Tim Worstall

Democracy and Liberty

The header for Peter Tatchell’s piece (which isn’t at all my point here. He’s quite right that stoning homosexuals is something that shouldn’t happen) is as follows:

This African country claims to be a democracy but its persecution of gay people is pure tyranny.

The problem is the sub-eidtor’s use of the word "but".

It’s entirely possible for somewhere to be both a democracy and a tyranny: the tyranny of the majority, for example. In the 1930’s the UK was certainly a democracy: and prison was the punishment for homosexual behaviour (however infrequently enforced). The reason such laws existed was that the majority thought they were good laws: how ever much they violated the rights of those engaging in the sodomy.

We’re used to the idea that a non-democracy is a tyranny and it’s difficult to think of places…well, Monaco is not a democracy but I think we’d be hard put to call it a tyranny. Hong Kong isn’t either, either. The Nazis (ooops! Godwin’s!) originally took power democratically and they were certainly a tyranny.

The point is that democracy, in and of itself, does not exclude the possibility of tyranny, of the trampling of the rights of some of the citizenry.

I agree that it’s the best means to an end, but democracy itself isn’t actually the end. Freedom and liberty are, and we need to be vigilant about the truth that just because something is democratically decided does not make it an advance in human freedoms.

As those men under threat of stoning for their sexuality are finding out, just because Nigeria is a democracy and the majority of that country (or of the State where it’s happening) want there to be such laws doesn’t mean that their rights are not being trampled upon.

As requested, the Tatchell piece is here.

In

11 responses

  1. Chris Harper (Counting Cats) Avatar
    Chris Harper (Counting Cats)

    Thank you. It isn’t often that these distinctions are made these days.
    I have made the same point in comments at Samizdata a couple of times over the years, that democracy is of value as the basis under which a free people can govern themselves, but that in that context it is a means to an end, not an end in itself. When democracy is used to endorse tyranny it ceases to deserve respect.
    NeuArbeit anyone?

    Reply
  2. Philip Thomas Avatar
    Philip Thomas

    Amen to that.

    Reply
  3. Puzzled Avatar
    Puzzled

    Could we have a link to the Tatchell piece, please?
    Also, how is your argument (which I sympathise with) essentially different from the argument that democracy is deficient because it doesn’t secure social justice, or total equality, or the rule of the Elect, or some other goal that some other people regard as paramount, in much the same way that you regard liberty as paramount? In other words, who – apart from God, or a Great Thinker of your choice, or a democratic majority – decides which of these various things matters more than democracy does? I await your answer with some interest, mainly because I can’t think of one.
    Tim adds: I don’t argue that democracy is deficient. I rather argue that it is not incompatible with tyranny. Which the sub does seem to think it is by his use of “but”.

    Reply
  4. Kay Tie Avatar
    Kay Tie

    “prison was the punishment for homosexual behaviour ”
    Trivial compared to the injections of oestrogen to “cure” men of gayness.

    Reply
  5. bruno Avatar
    bruno

    Puzzled, The more popular of the libertarian ethics nowadays would derive the primacy of liberty from one’s right of self-ownership, which they judge to be self-evident. If natural law, or intuitive ethics as its critics from the other libertarian (or, for the sake of distinction, classical-liberal) school would call it, doesn’t float your boat, as it fails to float mine, I recommend you give Henry Hazlitt’s The Foundations of Morality a try, if you can find a copy.
    It is hopeless to try to sum up such a huge field in a few sentences, but here goes nothing. Our individual objectives are to maximize happiness (in a particular sense, perhaps more accurately described as minimizing dissatisfaction). In so far as we are acting alone without affecting other people, we need no rules of behaviour, no ethics. The objective of ethics, then, is to guide our behaviour with respect to our relationships with other people, in such a way that, these rules being followed in the most part, our happiness would be maximized.
    Why do we cooperate with other people, leading to this requirement for rules to guide that interaction, rather than simply ploughing our own furrow? Because we have learnt that two or more people can get more benefit by cooperating than they can by acting individually. The objective of ethical rules is therefore to preserve and enhance social cooperation.
    If you have to force someone to do something, it isn’t cooperation, and it can’t have increased their happiness, or they would not have needed forcing. Proper, happiness-maximizing, social cooperation is therefore voluntary. The system that encourages the most voluntary cooperation and requires the least coercion is the one that can be said to be most likely to maximize happiness. Hence, the primacy of liberty – derived from first principles without relying on the word of god, guru or group-opinion.
    That is an entirely inadequate explanation of a subtle moral philosophy, but it’s the best I can do in a hurry.

    Reply
  6. Puzzled Avatar
    Puzzled

    bruno, Many thanks. It’s a very interesting argument, and it does make sense on its own terms, but there’s a flaw in it that (to me) looks fatal. If it’s morally wrong for those who take this view of liberty to coerce others into accepting and acting on it, how, if at all, can they make their views prevail over those of people who subscribe to other approaches? Those others can simply say “Hmm, that’s very interesting, but …” and outvote them, and, if they are acting freely in so voting – even to the point of (as libertarians would see it) voluntarily limiting their own freedom for the sake of what they, rightly or wrongly, see as higher or better goals – what’s left of libertarianism, apart from a wish that most people were other than they are? None of which, I should perhaps add, is in any sense a defence or a justification of what’s happening in Nigeria, or used to happen in the UK – but perhaps it may be concluded that, as long as human beings have ideals that are radically incompatible (our “liberty” is their “decadence”, etc.), such things will go on happening, and in a sense it’s better that they should than that a minority, even a libertarian one, tries to impose better laws, or customs, on an unwilling majority – since we all know what that can and does lead to. – Puzzled

    Reply
  7. gene berman Avatar
    gene berman

    The advantage of democracy is simply that, by and large, it makes possible the prospect that those in the minority may, through intellectual (at all levels) persuasion (and coalition-forming) become the majority whose views and programs become law of the land without resort to recurring violent conflict. In other words, it derives its morality from its practicality and its practicality from the nearly universal distaste of people for living perpetually under the threat of destruction and death.

    Reply
  8. Bob B Avatar
    Bob B

    Legislation proscribing male homosexual activity between consenting adults in private in England and Wales runs counter to John Stuart Mill’s benchmark in his famous essay: On Liberty (1859):
    “The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant.”
    http://utilitarianism.com/ol/one.html
    Curiously, there was no corresponding legislation proscribing female homosexual activity. Why was that?

    Reply
  9. JuliaM Avatar
    JuliaM

    “Curiously, there was no corresponding legislation proscribing female homosexual activity. Why was that?”
    Well, the old chestnut is that no one could bring themselves to tell Queen Victoria what lesbians actually do….but that’s too good a story to be true:
    http://www.lesleyahall.net/factoids.htm#lesbians

    Reply
  10. Bob B Avatar
    Bob B

    Thanks Julia, I’ve come across that explanation before – some of my friends etc – but since our gracious Queen Victoria went on to meet up with her Albert again in 1901, just what has prevented our esteemed Parliamentarians from rectifying the omission to legislate to proscribe lesbianism in all the years since?
    Heavens knows, there have been enough opportunities to add a clause or two to one of the umpteen criminal justice bills we have had during the last hundred and something years since. Something more is needed to account for the (entirely commendable) restraint on the part of our legislators on this.

    Reply
  11. bruno Avatar
    bruno

    Puzzled,
    “If it’s morally wrong for those who take this view of liberty to coerce others into accepting and acting on it, how, if at all, can they make their views prevail over those of people who subscribe to other approaches?”
    Now, that’s a different question. Your original question, you may remember, was:
    “who – apart from God, or a Great Thinker of your choice, or a democratic majority – decides which of these various things matters more than democracy does?”
    I took that to be a question about the basis and objectives of morality, and the justification for Tim’s statement that:
    “democracy itself isn’t actually the end. Freedom and liberty are, and we need to be vigilant about the truth that just because something is democratically decided does not make it an advance in human freedoms.”
    There’s a difference between the questions of the foundations of ethics and morality, and what one does about it. Can we take it that, because you have not challenged the former and have applied yourself instead to the latter, that you accept my poor summary as a reasonable basis for a moral code? If so, then we have disposed of the argument that democracy is an objective in its own right, and we need to deal with the next point – that, regardless of morality, it is possible for the majority to tyrannize the minority. What is a classical-liberal, who must in conscience oppose unnecessary coercion, to do about that?
    As Gene says, persuasion is the answer, if what one wants to achieve is a change of government or laws. You are right that the majority may not, indeed often do not adhere to liberal principles. This doesn’t make them right, but it does mean that liberals cannot try forcibly to impose their values on them. But where illiberality strays into oppression, I believe it is consistent with liberal principles to defend the oppressed against their oppressors, even with force if need be. You are not imposing your values on someone if you prevent them from expressing their values through aggression against another person. You are not forcing a homophobe to approve of homosexuality, if you prevent them from attacking gays.
    There is a problem with the moral relativism that can say “our ‘liberty’ is their ‘decadence’”. Where does that leave freedom of speech and religious belief (both of which could be described as “decadent” in certain contexts)? Where does that leave you when people are persecuted because of some “decadent” aspect of their culture? Decadence is amenable to such a wide range of definitions that it can provide an excuse for any form of intolerance. Are we really going to say that any form of aggression should be tolerated if it is targeted against something that the majority in a group judge to be “decadent”?
    You are worried by what happens when a minority tries to impose “better laws” on an unwilling majority. If the governing group really are a minority and the majority really are unwilling, this is not a sustainable outcome. In a sense, all sustainable government (whether democracy or dictatorship) is government by a minority with the acquiescence of the majority. I am more worried by what happens if aggressors sense that no one will stand up to them, and what happens when an intolerant majority (or an intolerant minority sustained by the acquiescence of the majority) decide to act out their intolerance against minorities. I’m not sure what you had in mind when you say that “we all know what that can and does lead to”. It seems to me that the obvious examples from history fall more into my categories than yours.

    Reply

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