The Issue of Democracy from Popper's Perspective

The question 'Who should govern?' and whether political institutions should be established to prevent the destructive actions of bad and false rulers occupied the mind of Karl Popper (1902–1994). His goal was to create institutions capable of preventing potential harm from powerful rulers or at least limiting the extent of their damage. He concluded that rulers do not always act rightly and wisely. Popper believed that rulers in the past often operated below the average level of thought and ethics of society. He argued that it is absurd to hope that choosing the best, most deserving, and capable rulers will necessarily lead to success for the general populace. Popper's theory of democratic control starts from the point that honest and excellent governance by the majority is, in fact, exceptional. The main point is that tyrannical and unethical authoritarian governments should be fought against and their growth should be prevented. According to Popper, there are essentially two main types of government: those that can be peacefully removed from power through elections, where social institutions allow people to dismiss their rulers, and those that can only be overthrown through bloody revolutions, which occurs relatively infrequently. He calls the former democratic systems and the latter authoritarian or dictatorial governments. For Popper, it is not very important that democracy means popular sovereignty; he emphasizes that people can only exert limited influence on their government, and in fact, in a democracy, people do not govern in the literal sense. Following this logic, democratic politics is limited to forming institutions that can control the power of rulers, aiming to eliminate the possibility of authoritarian and dictatorial governments, whether religious or secular. Popper believed it is better to have a bad democratic policy than an authoritarian government that claims to be just, wise, and virtuous. This does not mean that oversight institutions are necessarily formed and will unconditionally guarantee a democratic state. Popper argued that a bad democratic policy is preferable to an authoritarian government that claims to be just, wise, and virtuous. Therefore, Popper's theory of democracy is not based on the governance of the majority; rather, democratic control methods such as public elections and parliamentary government are institutions that can actually prevent authoritarian rule and improve their governance methods, even developing ways to enhance the system's growth and development. The virtue of a democratic system is not the majority vote, but the possibility of forming free and democratic institutions that can even review and revise the majority vote, of course, through democratic means and struggles. Popper writes bitterly in his book 'The Open Society and Its Enemies' that even if the majority of people, through their votes, lead to the destruction of democratic institutions, a democrat learns that there is no safe method to prevent authoritarian rule. He emphasizes that this historical experience, namely the rise of the Nazis in Germany, should not diminish a democrat's will to fight against dictatorship and weaken them. Popper did not seek ultimate happiness for a specific class, group, or race; it was sufficient for him that humans suffer as little as possible. Popper proposed the theory of critical rationalism or critical realism. According to him, humans cannot experience anything without prejudice, and without experience, humans cannot understand anything. Therefore, human knowledge is always provisional, and human science and knowledge must constantly be criticized and revised. Thus, humans are always guessing and do not possess eternal knowledge. For example, the fact that swans are white does not mean that it is impossible for a black swan to be found in a lake one day. The theory is essentially an effort to understand the world, and this understanding must always be questioned whether it can still comprehend the world's fabric or not. The virtue of a democratic system is not the majority vote, but the possibility of forming free and democratic institutions that can even review and revise the majority vote, of course, through democratic means and struggles. Because any ideological and idealistic worldview limits freedom, the free will of humans must be defended. The laws of open societies must be designed in such a way that political institutions and the laws of the country guarantee the freedom of every individual. An open society is a system that guarantees freedom, tolerance, patience, and forbearance among its citizens and is always capable of critically reviewing itself. According to Popper, freedom is, in fact, negative freedom, meaning freedom from coercion, oppression, and abuse. However, these freedoms are not unlimited. A powerful person is not allowed to humiliate someone weaker than themselves. That is, an individual's freedom ends where another's freedom is violated. Karl Popper not only defended individual rights and sought a libertarian, democratic, and social system, but he also supported government intervention in social issues, and for this reason, it cannot be said that he was entirely in favor of liberal economics. He believed that the authorities should create a type of social institutions capable of defending economically weak individuals against the coercion of the powerful. Political powers should control economic powers. Popper's urgent ideal was the 'open society.' People in modern societies must defend the interests of freedom and be the flag bearers of the goals of the open society. However, he opposed defending abstract lofty ideals. A citizen of the open society should address the poor conditions and deficiencies of society but should not attempt to make the world happy with ideological tools. Everyone should identify social issues and find solutions without creating an ideological ideal for themselves and preparing political programs for the distant and near future of society. The thought and vision of a better society is not the goal; rather, the main goal should only be to acquire the ability to potentially remove the government and ruling authorities of the country. That is, political institutions should control power and create political balance. Only a pluralistic democracy can guarantee freedom, a system that has a real separation of powers, establishes a system of periodic elections, and genuinely diverse and different political interests and opinions. Popper not only defended individual rights and sought a libertarian, democratic, and social system, but he also supported government intervention in social issues, and for this reason, it cannot be said that he was entirely in favor of liberal economics. Popper was one of the greatest critics of any ideology and utopia, that is, idealistic thinking and any kind of utopia. He believed that any attempt to reach a heavenly world would ultimately turn our good earth into hell. The goal of his theory of knowledge was that, in fact, the validity of any theory cannot be proven, and the possibility must always be provided to criticize and test any theory. He did not directly criticize Hitler and Stalin, but blamed the theories of Plato, Hegel, and Marx for the emergence of totalitarian theories. In an article published in August 1987 for the German-language weekly magazine Der Spiegel, he confessed that in his youth he was both a Marxist and a democrat, but totalitarian movements and dictatorships forced him to formulate the theory of the open society. In his article, he easily emphasizes that democracy means the sovereignty and independence of the people, but in fact, in no country do people govern; rather, states and bureaucratic apparatuses govern. Of course, some dictatorships also use the term democracy. He writes that our democracies are all party-based. However, parties are not very effective, and democracy is currently not possible without parties. In fact, modern democracies are not the sovereignty of the people; rather, they are the sovereignty of states in the sense of the government of states plus the government of parties and party leaders. The larger a party is, the less the limit of democracy within that party, and correspondingly, the less the people's influence on party and state policies. According to Popper, the plurality of opinions should not necessarily lead to a plurality of parties. The main goal of the open society is to guarantee the freedom of different opinions, and a two-party system can also fulfill that. He writes that, in fact, the governance of parties in parliament does not reflect the sovereignty of the people and the people's demands but only reflects the influence of parties and propaganda on the people. According to Popper, the effectiveness of democracy in a country with only two parties is better than in multi-party countries, and the reason is that any small party cannot have a significant impact on the policies of large state parties. This type of two-party democracy is also the best form of it. Popper writes that a two-party state is the best form of government because, in this case, parties are forced to criticize themselves. For example, typically, if a party does not receive enough votes in an election, reforms will soon occur within that party to change policies. This type of reformability is the result of political competition. According to Popper, after the experience of National Socialism in Germany and Stalinism in the Soviet Union, the theory of popular sovereignty has completely lost its moral and political significance. The two-party system is entirely sufficient. Following this theory, the duty of an opposition party is to critically monitor the policies of the ruling party so that tolerance, forbearance, and plurality of opinions in the country are guaranteed, and pluralism becomes a social reality, even if some ideologies promote propaganda against tolerance. According to Popper, the plurality of opinions should not necessarily lead to a plurality of parties. The main goal of the open society is to guarantee the freedom of different opinions, and a two-party system can also fulfill that. Closed systems cannot tolerate criticism and plurality of opinions and are immune to any form of criticism, fighting against any independent, creative, and innovative thought and opinion. In contrast, open systems risk their existence to engage with any opinion and thought, but for this reason, they can optimize their system without exploding and collapsing from within like religious and ideological dictatorships.