One political group is different from another and the type of government would also differ under one group compared to another. Under our democracies, the effect of voting is that one political group (e.g. Democrats in the US or Conservative/Lib Dems in the UK) are voted into power. Causally, it is those who voted for the winning party who secured this outcome. If I voted for a losing party, you could not say I supported or wanted the winning party to come into power. If you analyse recent historic elections you might be surprised. I did this during my undergraduate degree. I found that in the last 50-60 years, there are some elections when, if you take non-voters and people who voted for opposing parties into account, only a minority of people actually gave their support to the party who came into power; some where the successful party secured less than 50% support from the citizenry (worse in my country than yours I recall), a case of largest minority rule rather than majority rule. To what extent is this legitimate or representative?
I think this asks a good question – when do we consider a government to be “legitimate”? And what does that mean, anyways? What changes between the relationship of a citizen to a legitimate government versus the relationship of a citizen to an illegitimate government? It seems potentially like a rich topic.
But I think it necessary to add that, thread title notwithstanding, this wasn’t asked in the OP. I think that sN took on your two initial questions and answered them fairly.
I’m somewhat confused by your comments about changing minds. I think you are saying that the government is the result of our thinking, so if we want another type of government we must change our thinking. Well I am thinking clearly of a different type of government that I would want. I am not getting it.
Here I believe that you’re changing the scope of the question, from treating the citizens as a group, as asked in the OP (i.e. “To what extent is a citizenry responsible for the actions of its elected representatives?”), to asking about individual responsibility.
When sN says “they need to change what they think,” I think he’s referring in the main to those who initially support an immoral government, not those who do not.
As for individual responsibility, he said:
That does not mean that everyone is responsible or even equally responsible.
That seems sensible to me.
Am I responsible for changing the thinking and acting of the rest of the citizenry? If they won’t listen, am I still responsible for the kind of government we have? Or should I just shrug?
These are new questions. And they are good ones.
I think you’re responsible for supporting that which is good and opposing that which is evil. The specific form that this support or opposition takes will vary, depending on context. I don’t think that it would be reasonable to say that “a good man will take up arms against a tyranny” or so forth, independent of the context that any individual might have. Good men certainly may take up arms, but it also opposes bad government to, for instance, argue against the principles of bad governance. We must each decide our actions individually, depending on our individual circumstances.
This extends to trying to reason with others or to shrugging.
In no case are you responsible for what another man thinks or does.
Only if I shrug, Objectivists like Peikoff seem to be calling for my death for being a passive supporter of a regime and therefore no longer an innocent with rights. Well to be more concrete, the death of innocent Iranians who are shrugging at their situation, who Peikoff would happily nuke into oblivion in the name of self defense. I want to explore the steps a citizenry would be expected to take in order to take it off another regime’s kill list, when their government has already initiated force, or is threatening to.
If we want to discuss a specific claim of Peikoff’s, or any other, it might be helpful to have some quote or link to examine.
But if the question is “is it moral to target innocents,” my answer (as in
the thread targeted at that question) remains no.
If the question is “what must a person do to be ‘innocent’?” in this context, I would say at a minimum: do not initiate the use of force.
But yes, apart from what Peikoff may or may not have said (for it doesn’t matter who advocates for what, imo; the truth remains the truth regardless of who speaks it), I think it’s a good question as to what activities a citizen may engage in where they are no longer to be considered “innocent.”
My early inclination is that it depends on the support one gives to a government, knowing that the government is engaged in the initiation of force (or that they will). If you willingly provide the Third Reich with funds, with arms, with technology, with propaganda, then I’d say that you are not innocent of their activities. What say you?