Democracy vs Authoritarianism

So you consider it necessary to have disruptive changes of power?
The idea of democracy is to have institutionalized change with the problem you highlighted of choosing between whigs(cattle thieves) and tories(robbers). At the moment, in most major democracies there is a movement meant as disruption of current structural nepotism. They do try to have some kind of rebellion, facing all the problems of a rebellion with people who can be corrupted with power, money&pleasure. I'm not sure even the Chinese or Russian revolution created something devoid of these human weaknesses as money is just a contractual agreement on shares of resource access that can be similarly structured with other means.

Since Hong Kong and Singapore were brought up, they are perfect examples of the flaw in humans that can't tell the difference from believing in what they say or hiding behind them. What parts noted to be praised are from who? Singapore has been highly criticized for its authoritarian policies. On the other hand Hong Kong has never experience true democracy even with the British in charge. So what's to praise or take credit? Are we going to be selective when in regards to China the good is ignored while the bad is emphasized in order to declare overall failure. How convenient.

The argument of democracy vs authoritarianism is a facade. Hong Kong has now lived under the same "democracy" the British left behind longer under Beijing than Great Britain. Out of one hundred and fifty-six years of British rule over Hong Kong, only the last six experience their so-called gift of democracy. And that was only after the British failed to negotiate with Beijing for an extension in the treaty to continue their totalitarian rule. The punishemnt of caning in Singapore is a British import yet Singapore's cruel authoritarian judicial punishment is seen as foreign and barbaric by the West. So what gives the British a positive report card overall in the end? They're virtually no different from anything they portray of communist China. Maybe because they believe in democracy and human rights and the rule of law... for themselves? Like I mentioned in another thread, Hitler believed in his own rights. Does that make Hitler a human rights champion? Hitler protected the rights of people who held his same values too. Does that make Hitler a human rights advocate for all? It's easy to believe in all those things for yourself. But what makes one a true believer is if you'll protect them for especially those that are not like you and especially against people like yourself.

Based on that... the difference between democracy and authoritarianism is just a number of letters arranged differently.

Kurt said:

So you consider it necessary to have disruptive changes of power?
The idea of democracy is to have institutionalized change with the problem you highlighted of choosing between whigs(cattle thieves) and tories(robbers). At the moment, in most major democracies there is a movement meant as disruption of current structural nepotism. They do try to have some kind of rebellion, facing all the problems of a rebellion with people who can be corrupted with power, money&pleasure. I'm not sure even the Chinese or Russian revolution created something devoid of these human weaknesses as money is just a contractual agreement on shares of resource access that can be similarly structured with other means.

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Certainly, no armed revolution is going to do away with human nature. You cannot change the rules of a game by playing the game by the rules. Human nature can be thought of as the most basic "game rules" of all human societies.

This also means that if you institutionalize a means of change into a political system, no amount of change through this particular method is going to change the system that defined it. For example, in a parliamentarian democracy, no amount of elections is going to stop lobbyism.

JFK said that "those who make peaceful revolution impossible, will make violent revolution inevitable". It is a good sentiment, but Kennedy omitted to define the meaning of "peaceful revolution".

solarz said:

JFK said that "those who make peaceful revolution impossible, will make violent revolution inevitable". It is a good sentiment, but Kennedy omitted to define the meaning of "peaceful revolution".

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The one that isn't violent?

Not trying to be wise, and I agree with the rest of your post, but I'm not sure what this part means.

kyanges said:

The one that isn't violent?

Not trying to be wise, and I agree with the rest of your post, but I'm not sure what this part means.

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Revolution means change, changes means change the status quo to benefit the masses, however often the status quo benefit the established elite, so if you can peacefully convince the elites to change or give up their power then all is well, but more often than not they will resist change by peacefully means, so the only outlet left is violence revolution that overthrown them and re establied the order whole new.

jackliu said:

Revolution means change, changes means change the status quo to benefit the masses, however often the status quo benefit the established elite, so if you can peacefully convince the elites to change or give up their power then all is well, but more often than not they will resist change by peacefully means, so the only outlet left is violence revolution that overthrown them and re establied the order whole new.

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No, my question is, what does solarz mean by, "JFK didn't define 'Peaceful revolution'".

jackliu said:

Revolution means change, changes means change the status quo to benefit the masses, however often the status quo benefit the established elite, so if you can peacefully convince the elites to change or give up their power then all is well, but more often than not they will resist change by peacefully means, so the only outlet left is violence revolution that overthrown them and re establied the order whole new.

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Revolution does not only mean change. Think about it, evolution is change as well.

Revolutions does not have to benefit the masses, nor does it have to represent the masses.

A failed Revolution is a Rebellion, a Successful Rebellion is a Revolution.

kyanges said:

The one that isn't violent?

Not trying to be wise, and I agree with the rest of your post, but I'm not sure what this part means.

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Think about it, we all know what a violent revolution entails. Kill the current rulers and stick their heads on a pike, then proceed to install new rulers, who may or may not be exactly like the old ones.

Now "peaceful revolution", how does that work? Yes, the "non-violent" part is easy to understand. The tricky part is the "revolution". How would you define a revolution in this context? Is voting out republicans and voting in democrats a revolution? If not, then how would one conduct a "peaceful revolution" in the USA, for example?

I am not saying that there aren't any examples of peaceful revolution. There are, and I can think of two off the top of my head. The Indian independence movement headed by Gandhi, and the Quiet Revolution of Quebec in the 70's.

However, the Gandhi revolution took advantage of a sympathetic British media. It would only work if the people had more or less benevolent rulers. One can imagine, for example, for far Gandhi would've made it if he had to contend with Imperial Japan or the Mongols.

The Quiet Revolution of Quebec was in fact a change in Culture, as the traditionally religious Quebecers began rebelling against the edicts of the Catholic Church. Note however, that the Church played no part in the government (at least, not directly).

So neither of the two examples of peaceful revolution had anything to do with a democratic system of government, in the end. And since the context of JFK's quote was directed against authoritarian communism, I question what he meant exactly, by peaceful revolution.

peaceful revolution is an oxymoron

How important is the political system anyway? I think people often forget that they are a means to an end and not an end by itself. China is not really that broken, don't try to fix it. Don't fall into the dogmatic trap of political ideology, god knows China has paid enough for that already.