Democracy in times of ochlocracy

Abstract

For some time now we have noticed an increasing scepticism regarding the effectiveness of democracy, and its ability to represent citizens through elections. Elections are the central mechanism of political decision taking. However, there is a clear tendency to exploit electorial processes by populist politicians. The ancient ideal of paideia was to educate citizens by following a civic program. Its aim was to enable the citizen to exercise the civil rights and duties. Since the 1970s, however, we had observed two contrasting tendencies: a growth of individualization, and a ecrease of the level of civic education. In the 1990s populist political parties entered the political scene of European democracies, some of which have managed to establish a mob rule or ochlocracy (χλοκρατία). Since then, ochlocratic parties have systematically intended to win the votes of politically less educated citizens by offering them a simplified political discourse. In fact, these parties have managed to neutralize the twoparty system in many European countries. Thus they managed to block majoritybased governments, forcing parties to form coalitions with ideologically opposing smaller parties. This has created a situation in which the “punishment vote” becomes the mean to gain the votes of undecided people who may be characterized as rebels without political culture.