption, cronyism, and inefficient
policies designed to benefit a small coalition, rather than
the general public. Leaders of democratic governments also
try to maintain political support by providing benefits to
their supporters, but when most people are able to vote,
officials sometimes attempt to provide benefits that appeal
to a broad cross-section of the public. However, because
democratic leaders try to gain the support of various special
interest groups by targeting policies to their benefit, democratic
governments still tend to favor special interests over
the general public interest. The difference is that autocratic
governments tend to favor only a few who are the leader’s
strong supporters, whereas democracies tend to spread special
interest benefits to a larger group.
Democracies come in different forms, and the parliamentary
democracies that govern Europe appear to have
been less successful at controlling the size of government
than American democracy because interest groups can
wield more influence in parliamentary systems. Although
every nation is different in its particulars, in parliamentary
democracies, parties choose who will represent them in
elections, in contrast to the system that prevails in the
United States, where anyone can run for office.
Additionally, voters in parliamentary systems almost
always vote for parties, rather than individual candidates.
After parliamentary elections, the winners form a government
that has control over legislation as long as it remains
in power. Because the parties choose representatives in parliamentary
systems, representatives vote the party line and
do not have the independence to vote against the party position,
unlike in the United States. As a result, interest groups
have more influence in parliamentary systems primarily for
two reasons. First, special interests form relationships with
parties, and those relationships can last beyond the terms of
individual members, whereas in the United States interest
groups must deal with individual representatives who may
or may not vote with their parties. Second, once they are in
power, parliamentary governments have less opposition
because they control a majority of the legislature, whereas
in the United States individual representatives often vote
against their party leaders, so the leaders of the majority
party in the United States have less power to dictate policy
than they would in a parliamentary system. The larger point
here is that there are differences among democracies, and
the differences in the form of democracy can have a significant
impact on government policy.
There are many problems inherent in democratic decision
making. Recognizing these problems, the American
founders were wary of the power of democracy and deliberately
designed a government with constitutionally limited
powers. The United States was not designed to be a democracy,
in the sense of a government whose policies are determined
by popular opinion. Rather, the founders fashioned
constitutional limits on the government’s powers and created
a system of checks and balances to try to prevent
abuse. In addition, they limited the ability of citizens to
directly influence government decision makers. Despite the
popular appeal of democracy, one must recognize that the
success the United States has enjoyed in producing prosperity
and freedom relative to other parts of the world is more
due to the constitutional limits placed on government
power than to democracy.
The American founders, as they originally designed the
federal government, created institutions that were strongly
insulated from popular opinion and the will of the majority.
The judicial branch is insulated from democratic pressures
because justices and judges are appointed by the president
and confirmed by Congress and hold office for life. The
founders intended the executive branch to be similarly insulated,
with the president chosen by an Electoral College.
The Constitution did not specify how the members of the
Electoral College were to be selected, and early in the
nation’s history the most common way was to have
presidential electors selected by the state legislators. The