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In an Objectivist society, would there be a need for voting? And certainly, if there were, voting would be determined unanimously, correct? Majority voting does not support individual rights.

I am trying to argue for unanimous voting (similar to voting procedures in a jury. If you have seen 12 Angry Men or the recent Russian remake 12, you know what I mean) in my government class, and the biggest argument against it is that it is arbitrary, slow, and not practical. In a sense, I can see why that is the case. But I know that unanimous voting is the only way to truly preserve the individual's rights, especially regarding taxation. A little clarification on this entire topic would be very helpful.

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In an Objectivist society, would there be a need for voting? And certainly, if there were, voting would be determined unanimously, correct? Majority voting does not support individual rights.

I don't think Objectivism has a specific position on voting as an element in the government of a free society. Objectivism defends the view that the only proper function of government is to protect individual rights; the question of how exactly government should be structured to achieve that end is left to political science. I'm personally dubious that unanimous voting would actually serve to protect individual rights, as it would allow would-be criminals to cripple attempts at effective law enforcement. Majority voting on *everything* is clearly hostile to individual rights, but a government that is constitutionally limited to protecting rights could use majority voting as a way to select which of a number of legitimate options should be used to achieve that end.

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There isn't anything in Objectivism that would suggest unanimous voting to be a good alternative to traditional voting arrangements. I would estimate that it would be impossible to get anything done, with such a voting system.

You can have both an election process (in which some type of elections decide the country's political leadership) and a Constitution that limits that leadership's power and protects individual rights from government abuse. For instance, the United States political system was set up precisely to do that. It didn't work out, especially in the 20th centurey, because of the influence of socialism on the culture, but it did work fairly well to preserve a limited government (and preserving an imperfect set of principles aimed at protecting rights) before that. It could work even better, with a better Constitution and a culture that welcomes Laissez Faire Capitalism.

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In an Objectivist society, would there be a need for voting?

Yes. The only proper way to form and maintain a government is to elect its members.

And certainly, if there were, voting would be determined unanimously, correct? Majority voting does not support individual rights.

A government limited to the protection of individual rights through police, courts, and armed forces is not itself a violation of individual rights simply because its members were not elected via unanimous consent. How would a government even function if the disapproval of a single individual could leave important positions vacant?

I am trying to argue for unanimous voting (similar to voting procedures in a jury. If you have seen 12 Angry Men or the recent Russian remake 12, you know what I mean) in my government class, and the biggest argument against it is that it is arbitrary, slow, and not practical. In a sense, I can see why that is the case. But I know that unanimous voting is the only way to truly preserve the individual's rights, especially regarding taxation.

On what do you base this knowledge?

A little clarification on this entire topic would be very helpful.

I look forward to responses from those better equipped than myself.

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Voting would not need to be unanimous -- unanimity also does not guarantee protection of individual rights. The way to do that is have a constitution that limits what government can do.

First you must decide who may vote -- surely not every person present in the country. When there are only two alternatives, the only rational requirement is "majority wins" (the alternative "majority loses" is just perverse). There are good reasons to want to require all voting to be on two-choice issues, so Yeah vs. Nay on any proposition, and winnow the candidate pool down to the top two.

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When there are only two alternatives, the only rational requirement is "majority wins" (the alternative "majority loses" is just perverse). There are good reasons to want to require all voting to be on two-choice issues, so Yeah vs. Nay on any proposition, and winnow the candidate pool down to the top two.

I think Arrow's theorem demonstrates that there is no way to 'winnow' a multiple candidate field down to just two without violating at least one seemingly desirable characteristic of an ideal voting system. The real key, as has been noted by multiple people in this thread, is a constitutional restriction on the powers of government. That reduces the stakes of voting to the point where 'good enough' is good enough.

Robert Tracinski has made an interesting point about one benefit of requiring some kind of voting -- elections require politicians to make a case in support of themselves and their policies to the public. In other words, voting imposes a structural requirement for debate, which provides at least an opportunity for widespread rational discussion of issues. Without voting, politicians have no need to try to convince the public of the merits of their policies, which means they have no need to argue for them. In this sense, political systems that incorporate some kind of voting requirement have a place for reason (or at least the possibility of reason) built into them in a way that non-voting systems do not. They implicitly acknowledge the importance of persuading the governed that they ought to support the government.

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'DavidOdden'

Voting would not need to be unanimous -- unanimity also does not guarantee protection of individual rights. The way to do that is have a constitution that limits what government can do.

One needs protection from other individuals, not just Govt.

________________

By "majority voting", I assume Amo was referring to a democracy; and that does not mean a lack of support of rights. There cannot be an "Objectivist society"; so the hypothesis of unanimous voting is really meaningless.

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Kenneth Arrow, the economist and social choice theorist proved that no system of voting is fair if there are more than two choices.

Please refer to

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrow%27s_impossibility_theorem

His theorem is very counter-intuitive but if you read the proof you will see it has no holes.

Bob Kolker

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One needs protection from other individuals, not just Govt.

A proper constitution lays out the purpose and function of the government. This both limits and enables -- it prevents the government from violating individual rights, and it enables the government to protect individual rights from violations by other individuals (and other governments, but that should go without saying).

By "majority voting", I assume Amo was referring to a democracy; and that does not mean a lack of support of rights.

Certainly a pure majoritarian democracy means a lack of support for rights, because such a system allows the government to do anything that is validated by the support of 50% + 1 of the population. Such a government has no principled limit on its authority. For the last several decades the term "democracy" has been used as a package deal to combine majoritarianism with selected elements of a free society, such as freedom of speech, gender equality, religious toleration and the like. The effect of this has been to conflate majority rule with freedom, with disasterous results. Democracy, per se, is really a side issue. The fundamental in politics is the principle of individual rights. Everything else revolves around that. Voting has value only insofar as it contributes to the stability, legitimacy and effectiveness of a rights-protecting government.

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A scenario that seems to beckon to me as a just example of unanimous voting would be in the case of taxation. I'm aware that Objectivism frowns upon taxation, but bear with me.

In the land of 100, there are, you guessed it, one hundred citizens. A majority of the citizens (exactly 51 of them), travel nearly the same way to and from work and home, respectively. There has been no road system erected, and none of the citizens have the time or expertise to build a decent road. They therefore decide to vote for the installation of a new road, to be completed by a government-funded team of road-makers. This vote obviously involves a tax increase.

If 51 people vote for this, does it not violate the individual rights of the remaining 49 citizens? That is classified as majority voting, though. Someone mentioned "good enough is good enough". That, to me, just doesn't seem like an Objectivist response to anything. I remember reading somewhere that Ayn Rand disliked "shades of gray", and that decisions were black and white; that things were one way or another. Leaving decision-making up to some scant majority doesn't seem to reflect Objectivism.

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A proper constitution lays out the purpose and function of the government. This both limits and enables -- it prevents the government from violating individual rights, and it enables the government to protect individual rights from violations by other individuals (and other governments, but that should go without saying).

Certainly a pure majoritarian democracy means a lack of support for rights, because such a system allows the government to do anything that is validated by the support of 50% + 1 of the population. Such a government has no principled limit on its authority. For the last several decades the term "democracy" has been used as a package deal to combine majoritarianism with selected elements of a free society, such as freedom of speech, gender equality, religious toleration and the like. The effect of this has been to conflate majority rule with freedom, with disasterous results. Democracy, per se, is really a side issue. The fundamental in politics is the principle of individual rights. Everything else revolves around that. Voting has value only insofar as it contributes to the stability, legitimacy and effectiveness of a rights-protecting government.

You hit the nail on the head regarding my last post. I can see why 99% of people wanting something done seems arbitrary to impede if 1% disagrees, but if a vote has anything to do with taxes or property or rights, then does not that 1% hold the same value as the 99%, since their common denominator is the individual? I guess my question is this: What is a fair majority vote? 51%? 2/3? 99%?

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You hit the nail on the head regarding my last post. I can see why 99% of people wanting something done seems arbitrary to impede if 1% disagrees, but if a vote has anything to do with taxes or property or rights, then does not that 1% hold the same value as the 99%, since their common denominator is the individual? I guess my question is this: What is a fair majority vote? 51%? 2/3? 99%?

Your implicit premise seems to be that if voting is part of the political system then any issue is subject to voting. With a constitutionally limited government that simply is not the case. Issues of taxation, for example, are not subject to vote because a proper government doesn't have the authority to take its citizens property by force, period. But there are many concrete issues facing even a legitimate government where there are a range of possible options all of which are compatible with the principle of individual rights. Consider a question like "Should the government hire more police officers?" There is no principle from which you can deduce the answer to that. Subjecting the issue to unanimous vote would allow criminals to veto the hiring of police, which would be ludicrous. But some kind of vote seems a reasonable way of addressing the question, by getting a sense from the public whether it thinks the existing police force is doing an adequate job of protecting their rights.

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A scenario that seems to beckon to me as a just example of unanimous voting would be in the case of taxation. I'm aware that Objectivism frowns upon taxation, but bear with me.

In the land of 100, there are, you guessed it, one hundred citizens. A majority of the citizens (exactly 51 of them), travel nearly the same way to and from work and home, respectively. There has been no road system erected, and none of the citizens have the time or expertise to build a decent road. They therefore decide to vote for the installation of a new road, to be completed by a government-funded team of road-makers. This vote obviously involves a tax increase.

If 51 people vote for this, does it not violate the individual rights of the remaining 49 citizens? That is classified as majority voting, though. Someone mentioned "good enough is good enough". That, to me, just doesn't seem like an Objectivist response to anything. I remember reading somewhere that Ayn Rand disliked "shades of gray", and that decisions were black and white; that things were one way or another. Leaving decision-making up to some scant majority doesn't seem to reflect Objectivism.

It seems to me that if those 51 citizens want a road and 49 dont. Well than the 51 should pay for the road. leave the other 49 out of it. No one has the right to force someone to pay for anything. Ratio of yays to nays is irrelevent. Amo, I agree with you. I dont think letting some majority call the shots reflects Objectivism at all.

Edited by clemetson91
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A scenario that seems to beckon to me as a just example of unanimous voting would be in the case of taxation. I'm aware that Objectivism frowns upon taxation, but bear with me.
I took you at your word, that we were dealing with a Objectivist society. It's not that Objectivism merely frowns on taxation; taxation is entirely contrary to Objectivism. So if you're not talking about an Objectivist society, we can just stick with the current society, or some slightly more rights-respecting version. All taxation measures would be submitted to a vote which is accepted or rejected by a simple majority. This affords vastly more protection of individual rights than the current situation where citizens do not vote on matters of taxation.

Your presumption that government would be in any way involved in road-building also demonstrates that your question is in fact not about what would happen in an Objectivist society. So what is your question really about?

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'khaight'

A proper constitution lays out the purpose and function of the government. This both limits and enables -- it prevents the government from violating individual rights, and it enables the government to protect individual rights from violations by other individuals (and other governments, but that should go without saying).

Note what I was responding to - "limits what govt. can do", not what others can do to each other.

Certainly a pure majoritarian democracy means a lack of support for rights, because such a system allows the government to do anything that is validated by the support of 50% + 1 of the population....

In a democracy, the people do not necessarily vote to limit rights; that depends on Govt. laws. We have rights here, the only difference being that our Republic affects how we vote for the poliiticians.

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'AmoProbos'

A scenario that seems to beckon to me as a just example of unanimous voting would be in the case of taxation. I'm aware that Objectivism frowns upon taxation, but bear with me.

It's not that it frowns on taxation; it is about what the taxation is for.

In the land of 100, there are, you guessed it, one hundred citizens. A majority of the citizens (exactly 51 of them), travel nearly the same way to and from work and home, respectively. There has been no road system erected, and none of the citizens have the time or expertise to build a decent road. They therefore decide to vote for the installation of a new road, to be completed by a government-funded team of road-makers. This vote obviously involves a tax increase.

Where Govt. does not have laws that say it should fund roads, then the majority could not impose such a thing. Otherwise, a new law would be required that would only involve the Congress, not a majority of voters.

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'DavidOdden' I took you at your word, that we were dealing with a Objectivist society. It's not that Objectivism merely frowns on taxation; taxation is entirely contrary to Objectivism. So if you're not talking about an Objectivist society, we can just stick with the current society, or some slightly more rights-respecting version. All taxation measures would be submitted to a vote which is accepted or rejected by a simple majority. This affords vastly more protection of individual rights than the current situation where citizens do not vote on matters of taxation.

As I already alluded, I don't agree: taxation is not "entirely contrary to Objectivism." What is necessary for the protection of rights must be paid for by the citizens; taxation is the only practical means for doing so.

I already noted that one cannot talk about a meaningless concept of an "Obj. society."

A majority cannot be relied upon to determine what is taxed.

It is a different matter to talk about taxation that is immoral. There, we simply have to vote out the politicians who support that - still can't rely on any majority vote.

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Note what I was responding to - "limits what govt. can do", not what others can do to each other.

And note which statement of yours I was responding to: "One needs protection from other individuals, not just Govt.". Guess what provides that protection? That's right, government. Or are you advocating some kind of anarchism?

What is necessary for the protection of rights must be paid for by the citizens; taxation is the only practical means for doing so.

Rand disagreed. She laid out the Objectivist position in her 1964 essay "Government Financing in a Free Society", which is reprinted in The Virtue of Selfishness. There, she writes that "In a fully free society, taxation -- or, to be exact, payment for governmental services -- would be voluntary." You may not agree, but the Objectivist position on compulsory taxation is clear and unequivocal.

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Kenneth Arrow, the economist and social choice theorist proved that no system of voting is fair if there are more than two choices.

That's one interpretation of the meaning of his impossibility theorem, but I believe that that interpretation is not correct.

John Link

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A scenario that seems to beckon to me as a just example of unanimous voting would be in the case of taxation. I'm aware that Objectivism frowns upon taxation, but bear with me.

In the land of 100, there are, you guessed it, one hundred citizens. A majority of the citizens (exactly 51 of them), travel nearly the same way to and from work and home, respectively. There has been no road system erected, and none of the citizens have the time or expertise to build a decent road. They therefore decide to vote for the installation of a new road, to be completed by a government-funded team of road-makers. This vote obviously involves a tax increase.

If 51 people vote for this, does it not violate the individual rights of the remaining 49 citizens?

That's right, if 51 people can force the other 49 people to finance the road with them though the government, it does violate the 49's individual right.

But let me put this into perspective:

If 99 people voted to build the road and can force that last person to finance the road against his will through the government, that is still individual right violation.

Which comes to your second question:

I guess my question is this: What is a fair majority vote? 51%? 2/3? 99%?

The issue comes first. Some issues are up for voting, others are not (like the above case). The fair percentage question can only apply to issues that are up to vote, and in those cases, the % should be determined by politicians through political science.

The issues that are not up to vote are not up to vote. No percentages can provide justification.

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That's right, if 51 people can force the other 49 people to finance the road with them though the government, it does violate the 49's individual right.

But let me put this into perspective:

If 99 people voted to build the road and can force that last person to finance the road against his will through the government, that is still individual right violation.

Which comes to your second question:

The issue comes first. Some issues are up for voting, others are not (like the above case). The fair percentage question can only apply to issues that are up to vote, and in those cases, the % should be determined by politicians through political science.

The issues that are not up to vote are not up to vote. No percentages can provide justification.

Thank you. I just didn't consider the distinction between voting issues. When you think about tax voting, it is obvious. But other things muddy the water a bit.

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If a hundred people live in the constituancy, and all of them need the road to get to work, but still somehow havent managed to build such roads then how would a vote on issue make any difference?

Surely the politicians dont have any more money then that in the possetion of its one hundred citizents, and considering that this is vital for all the inhabitants it would seem absurd that they wouldnt make it without the interference of government if it was financially possible or efficient :lol:.

When it comes to the general debate the ideal political system is obviously a constitutional republic where one can elect whomever one wants for whichever office is neccesary, but where such an election is merely a formality as the candidates themselves wont wield any real power - given how restricted they are in there options to begin with.

However, the best option is still a bad one, as no constitutional republic (or any form of government for that matter) can survive longterm unless it has the support of its voters.

If the majority of the population are socialists, then socialism WILL influence the politics of that nation, if not immediatly then atleast over time, no matter what..

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Well yeah, if people decides to go irrational, nothing you or anyone can do about them. And no, a free society does not rest it's foundation on votes, but on objective laws. If enough people go irrational and stop following those objective laws..etc., the rationals can just leave the country or fight back.

The difference between Capitalism and other altruistic based political system (and why it is superior) is that Capitalism doesn't do anything, while all other system acts artificially to drag men down.

Human nature dictates that whether a man rise or falls rest solely upon his own choices. No political system can change this fact of reality. To cope with this fact of human nature, the best a political system can do is deliver justice and give to each man the sole right to the result of what his own choices have sowed, whether that result be a success or a failure. That is Capitalism, and that's why it is the best.

And that fact about human nature is also why all attempts at creating utopia though politics fails. Political system cannot substitute human volition as the source of wealth. No political system can ever act to drag men up, to make them rational instead of irrational. The best a system can do is do nothing but deliver justice. There is no good or bad about the best option, it just is. Like human nature.

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'VECT'

The difference between Capitalism and other altruistic based political system (and why it is superior) is that Capitalism doesn't do anything, while all other system acts artificially to drag men down.

I see what you mean but that is not literally true.

Capitalism enables more abuse (immoral and illegal behaviors) of the system which is exactly what liberals criticize. And while the purpose of Govt. is to protect our rights and prevent such abuse, it is unfortunately far easier for Govt. to place more controls on people than it is to monitor their actions for abuse.

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