Rousseau and Democracy
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During this past election week, I had the timely task of critically evaluating Jean-Jacque Rousseau’s argument against democracy from Of the Social Contract. Rousseau argues that if we were a people of gods, we would govern ourselves democratically, but since we are in fact human, true democracy tends towards instability and is therefore an unsuitable form of government for human beings.
I ultimately found Rousseau’s argument compelling but ultimately objectionable, and I wish to take this blog post to present my critical evaluation of his argument.
Rousseau mainly relies on two premises to argue against the suitability of democracy. The first of which is if it is the case that democracy is unstable and difficult to maintain, then it is a form of government unsuitable for human beings. Second, due to certain characteristics of human nature, democracy is unstable and difficult to maintain. Therefore, Rousseau can cogently conclude that democracy is a form of government unsuitable for human beings.
In his justification, Rousseau puts forth several compelling motivations. To be clear on the meaning of democracy for Rousseau’s purposes, he is referring to a pure or direct democracy in which matters are directly decided by the choice of distinct groups of citizens (whether it be a majority or unanimous group). Rousseau defines democracy, but leaves his first premise relatively unmotivated because it is uncontroversial. The purpose of a government is to provide stability to humans that the state of nature does not. If a form of government does not provide that stability and proves difficult to maintain, then citizens begin to wonder what the point of establishing that government is. Instinctively, human beings do not want a government prone to corruption, infighting, or dissolution because it fails to serve its purpose of providing increased stability. So, most tend to agree readily with Rousseau’s initial premise of if democracy is unstable and difficult to maintain, then it is a form of government unsuitable for human beings, which is why he focuses on more controversial components of his argument.
As such, Rousseau’s main motivating focus lies in supporting the second premise, which is the condition critical to his conclusion. For his argument to succeed, Rousseau must convince his audience that democracy is unstable. He first focuses on the potential for corruption within a democracy. He argues for the separation of powers because “the abuse of laws by the Government is a lesser evil than the corruption of the Legislation” (Cahn 341). Rousseau stands vehemently against the potential for corruption and his reasoning stems from the fact that although humans may err in execution of the law, if the law is just, there is less room for error and corruption than if the law itself is unjust. In a democracy, because theoretically, every citizen is involved in the legislative process, there is no way to separate the executive and legislative powers. Due to human nature, citizens will undoubtedly bring their own private interests into voting and will not be able to serve as neutral third parties advocating objectively for the benefit of the general will. Therefore in a democracy, with no way to divide powers, corruption seeps into the core of the state, and Rousseau argues, “the State having been corrupted in its substance, all reform becomes impossible” (Cahn 341). With no way to reform the corrupted, illegitimate government, a revolution will necessarily happen which generates instability.
Rousseau continues to motivate his second premise by providing a second source of instability for democracy. He raises the idea that populations of states are too large for democracies to function, stating that “it is contrary to the natural order that the greater number should govern and the lesser number should be governed. One cannot imagine the people remaining constantly assembled in order to attend to public affairs” (Cahn 341). In a democracy with thousands of people, especially during Rousseau’s time, there was no way to collect everyone into a space to continually vote on topics. Today, technology may exist to facilitate mass voting, but there is still not adequate time for all citizens to educate themselves and holistically cultivate their views on every issue. There is also the issue of the population wanting to remain assembled for legislative purposes. A large portion of the population could be too disinterested in politics or occupied by personal matters for the nation to remain assembled. Rousseau also brings up the point that a democracy “would not know how to establish commissions [to attend to public affairs] without the form of the administration changing” (Cahn 341). In a true democracy, when everyone participates in legislation, it is difficult to restructure the legislative branch, or develop a separate executive branch to enforce laws without altering the structure of the state to the point where it is no longer a true democracy. By creating smaller tribunals for political matters, the population’s participation in politics is reduced, thereby reforming the state into a new mixed system that is not a true democracy. This is how Rousseau uses the size of population argument to motivate the idea that democracy is unfeasible and therefore volatile and pulled to changes.
Rousseau’s third motivation focuses on democracy’s potential for civil wars. Because democracy is imbued with private interests and corruption throughout the entire system of government and because Rousseau establishes how excessive population size breeds volatility and form changes in democratic governments, he argues that “there is no Government so subject to civil wars and internal agitations as the Democratic” (Cahn 341). This follows logically because there is a greater propensity for factions to form and for citizens to view each other as partisan opponents rather than fellow citizens in democracies, due to the fact that everyone has a political opinion based on their personal interest and the ability to influence governance in a more direct way than in other systems. Instability accompanies civil war, and Rousseau uses the argument that democracies are most prone to internal tensions and civil wars as a third and final way of motivating his second premise.
While Rousseau motivates three sources of instability in a democracy, I believe that there is an additional source. Rousseau states that “it is contrary to the natural order that the greater number should govern and that the lesser number should be governed” (Cahn 341). He then proceeds to argue that it is unrealistic to assume that an entire society will remain assembled constantly to attend to public affairs, and I agree. Even members of Congress choose to miss hearings and votes in favor of their personal political campaigns or other interests. While certainly true, I believe there is another way in which democracy runs contrary to the natural order. Every hierarchical system narrows towards the top. A smaller number of people always governs the larger. A CEO leads a company of employees similar to how a captain leads a ship. The idea that “the greater number should govern and that the lesser number should be governed” (Cahn 341), runs counter to the natural order because when everyone rules, no one does. In democracy, there is no hierarchy, no ruler, no true governor; instead, true democracy tends toward anarchy. Anarchy is merely a return to the state of nature within which one is only able to pursue their own interests to the degree their power allows. Because true democracy tends to destabilize into anarchy, it is an unsuitable form of government for human beings.
While I have just illustrated an alternative method of defending Rousseau’s second premise, I would like to defend it from a compelling objection to further prove its credibility. Critics will object to Rousseau’s second premise that democracy is unstable by pointing to successful long standing democracies. For instance, the United States of America has one of the oldest and most stable governments in the contemporary world. Proponents of democracy claim that its democracy has been relatively stable for over 200 years and that the US has not seen the frequent dissolution and reformation of nation-states observed in European countries that adopted democracy later into this time period. This objection is critical because it is true that the United States is a democracy and despite a brutal Civil War, has never fully collapsed during the Westphalian Era. Constituents of the US, having frequent opportunities to exercise their votes, largely have no reason to believe that the US democracy will suddenly turn unstable. However, I must deflect this objection as irrelevant because the United States is a representative democracy and not a true democracy, which is the system of government Rousseau argues against in this chapter, when he notes “there has never existed a true Democracy” (Cahn 341). Opponents of Rousseau fail to negate his argument with this objection in the specific case, but they also refuse to prove the general case because even the most democratic countries today are not true democracies, and there still has yet to exist a truly democratic state. Therefore, no contemporary or historical example can directly attest to the stability of a democracy, and this objection is sufficiently defended against.
Ultimately, this was a very interesting argument to explore during the annual high point of American democracy. Rousseau’s assertion that corruption, population size, and potential for civil wars all destabilize democracy, coupled with the fact that true democracy tends toward anarchy, was enough to convince me to agree that true democracy is an unstable, unsuitable form of government for human beings as we are now. Now, the question is, what would it take for democracy to be suitable for humans? How would an increase in faith impact this question? Could a true democracy ever be feasible at a national level?
References
Cahn, Steven. Political Philosophy. S.L., Oxford Univ Press, 2022.