The Democracy Paradox

Firstly, credit where credit is due, in our long and turbulent history, democracy has surely shown itself to be the best system of government where power is vested in the people, who rule either directly or through freely elected representatives. For sure, it has many flaws, and many democracies essentially fail because corruption and greed become such dominant forces. But even the best examples of democratic societies have a fundamental flaw, which is that even the most uneducated, misinformed, unknowledgeable, and gullible individuals are allowed to cast their vote and bring about change. On the one hand you could argue that it doesn’t matter, because the important thing is that every citizen should be allowed to have “their say” because that is the very point of the democratic system, “one man, one vote”. Unfortunately letting people who don't truly understand the facts about an issue can have a damaging and sometime catastrophic effect.

If you were stranded on a deserted island with other people and you knew that the native plant life was a mixture of safe and nutritious plant food and deadly poisonous plants, and that the group of people consisted of a pilot, a salesman, a carpenter, a customer service rep, and a botanist, would you put it to a democratic vote to see which plants you should all eat or would you be guided by the botanist? Everyone would have an opinion on each plant, based on its color, location, size, and whether other animals are eating it, but would you risk your life based on a decision made democratically by everyone in the group? Obviously when decisions start being made by the one or the few instead of by the majority, then corruption and abuse of power are usually inevitable. One could imagine with our desert island example that the botanist might start making demands of the others in exchange for his continued advice on what plants should be used or avoided for food.

In Nutopia everyone gets to vote on various issues in the community but a prerequisite for casting a vote is that they are “informed” about the issue. This ensures that votes are only from people who properly understand an issue based on the facts instead of what they hard heard, what a friend told them, a rumor they heard at work, or any other misinformation. A simple factual test on the issue at hand is taken by each citizen before they can make their vote. The information about the issue that is presented to the voters is carefully reviewed by a panel to ensure that it is entirely truthful and factual and is free from any bias.