The Hatred of Democracy, Research Paper Example

Jacques Rancière argues that though politicians talk much about democracy but they find ways to limit it. They will on most times do contrary to what they say. Politicians will reject democracy because they feel that democracy belongs to the tradition where Marxism ruled. They cite instance such as “Gulag arose out of the French Revolution” in a bid to show that democracy is not a form to govern the society.

Politicians praise democracy as a system of governing the community attuned to the power of a capitalistic market. They have the feeling that so long as they talk of democracy the people that they rule will feel that power belongs to them. Through this they gain the trust of their people. But again they reject democracy as power belonging to no one. They argue that democracy is a power of the mob and present as a state whose salient factors are individualism, loss of the social fabric that hold the society and consumerism. Their democracy is an oligarchy that must be ruled by experts and protected against democracy viewed as either the rule of the mob or the empire of individualism, (Rancière, 2007).

Philosophers argue that the adaptation of countries or “democracies” to the global law of free flow of wealth between states is a major concern for all governments. This requires to be thought of carefully and cannot be left to the rule of the mob. On the contrary those dictatorial states that were supported by anticommunist bastions appear to jeopardize those that initially protected them. This ha sled to the exportation of democracies to such states.

Philosophers have again accused democratic revolution of as having destroyed the old social institutions and authorities that hold the society and have led to widespread individualism and the results of the free markets.

According to Zizek, the inhibitors of democracy are inherent in the democratic process itself. Excessive powers to the leaders limits the the process of democratization. Such leaders are bound to use their powers to influence the decision of democratic making it look like a democratic process whereas in actual sense it is an authoritative / aristocratic system.

He continues to state that the state is also a contributor to limiting democracy. He argues that in a democratic electoral process, the society is reduced to a numerical multitude. By this notion democracy is implied to control the doing and excesses of the state. Paradoxically this is not what takes place since it is the state that has manipulated the democratic electoral process to appear as so.

Establishing a democracy poses the problem that once it is established as the system through which a group of political subjects competes for power, there has to be some processes that are excluded as being nondemocratic. This decision on who is excluded or included is in itself nondemocratic. Marx’s insight of inclusion / exclusion is overly determined by social antagonism within the society (Zizek, et al, 2000). This excludes the process from being a democratic process.

Aristotle suggest that at times deviations from the rule of law may be necessary attributing this to the irreducibility of law. The unreflective proposition of what is considered lawful with what is just is not a salient feature of democratic systems, where it is anticipated that the rule of law will do good to the public. However where a tyrant is able to destroy his rivals by lawful means will seek the appearance of legality to do so.  It is as though we expect the law, by virtue of its being law, to somehow be fair.

Work cited

Rancière, Jacques. Hatred of Democracy, Translated by Steve Corcoran. London; New York : Verso, 2007

Zizek, Slovaj.  “Class struggle or Postmodernism? Yes, Please” Contigency, Hegemony, Universatality: Contemporary Dialogues to the left.  London: Verso, 2000. 90 – 135.

Aristotle, The Politics of Aristotle, ed. Ernest Barker. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977