I materially agree with Steven Greenhut’s observation at Reason.com that we have entered a period of kakistocracy:
Being a writer, I’m fairly confident in the extent of my vocabulary. I was nevertheless surprised to learn a new word in 2024—and to realize that, according to more than a few pundits, it defined the entire year. The herd of political onlookers might actually be onto something.
The word is so arcane my Word document flags it as a misspelling. Whereas an “idiocracy” is a society governed by morons, a “kakistocracy” is one “governed by its least suitable or competent citizens.” In this case, our nation’s overlords aren’t dummies, but might be defined by cunning, self-interest, venality, delusion, vanity or mental decline.
They most definitely do not adhere to Thomas Jefferson’s observation that, “Power is not alluring to pure minds.” By contrast, a kakistocracy is a government run by impure folks who crave little more than power. Such a system more closely resembles Benjamin Franklin’s observation: “In rivers and bad governments the lightest things swim at top.”
Not only that but things are likely to remain that way unless we identify the reasons why this has happened.
My first claim would be that we have been relentlessly pushing towards kakistocracy for a very long time. Open media have just made it more obvious.
My second claim is that the farther the government is from ordinary citizens and the less constrained by law, the will of the people, and even right and wrong the worse things will become.
My third claim is that partisanship allows us to ignore the obvious faults of our fellow partisans.
My last claim is that the more money and power there is in government the worse things will become.
Beyond that I have few ideas of how to make things better.
The word has popped up at a number of sites I read. It has been appropriate for a while but Trump’s nominees made it really hard to avoid.
Steve
@steve
So, we should thank Trump for making the obvious “really hard to avoid.”
“Biden’s” awards to Clinton, Cheney, and Soros are a celebration of kakistocracy.
As to a cure, there is a kind of entropy that governs all organizations, businesses, and governments that requires that they become progressively worse and then die. There is no cure, no restoration. We are on a toboggan ride to Hell. So stop dreaming and enjoy the ride.
The recent election’s most analogous comp is the 1888 election btw/ sitting President Benjamin Harrison and former President Grover Cleveland. I don’t know if the term kakistocracy was used, (I don’t recall reading it before), but the mood was despairing, particularly among the Mugwumps, moralizing types that liked to cast themselves as above party (i.e., moralists). Here is the best explanation of the American predicament at that time by an Englishmen:
“In America, which is beyond all other countries the country of a’ career open to talents,’ a country, moreover, in which political life is unusually keen and political ambition widely diffused, it might be expected that the highest place would always be won by a man of brilliant gifts. But from the time when the heroes of the Revolution died out with Jefferson and Adams and Madison, no person except General Grant, had, down to the end of last century, reached the chair whose name would have been remembered had he not been president, and no president except Abraham Lincoln had displayed striking qualities in the chair. Who knows or cares to know anything about the personality of James K. Polk or Franklin Pierce? The only thing remarkable about them is that being so commonplace they should have climbed so high.”
He offered that “eminent men” did not rise in American politics, both because the ablest men were not attracted to public life and Congress in particular offers few opportunities for distinction and more for making enemies, though all eminent men make more enemies than safe men. “The safest candidate may not draw in quite so many votes from the moderate men of the other side as the brilliant one would, but he will not lose nearly so many from his own ranks. Even those who admit his mediocrity will vote straight when the moment for voting comes.”
https://learninglink.oup.com/access/content/schaller-3e-dashboard-resources/document-excerpt-from-james-bryce-the-american-commonwealth-1900
That’s very helpful, PD. As I noted the phenomenon is not new.