> "As the simplest example, a democracy that required 55% of the votes wouldn't stop being a democracy."
Good point. Considering that 55% is > 50%, would we not say that anything that requires more than 50%, is a supra-majority system? In a multi-party system, they sometimes require some thresholds which requires runoffs but I would consider them supra-majority or supra-variations on the majority rule.
> Claiming a 17yo is not a person in the US but is a person in Argentina undermines the notion that there's a universal definition of democracy... which is the premise of this entire argument!
Societies the world over different notions of what constitutes legal age for driving, marriage, enlisting and in general to be considered of age. Voting is just one more manifestation of that inconsistency.
Your other point about lottery systems does seem interesting but could we not say that term-limits are a (poor) version of a lottery system? Term limits have pros-and-cons and those would transfer to the lottery system, namely lack of institutional knowledge to run a govt in which case the bureaucracy (also called the deep state in fringe literature) would dominate.
I just wrote a long reply to your comment, but I realized it ultimately was just a ramble, so I'll scrap it.
To answer your questions briefly:
- Sure, I guess we can call it that.
- Term limits seem orthogonal to the lottery system though? You can have either with or without the other. Not sure I can see them as being versions of each other.
Good point. Considering that 55% is > 50%, would we not say that anything that requires more than 50%, is a supra-majority system? In a multi-party system, they sometimes require some thresholds which requires runoffs but I would consider them supra-majority or supra-variations on the majority rule.
> Claiming a 17yo is not a person in the US but is a person in Argentina undermines the notion that there's a universal definition of democracy... which is the premise of this entire argument!
Societies the world over different notions of what constitutes legal age for driving, marriage, enlisting and in general to be considered of age. Voting is just one more manifestation of that inconsistency.
Your other point about lottery systems does seem interesting but could we not say that term-limits are a (poor) version of a lottery system? Term limits have pros-and-cons and those would transfer to the lottery system, namely lack of institutional knowledge to run a govt in which case the bureaucracy (also called the deep state in fringe literature) would dominate.