The Individuality of Integrity; The Collapse of Common Consent

Social science asserts that social preferences cannot be made intelligible in a democracy--that democracy must be either arbitrary or impossible. Proofs are provided by the Condorcet Paradox and the Arrow Impossibility Theorem. Stated differently, political science insists it is futile to expect to translate the popular will into coherent social policy in a democracy--that what is expressed by a close election must be either arbitrary or manipulated. This is, obviously, a very cynical concept.

But it is one that is held by many governing elites in America. It explains some of the cynicism toward the governed and the distrust of the governing in America: there is a belief among our foremost democrats that democracy is impossible. But they won't broadcast this belief: to do so, would be to controvert their own legitimacy; to do so, would be to confess their cynical manipulation of a political system they contest. When these "democrats" envision a "more perfect union" than our constitutional democratic republic, what is it that they envision? What form would their perfect union take--a form far more efficient than democracy--the form of a tyranny? Before modern social science had sway, Winston Churchill, the English statesman and historian, asserted that "democracy is the worst form of government except all of the others that have been tried".



Without the aid of modern science, our forefathers understood the perils of plurality: in arguing for the Constitution, James Madison observed that "democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths." To check this tendency of democracies, the founders implemented a republic--a representative democracy. The will of the people would be expressed by representative legislators and electors focused on governance. A republican form of government would mitigate many of the deficiencies of a pure democracy. For example, a republican form of government would address asymmetric access to information: electors and dedicated legislators would be drawn from the elites--from persons with better access to education and information--elected directly by the people. Dedicated and consequently better-informed representatives would express the preferences of a less informed and sometimes misinformed mass of voters in public policy debates. If this characterization of the masses (ie. as misinformed) rankles readers, consider the characterization that the "democrats" described above entertain: they consider the masses completely incapable of self-governance.



The founders recognized that a republican form of government would not mitigate all the deficiencies of pluralism. For example, it would be less efficient about decisions and resource-allocations than would be a dictatorship. It would probably be less constant but longer lived than a kingship. But administered faithfully, it would best protect persons from oppressions and private property from confiscations.



From the axioms of social science, it follows, (and reason confirms) that common consent lacks the integrity of individual conscience. Without unanimous solidarity in leadership, institutions (ie. parties) are incapable of real integrity and real honesty. Their course will be circuitous. An individual, only, is capable of a straight and narrow course--by the grace of God. But only if the individual refuses changing, inchoate collective wisdom. Integrity is an attribute of individuals; it is not an attribute of institutions based on common consent. And it defies leaders who chase mass consent--leaders who are lead by polls and collectives--and not by their conscience.