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Democracy Despite Itself: Why a System That Shouldn't Work at All Works So Well
Why democracy is the most effective form of government despite irrational (and sometime oblivious) voters and flawed (and sometimes inept) politicians. Voters often make irrational decisions based on inaccurate and irrelevant information. Politicians are often inept, corrupt, or out of touch with the will of the people. Elections can be determined by the design of the ballot and the gerrymandered borders of a district. And yet, despite voters who choose candidates according to the boxer–brief dichotomy and politicians who struggle to put together a coherent sentence, democracy works exceptionally citizens of democracies are healthier, happier, and freer than citizens of other countries. In Democracy Despite Itself , Danny Oppenheimer, a psychologist, and Mike Edwards, a political scientist, explore this How can democracy lead to such successful outcomes when the defining characteristic of democracy—elections—is so flawed? Oppenheimer and Edwards argue that democracy works because regular elections, no matter how flawed, produce a variety of unintuitive, positive consequences. The brilliance of democracy, write Oppenheimer and Edwards, does not lie in the people's ability to pick superior leaders. It lies in the many ways that it subtly encourages the flawed people and their flawed leaders to work toward building a better society.
245 pages, Hardcover
First published February 3, 2012
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
February 12, 2012
Churchill had two great quotes about democracy, that "the best argument against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter," and that "democracy is the worst form of government, except all of the others that have been tried."
In the alternately hilarious and depressing first half of the book, the authors explore the truth behind the first quote -- that voters are dismally ignorant about many issues and make terribly flawed decisions when choosing candidates. The authors combine great experimental data on decision making biases with real world examples of how those biases play out in real elections -- how election results are demonstrably influenced by the order of candidate names on the ballot, how they can be predicted by 100 millisecond assessments of how "competent" a candidate looks, how voting in a school or firehouse can prime voters to the issues of education or public safety, and dozens more interesting facts.
The second half of the book grapples with why, despite all this, democracies work better than any other form of government. It explores how the wisdom of crowds, a sense of fairness in the system, and opportunities for peaceful transitions of power lead to reasonable outcomes and incentives for both leaders and the electorate to fully participate and abide by the rules of the society. In one of the book's most moving sections, the authors describe how we should not take for granted an event like the peaceful transition of power from George W. Bush to Barack Obama in 2009, and how the guarantee of such events is one key to the success of democracy.
Overall, this is a great and thought-provoking read, useful for both amassing fun factoids about irrational behavior and for thinking seriously about why our form of government works, and what could still be improved.
In the alternately hilarious and depressing first half of the book, the authors explore the truth behind the first quote -- that voters are dismally ignorant about many issues and make terribly flawed decisions when choosing candidates. The authors combine great experimental data on decision making biases with real world examples of how those biases play out in real elections -- how election results are demonstrably influenced by the order of candidate names on the ballot, how they can be predicted by 100 millisecond assessments of how "competent" a candidate looks, how voting in a school or firehouse can prime voters to the issues of education or public safety, and dozens more interesting facts.
The second half of the book grapples with why, despite all this, democracies work better than any other form of government. It explores how the wisdom of crowds, a sense of fairness in the system, and opportunities for peaceful transitions of power lead to reasonable outcomes and incentives for both leaders and the electorate to fully participate and abide by the rules of the society. In one of the book's most moving sections, the authors describe how we should not take for granted an event like the peaceful transition of power from George W. Bush to Barack Obama in 2009, and how the guarantee of such events is one key to the success of democracy.
Overall, this is a great and thought-provoking read, useful for both amassing fun factoids about irrational behavior and for thinking seriously about why our form of government works, and what could still be improved.
April 18, 2012
I won this book on Gooreads and I am so glad I had the chance to read it! Instead of tearing apart the democratic system Edwards and Oppenheimer examine the people who fuel the voting process. If our system is broken, they explain through clear examples, it is our fault not the fault of a democratic system. Uninformed, misguided voters select candidates based not on platforms but preconceived biases and "news" that they accept without questions. This book should be required reading for students in high schools. Why? Instead of complaining about whats "not" happening, we all need to educate ourselves and make better choices. This book will readjust your thinking inspire you to be more informed in this election year.
June 7, 2018
This is an easy read that brings up a lot of fun stuff about heuristics in human thought, but ultimately I felt the premise and argument was thin. The idea is that humans are irrational yet somehow when they form democracies their irrationalities balance each other out and they end up with a stable society. I am left doubtful of the mechanisms behind this magic. (A more cynical account is in the more recent
Democracy for Realists: Why Elections Do Not Produce Responsive Government
.) I also wonder why the authors did not recommend that people take action to better inform themselves and to take more action so they can become better citizens. (A program for this is in We Are the Ones We Have Been Waiting for: The Promise of Civic Renewal in America.)
Regular people cannot opine on "the appropriate amount to tariff Guinean bauxite" or " the maximum allowable levels of dicholorethylene in drinking water," and politicians, for their part, have reason "to oversimplify their own positions" since any policy comes with a complex cost-benefit tradeoff that is likely to confuse and alienate the electorate.
This book does a good job of quickly explaining a number of heuristics such as confirmation bias (the tendency to entrench one's preexisting beliefs), the desire to project a consistent identity, the need to trust experts to arrive at correct decisions, the ease of remembering a positive or negative feeling but not necessarily the original rationale for that feeling, and so forth. It is also pretty good at introducing concepts of how politicians need to pay attention to public opinion (even though it's often hard to get accurate, predictable, and useful information about this) if they wish reelection and how they generally obey unwritten norms of democracy. It is weaker at explaining how all this individual ignorance aggregates into a collective decision-making process that yields a stable society that can hold politicians accountable.
On the subject of activism or moral progress (terms that weren't really used because the concepts weren't really discussed), the authors suggest that the march for equality is a self-fulfilling prophecy that depends on people wanting it and believing in it, yet they also say that it's hard to figure out — because, at least, the kind of studies they examined were unable to address this — the chicken-and-egg question of why public opinion ever changes. In other words, when we're faced with our own confirmation bias, our need for a reliable self-image, our self-created echo chambers, and so forth, what we really have is a desire not to change. Everything we think is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Exactly how do we break out of old ways of thinking to contribute to collective decisions on how to form a more perfect union? How would we even go about investigating or encouraging our own moral transformation? "Self-fulfilling prophecy" is well and good if we happen to be on an upward swing, but how do we break out of a downward spiral?
Morality was indirectly mentioned in one way: Certain heuristics reveal that people will sometimes accept a material loss to their self-interest if it means that principles of fair treatment are upheld. This privileging of the idea of fairness over self-interest seems a positive human trait overall but it isn't clear how far it gets us collectively especially since people disagree on what is fair, so it doesn't yet show why democracy "works so well" (to reference the book's subtitle).
They think that the psychological and statistical forces underlying democratic elections result in pushing the nation toward a moderate middle. They claim that "the most extreme and bizarre voices tend to cancel each other out, while the rest of us rely on simple shortcuts that tend to stabilize our decisions." This no longer rings true after the 2016 U.S. election and indeed should have been reevaluated in light of other historical incidents in which a formerly moderate democracy began bending and splitting toward extremism. It's fine to say that democracy usually lends itself to moderation but we need an account of how polarization happens and what that means. The threat of polarization is examined in the recent How Democracies Die: What History Reveals About Our Future. The way that people tend to vote according to their partisan identities (incidentally embracing whatever policy ideology their party supplies) was stressed in Democracy for Realists; this is a contributing factor to polarization. And the way that people resist marginalization by embracing "identity politics" was criticized by Mark Lilla in The Once and Future Liberal: After Identity Politics because he fears it amounts to a strategic shot in the foot, a position that many have taken issue with, but, in any case, as long as minorities are marginalized and can't find a political strategy that works, that in itself has to be a heavy caveat against the claim that democracy "works so well," one that the authors only sort of acknowledge by saying that democracy is simply better than the alternatives.
More thoughts recorded in my blog post: "Four books on the strengths and frailties of democracy."
Regular people cannot opine on "the appropriate amount to tariff Guinean bauxite" or " the maximum allowable levels of dicholorethylene in drinking water," and politicians, for their part, have reason "to oversimplify their own positions" since any policy comes with a complex cost-benefit tradeoff that is likely to confuse and alienate the electorate.
This book does a good job of quickly explaining a number of heuristics such as confirmation bias (the tendency to entrench one's preexisting beliefs), the desire to project a consistent identity, the need to trust experts to arrive at correct decisions, the ease of remembering a positive or negative feeling but not necessarily the original rationale for that feeling, and so forth. It is also pretty good at introducing concepts of how politicians need to pay attention to public opinion (even though it's often hard to get accurate, predictable, and useful information about this) if they wish reelection and how they generally obey unwritten norms of democracy. It is weaker at explaining how all this individual ignorance aggregates into a collective decision-making process that yields a stable society that can hold politicians accountable.
On the subject of activism or moral progress (terms that weren't really used because the concepts weren't really discussed), the authors suggest that the march for equality is a self-fulfilling prophecy that depends on people wanting it and believing in it, yet they also say that it's hard to figure out — because, at least, the kind of studies they examined were unable to address this — the chicken-and-egg question of why public opinion ever changes. In other words, when we're faced with our own confirmation bias, our need for a reliable self-image, our self-created echo chambers, and so forth, what we really have is a desire not to change. Everything we think is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Exactly how do we break out of old ways of thinking to contribute to collective decisions on how to form a more perfect union? How would we even go about investigating or encouraging our own moral transformation? "Self-fulfilling prophecy" is well and good if we happen to be on an upward swing, but how do we break out of a downward spiral?
Morality was indirectly mentioned in one way: Certain heuristics reveal that people will sometimes accept a material loss to their self-interest if it means that principles of fair treatment are upheld. This privileging of the idea of fairness over self-interest seems a positive human trait overall but it isn't clear how far it gets us collectively especially since people disagree on what is fair, so it doesn't yet show why democracy "works so well" (to reference the book's subtitle).
They think that the psychological and statistical forces underlying democratic elections result in pushing the nation toward a moderate middle. They claim that "the most extreme and bizarre voices tend to cancel each other out, while the rest of us rely on simple shortcuts that tend to stabilize our decisions." This no longer rings true after the 2016 U.S. election and indeed should have been reevaluated in light of other historical incidents in which a formerly moderate democracy began bending and splitting toward extremism. It's fine to say that democracy usually lends itself to moderation but we need an account of how polarization happens and what that means. The threat of polarization is examined in the recent How Democracies Die: What History Reveals About Our Future. The way that people tend to vote according to their partisan identities (incidentally embracing whatever policy ideology their party supplies) was stressed in Democracy for Realists; this is a contributing factor to polarization. And the way that people resist marginalization by embracing "identity politics" was criticized by Mark Lilla in The Once and Future Liberal: After Identity Politics because he fears it amounts to a strategic shot in the foot, a position that many have taken issue with, but, in any case, as long as minorities are marginalized and can't find a political strategy that works, that in itself has to be a heavy caveat against the claim that democracy "works so well," one that the authors only sort of acknowledge by saying that democracy is simply better than the alternatives.
More thoughts recorded in my blog post: "Four books on the strengths and frailties of democracy."
March 9, 2017
Disclosure: The lead author is a friend and colleague (I worked in his lab in college).
This insightful and thought-provoking book explores how democracy can do such a good job of ensuring the rights, freedoms, and prosperity of the people in it even though those people often make decisions--political and otherwise--for crazy reasons. The first half of the book mainly uses information from psychology to show how people's irrationality impacts the political process in ways most of us would like not to think about too much. Here, though, it's much less painful than usual to face our shortcomings, because the book presents them with balance and humor. The second half shifts the focus to how democracy is uniquely suited to allow societies to flourish in the face of the craziness of their members, using insights from political science, history, and psychology.
You don't have to know a lot--or even anything at all--about psychology or politics to enjoy this book. Everything is presented in a clear and engaging manner. But there's no need to worry about being bored if you're an expert, either. The authors combine the disciplines in an exciting way that will make you think about both human decision making and politics in ways you haven't before. And whether you go into the book knowing a little or a lot, you'll come out having learned a lot, including a deeper understanding of our flawed nature, plenty of fun and fascinating historical and psychological tidbits (enough for at least several years' worth of cocktail parties), and--most importantly--a new appreciation for all that democracy does for us as citizens and allows us to do together as a society.
This insightful and thought-provoking book explores how democracy can do such a good job of ensuring the rights, freedoms, and prosperity of the people in it even though those people often make decisions--political and otherwise--for crazy reasons. The first half of the book mainly uses information from psychology to show how people's irrationality impacts the political process in ways most of us would like not to think about too much. Here, though, it's much less painful than usual to face our shortcomings, because the book presents them with balance and humor. The second half shifts the focus to how democracy is uniquely suited to allow societies to flourish in the face of the craziness of their members, using insights from political science, history, and psychology.
You don't have to know a lot--or even anything at all--about psychology or politics to enjoy this book. Everything is presented in a clear and engaging manner. But there's no need to worry about being bored if you're an expert, either. The authors combine the disciplines in an exciting way that will make you think about both human decision making and politics in ways you haven't before. And whether you go into the book knowing a little or a lot, you'll come out having learned a lot, including a deeper understanding of our flawed nature, plenty of fun and fascinating historical and psychological tidbits (enough for at least several years' worth of cocktail parties), and--most importantly--a new appreciation for all that democracy does for us as citizens and allows us to do together as a society.
July 30, 2015
This book is basically split into two distinct parts:
Part 1 - Explains in scary detail how flawed and complicated the US democratic system is. It lists issues and contradictions in the candidates, the voting process, and even the voters themselves.
Part 2 - Explains why even despite all its warts, our US democracy is leaps and bounds more desirable than any of the alternatives. Seems like the system tends to be a self-righting ship usually headed straight ahead while being urged Left or Right by its constituents.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book and would recommend it to anyone even vaguely political.
Part 1 - Explains in scary detail how flawed and complicated the US democratic system is. It lists issues and contradictions in the candidates, the voting process, and even the voters themselves.
Part 2 - Explains why even despite all its warts, our US democracy is leaps and bounds more desirable than any of the alternatives. Seems like the system tends to be a self-righting ship usually headed straight ahead while being urged Left or Right by its constituents.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book and would recommend it to anyone even vaguely political.
July 7, 2013
Despite all their warts, democratic countries do better than the rest by a wide margin. There are many reasons why. When people think that the governing process is fair and that they have a voice, they are more likely to voluntarily follow laws, regulations and processes. When people do this, things work better. When opposition leaders see that there is life after being power, they will be more likely to accept criticism and defeat when they are in power again, thus enhancing the virtuous circle of fair play. These and other issues are explored, drawing on behavioral research and other disciplines.
November 20, 2011
Bias alert: I'm married to the second author of this book.
It's an enjoyable read and surprisingly funny. You, the voter, get to be both the villain and the hero of the story.
Yep, you, me, the authors of the book -- we all make some pretty bad political decisions. But it's ok. In the end, things work out pretty great after all.
It's an enjoyable read and surprisingly funny. You, the voter, get to be both the villain and the hero of the story.
Yep, you, me, the authors of the book -- we all make some pretty bad political decisions. But it's ok. In the end, things work out pretty great after all.
Want to read
June 13, 2012Didn't realise this was an MIT Press book until I got it, makes me that much more excited to start it!
In compliance with FTC guidelines, I am required to disclose that I received the book for free through Goodreads First Reads.
In compliance with FTC guidelines, I am required to disclose that I received the book for free through Goodreads First Reads.
August 23, 2016
It was a book about democracy and how it is not supposed to work well. Also it is about how it works well too.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews