In their newly published books, retired Generals Michael Hayden and James Clapper both refer to a democracy ranking compiled annually by the magazine The Economist. As quoted from Hayden’s book (Clapper’s book has a similar quote):
During Trump’s first week in office, the Economist’s prestigious Intelligence Unit’s annual Democracy Index ranked the United States a “flawed democracy” in the company of states like Italy, France, Mongolia, South Korea, and Estonia and no longer a “full democracy” like Australia, Norway, Germany, and Canada.
The use of the word “flawed” by the Economist implies the United States has withered from the virtuous governing model of a “full democracy” to something less sterling. To create this ranking, the “Intelligence Unit” of the Economist contrived their own definition of a democracy using five broad categories and sixty sub-categories to determine a “standard” by which (they believe) each country in the world can be legitimately judged. It is against this standard that they now adjudge the US a “flawed” democracy.
To us, the whole concept of such a ranking is elitist, grossly misleading, and based on a false premise, particularly as regards the United States Government. However, the two prominent books cited above (as well as other current news stories) include references to this index as authoritative. We couldn’t disagree more. Here’s why:
The US model of government is described in detail in our Constitution. Adherence to our model of democracy as set forth in our Constitution is the only standard by which it can be evaluated. The ideals in our Constitution have not been replaced by or morphed into an arbitrary set of categories concocted by a contemporary magazine publisher. The US form of government is well-established, unique in the world, and based on a Constitution that very specifically defines our ideal of a democracy – not some contrived world “standard”.
The term “democracy” has been around for nearly 500 years, and its most commonly held historical definition is very simple – a government by the people with decisions made by majority rule. That the Economist or anyone else can simply re-define democracy (with sixty sub-categories no less) to suit a modern-day agenda of classifying countries as improving or failing is preposterous. In describing the United States as having become a “flawed” democracy, there is an inherent false premise: that we once were a “full democracy”, the purest and most desired form of a democracy according to the Economist. In fact, the United States has never been a “full democracy” at any point in its 229-year history. That was by design and is not a “flaw” in our model of governance. While the United States is a government by the people, we are represented by elected officials for most decisions, and very few of those decisions are made by majority rule. This was an intentional restriction placed by the framers of the Constitution to ward off the possibility of “mob” rule. That is why our law-making process includes a Senate with non-proportional representation in addition to a proportionally-populated House of Representatives. Further, the US President has veto power over legislation passed by the House and Senate, and many important Congressional actions in each body require a two-thirds or even a three-fourths “super majority” as opposed to just a simple majority of more-than-half. Also, we elect our President via the unique electoral college system instead of a simple majority vote. So intent were the framers that our system of government not be characterized as a “full democracy”, that the word democracy doesn’t appear anywhere in the US Constitution. It is illogical to assert the United States is no longer a “full democracy” when it never was one.
Hurray for the fact that we are not a “full democracy”. Don’t be fooled by the “prestigious” credentials of anyone attempting to disparage our model of government. The safeguards baked into our Constitution that maintain our unique form of democracy are still working like a charm almost 230 years later. No other country on earth has such a consistent record of success.
4 Responses
USA is not a democracy, and it is a flawed democracy. The three institutions that comprise of the government are executive, legislative, and judiciary. The head of the executive is not representative because he is elected not by who gets the most votes but who gets the most electoral college votes. The nine members of the supreme court do not represent the whole population because they are elected by a senate which is not even close to be a representative body. Montana and California both get 2 senators. At present, 18% of the population elects 50% of the senators! The 18% of the senate appoints Supreme Court judges. Only the house of representative is close to a representative body. This body also needs to have more members because the population has grown a lot.
Thank you. I’m not sure it’s what you intended, but your comment supports our article quite well. Our whole point was that the USA is not, and never has been, a democracy as defined by the people at The Economist. All of the things you mention in your comment are part of the original design of our government. It is not a “flaw”. It was intended to be this way and has worked without major change for over 230 years and counting. Of course, there are other governments in the world that are modeled on the purer version democracy defined by The Economist, and that you seem to support. The Economist article gave those countries high marks. However, it was improper for The Economist to include the United States in a comparison with these other countries. It is not the intent of the USA to ever change to a pure democracy and/or try to become like those other countries. Our founders knew full well they were not designing a pure democracy for our government which is why the word “democracy” never appears anywhere in the entire text of the US Constitution. A majority of Americans understand this, which is why the structure of our government has remained as is despite periodic attempts by progressives to change it over the last 100+ years.
I disagree. Communist China, North Korea, and Soviet Union all have a constitution. Theu do all follow their constitution. That does not make them remotely akin to a democracy or a representative democracy. If USA wants to call itself a representative democracy, it should radically change the constitution. Besides, constitution is a living document. Many of its provisions were incorporated to keep the slave holders happy.
Just because a country has a constitution doesn’t mean it is a democracy (of any kind). The two are not synonymous with each other. And with the exception of a small minority of extremists in this country, the USA has no desire or reason to radically change its Constitution. That doesn’t mean our Constitution doesn’t evolve over time as needed. It has been amended 27 times since it was written. Court challenges to some of its provisions have resulted in numerous legal precedents that have further refined the document. In order to radically change the US Constitution, or even add another amendment, 3/4ths of the states must ratify the change. That is a tall order even for a non-controversial change. At present, there is nowhere near that level of support for what you propose. Lastly, although it is a popular progressive theme, the US Constitution was not written for slaveholders. It was written to establish a unique form of government, unlike any in the world at that time. It was strong enough to survive a Civil war and eradicate slavery at the same time. The 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments enshrined the end of slavery into the document.