What Do People Want From Politics? — Catelli’s Take

A response to David Moscrop

David Moscrop writes What Do People Want From Politics?

The insight I gleamed from the prevalence of a weak commitment to democracy — gleamed shockingly and embarrassingly late in life, I confess — is that many people, first and foremost, simply want their problems solved. If democracy can solve their problems, democracy it is. If it can’t, well, then they’re willing to bargain.

I realized this myself a long time ago. I (like David) have a deep-seated need to be informed. I want to be an informed voter, so that I can make intelligent choices. I also just like, to put in plainly, knowing stuff.

But it’s a lot of work. Work that many of my friends and colleagues do not want to put the effort into. Which made discussing the politics or news of the day challenging. I was always playing “Mr. Know-It-All” which was almost as annoying for me as it was for the people I was conversing with. I did notice something though; my friends that were less informed were quite happy, seemingly happier than I was, as a lot of what I was learning was depressing. Ignorance has a form of freedom; a freedom I find myself envying at times.

David goes on to explain,

While people may not be ideologically consistent and coherent or up-to-date on every bit of the latest news, they aren’t stupid. People can sense when the system and its stewards aren’t serving them, and that makes them angry, frustrated, anxious, and disaffected.

….

But for now, it’s enough to say that if democracies don’t serve people and their fundamental needs and interests — especially their economic, which is to say material, interests — then democracy itself will end up on the ballot and eventually it will be defeated.

Up until this point of his essay, I am largely in alignment with the argument presented. But his conclusion is where he and I diverge, in the high-lighted text marked below.

The best way to address this risk is to ensure consistent, broad, and deep democratic representation that brings people into public life, takes their concerns to heart, includes them in self-government, and puts their economic interests first and foremost above all-else.

My disagreement stems from this: people are selfish. They don’t want to be involved in public life or self-government. This is the conundrum of a democratic system. To have a properly functioning free and democratic society, one must participate. “Must” and “free” are in opposition to each other.

This conundrum, this opposition, is best demonstrated by the debate around mandatory voting. Canada does not require citizens to vote. And as voter turnout declines, the calls to require voting (as other democracies do) echo louder. This is when the inner libertarian comes out. Compulsion is not freedom, and can cause people to lose faith in the system. Compulsion weakens a free society. If it must be used, it must be used sparingly.

When I say people are selfish, that is not a criticism. It’s a reflection of life itself. Either some of the time or all of the time each of us will be totally consumed by trying to live our own lives. Whatever mental energy we have, whatever time we have, we will give to other things. And we may not have, ever, anything left to serve “democracy.”

The goal of “bringing people into public life, including them in self-government” while laudable, always has to be optional. And depending on how busy life is for everyone, it may ever only be a minority of the population. That possibility is forever unavoidable.

It is somewhat ironic. A well functioning democracy requires well rounded individuals to govern us, so well that we can effectively ignore them most of the time. A democracy that lets us live our lives unaware of the machinations around us is the one most would be happiest with. Which is basically describing a benevolent dictatorship. We just vote in the dictators every 4 years or so. Yes, that is an impossibility, but in reality? Most of us crave that. Wouldn’t it be nice to not have to care about politics or government?

It is in that grey area that we need to keep an eye on things to ensure that we get the results we want that causes the tension. This is the seed that causes people to crave authoritarian governments. If our fundamental needs and interests are met, who cares how we got them?

What do people want from politics? A better class of individuals in government so that we can care a lot less about it. So how do we get that? How do we keep the Donald Trumps, the Jair Bolsonaro’s, The Viktor Orbán’s and the Pierre Poilievre’s out of government?

Unfortunately I do not have answers. I fear this world may be getting too complex for a simple and selfish people. I just know that a solution that requires more out of us is not going to go far or last long. We have other things to do.