The Highest Form of Democracy: Populism, Idiocracy, or Something Far Worse?

The article examines the limits of democracy through the lens of political philosophy, social choice theory, and empirical data — from Brennan's epistocracy through Caplan's rational irrationality of voters to Arrow's impossibility theorem. It analyzes populism (Müller, Mudde), refutes the biological scenario of idiocracy using the Flynn effect, and offers deliberative democracy (the Irish citizens' assembly, Fishkin's deliberative polls) as a practical path toward improving democratic decision-making.

Imagine you go to the dentist. Fifty people are sitting in the waiting room, and the dentist announces: "Today we're going to vote on whether to pull the patient's wisdom tooth or give him a crown." Twenty-five people raise their hands for extraction, twenty-five for the crown. The dentist shrugs and says: "Democratically undecided. We'll flip a crown — the dental kind." Absurd? Of course. And yet this is exactly how a substantial part of democratic decision-making works on matters considerably more complex than dentistry.

The question of whether democracy is the best form of government has troubled philosophers since Plato, who regarded it as a precursor to tyranny. Winston Churchill made it famous as "the worst form of government — except for all the others." And Mike Judge made Idiocracy, in which a wrestler becomes president and plants are watered with an energy drink because "it's got electrolytes." So which is it? Populism? Idiocracy? Or just an ordinary mess with a constitutional framework?

Let's look at the hard data.

Jason Brennan, a political philosopher at Georgetown University, pulls no punches in his book Against Democracy (2016). He sorts voters into three groups — and none of them looks flattering.

"Hobbits" are politically disengaged and ignorant. They don't know who the prime minister is, but they hold a strong opinion that "the whole thing has to change." "Hooligans," by contrast, are passionately engaged — but like football fans who brawl over the color of a jersey, not over the quality of the game. And "Vulcans" — rational, dispassionate, evidence-driven — are about as common as unicorns on the highway.

Brennan's proposal? Epistocracy — rule by the competent. For example, knowledge tests could determine the weight of a vote, more educated citizens could be given more votes (something, incidentally, that John Stuart Mill already proposed in the 19th century), or an "epistocratic council" could veto manifestly harmful legislation. It sounds reasonable — until you ask who will write those tests. (Princeton University Press; Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews)

If voters were merely randomly ignorant, it wouldn't be such a problem. Random errors cancel out in a sufficiently large sample — that's the principle underlying both actuarial mathematics and lotteries. But Bryan Caplan, an economist at George Mason University, showed something worse in his book The Myth of the Rational Voter (2007): voters aren't randomly wrong. They're systematically wrong.

Drawing on data from the Survey of Americans and Economists on the Economy, he identified four reliable biases: voters underestimate the benefits of markets, hate international trade (even when they profit from it), overvalue "preserving jobs" at the expense of productivity, and are chronically convinced that the economy is doing worse than it actually is. These biases persist even after controlling for income, education, race, age, and ideology — they're not self-interest, but authentically mistaken beliefs. (Princeton University Press; Wikipedia: The Myth of the Rational Voter)

Caplan's key concept is "rational irrationality." Because the probability that a single vote will decide an election is effectively zero, the personal cost of holding nonsensical beliefs is negligible. The voter therefore happily "indulges" in a belief in protectionism as a form of psychological luxury — just as someone indulges in a chocolate cake even though they know it will make them fat. The difference is that the chocolate cake fattens only the person eating it. Irrational voting fattens the whole economy. (Wikipedia: Rational irrationality)

Two famous results from social choice theory bound the space for optimism — and for pessimism.

Condorcet's jury theorem (1785) sounds hopeful: if each voter has a greater than 50% probability of choosing the correct answer, then majority voting by a sufficiently large group converges toward the certainty of a correct outcome. Three voters with 80% accuracy give the correct answer with a probability of 89.6%. A million voters with 51% accuracy give the correct answer practically with certainty. Democracy works — provided the average voter is a hair better than a coin-flipping monkey.

The catch? The theorem requires three conditions: independence (voters don't influence one another), competence above the level of chance, and binary decision-making. In the era of social networks, where millions of people share identical disinformation, the assumption of independence is about as realistic as the assumption that Facebook exists to maintain friendships. Dietrich and Spiekermann (2020) therefore declared the "infallibility hypothesis" untenable for real democracies — in their view, only the weaker thesis is reasonably defensible: that larger groups decide better, not that they decide flawlessly. (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Jury Theorems; Wikipedia: Condorcet's jury theorem)

And then there's Arrow's impossibility theorem (1951), for which Kenneth Arrow received the 1972 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences. It runs roughly as follows: for three or more candidates, there exists no voting system that simultaneously satisfies several intuitively reasonable requirements — above all independence of irrelevant alternatives (the ranking of A and B should not depend on the existence of C), Pareto efficiency (if everyone prefers A to B, the outcome must prefer A to B), and non-dictatorship (no single individual can unilaterally determine the outcome). Every system must violate at least one condition. Arrow himself commented soberly: most systems won't function badly all the time — he proved only that all of them can fail sometimes. (Wikipedia: Arrow's impossibility theorem)

Translated into plain language: a perfect democracy is mathematically impossible. But that's not an argument against democracy — it's an argument against utopian expectations of anything.

If democracy is "rule by the people," populism is the moment when "the people" start beating someone up.

Jan-Werner Müller of Princeton (What Is Populism?, 2016) defines populism as anti-pluralism: populists don't merely say "we represent the people" — they say "we, and we alone, represent the people." Whoever disagrees is not the opposition but an enemy of the people. Under this definition fall Orbán, Chávez, Trump, and Erdoğan. It does not encompass Sanders or Syriza — because they do not question the legitimacy of the political opposition. (LSE Review of Books; Springer)

Cas Mudde of the University of Georgia added a useful framework: populism is a "thin ideology" — it divides the world into "the pure people" and "the corrupt elite," but has no position of its own on the economy or foreign policy. It must always "attach itself" to a host ideology: to nationalism on the right, to socialism on the left. The conceptual opposite of populism, moreover, is not democracy — it's pluralism: the conviction that society is composed of many overlapping groups with legitimately differing interests. (Oxford Academic: Populism: A Very Short Introduction; UPenn: Mudde — Populism in the 21st Century)

Is populism inherent to democracy? Margaret Canovan (1999) answered yes — it is an inevitable product of the tension between democracy's pragmatic face (institutions, compromises, tedium) and its redemptive face (popular sovereignty, the transformative promise, excitement). As long as there is a gap between what democracy promises and what it delivers, there will be populism. (Sage Journals: Canovan — Trust the People!)

And what about populists in power? The data aren't flattering. A study by Vittori (2022) on a sample of 19 countries showed that populist governments negatively affect nearly all qualities of democracy — with exclusive populists (right-wing nativism) doing more harm than inclusive ones. (Cambridge Core: Threat or Corrective?)

The film Idiocracy (2006) is built on the premise of dysgenic fertility: people with lower IQ have more children, so the population's average intelligence declines. As satire, it's brilliant. As science? Not quite.

The Flynn effect — an increase in average IQ of roughly 3 points per decade — took place throughout the 20th century thanks to better nutrition, education, and smaller families. Since the 1990s, some countries have recorded a reverse trend: Bratsberg and Rogeberg (2018), in a study of Norwegian conscripts, demonstrated a decline of roughly 0.33 points per year. The key finding: the decline occurred within families (younger siblings scored worse than older ones), which ruled out a genetic explanation. The causes are environmental — probably changes in the educational system and media consumption, not "stupid people having more children." (PNAS: Bratsberg & Rogeberg 2018)

Genetic studies from Iceland, the USA, and Great Britain show a decline in alleles associated with intelligence of only 0.3–0.9 IQ points per generation — roughly three times less than the Flynn increase amounted to. An idiocracy scenario would require numbers of a different order of magnitude. (Institute for Family Studies: Are We Headed Towards Idiocracy?)

So no, idiocracy as a biological destiny is not looming over us. As a cultural phenomenon, however, it's a different matter — and there, social networks and disinformation get us there more effectively than any genetics.

Does IQ correlate with political preferences? Yes — but not in the way anyone from any part of the spectrum would expect.

Higher cognitive abilities consistently predict socially liberal attitudes — lower authoritarianism, greater tolerance toward different groups. That's a robust finding across studies. The relationship to economic preferences is more tangled, however: Caplan and Miller (2010) found that verbal intelligence correlates with pro-market attitudes, while Ganzach (2020) showed that cognitive abilities lead to liberal attitudes via education but to conservative ones via income — two opposing channels. (PubMed Central: Cognitive ability and economic ideology)

Scott Althaus (2003) simulated how public opinion would change if all citizens were equally informed. The result: a fully informed public would be less militaristic in foreign policy, less conservative on social issues, and more skeptical of government intervention in the economy — roughly in a "libertarian" direction. No one would be pleased about it. (Econlib: Extending the Enlightened Preference Approach)

And here we run into a fundamental ethical problem: linking IQ to the right to vote. Scores on cognitive tests correlate with socioeconomic status, race, and access to education. Any competence restriction would systematically exclude the poor and minorities — not because they're stupider, but because they had worse schools. The historical experience with literacy tests in the American South (1890–1965) is a cautionary tale: in Georgia, voter turnout among Black men fell by 50% after the introduction of cumulative "poll taxes." Identical test answers were graded as correct for white applicants and incorrect for Black ones. (History.com: Jim Crow Laws; Wikipedia: Literacy test)

Athens: when politics was done by lot

Athenian democracy (508–322 BC) filled most offices by lot — the Council of Five Hundred, about 700 magistrates, 6,000 jurors a year. It used the kleroterion, a stone randomization device that today could serve as a hipster coffee table. Aristotle commented on it simply: "Sortition is more democratic than election," because elections favor the wealthy and the charismatic. Only military generals (strategoi) and financial officials were elected — that is, positions where incompetence could kill.

Of roughly 250,000–300,000 inhabitants, 30,000–40,000 adult men held political rights. Women, slaves, and foreigners were excluded — but within the body of eligible citizens, the system functioned remarkably stably for nearly two hundred years. (World History Encyclopedia: Athenian Democracy; Wikipedia: Sortition)

Singapore: technocracy with both results and a price

Singapore under Lee Kuan Yew (1959–1990) represents the purest modern experiment with technocracy. GDP per capita rose from about USD 500 to today's roughly USD 65,000 (nominal). The HDI reaches 0.949. Corruption is among the lowest in the world. 80% of the population lives in public housing.

The price? The Gini coefficient before redistribution reaches roughly 0.43 — a value often labeled as a warning sign. Continuous single-party rule since 1959, short nine-day campaign periods, controlled media, and the POFMA law (2019) allowing the government to label information as "false." Singapore proves that technocracy can work — but also that it works like a guillotine: efficiently, quickly, and you'd better not stand too close. And what works in a city-state of 6 million inhabitants need not be transferable to larger entities. (CFR: Lee's Lasting Legacy; Democratic Erosion: Singapore)

The most elegant philosophical answer to Brennan was formulated by David Estlund in Democratic Authority (2008): even if some people really did know better which policies are correct, authority to rule does not automatically follow from expertise. A doctor knows better than a patient what is healthy — but that doesn't mean the doctor can force the patient to eat broccoli. Estlund demands that political authority be justifiable in a way that no reasonable person could reject. Because reasonable people disagree about who the political experts are, epistocracy fails to meet this requirement. (Taylor & Francis: Is this what democracy looks like?; Springer: Estlund on Epistocracy)

Elizabeth Anderson, in "The Epistemology of Democracy" (2006), added a positive argument: democracy functions as a system of collective experimental learning. Using the example of community forestry groups in South Asia, she showed that excluding women from decision-making led to worse outcomes, because the women held key local knowledge about forest resources. Excluding voices harms not only the excluded — it worsens the decision for everyone. (Project MUSE: Anderson — The Epistemology of Democracy)

And then there's the macro-level paradox pointed out by Thomas Christiano: democracies empirically outperform alternative systems on practically every metric. They don't wage war on one another, they better protect human rights, they prevent famines, they reduce poverty, and they exhibit higher per capita growth. This is hard to reconcile with the notion that Brennan's hooligans and hobbits are at the helm. Either they somehow produce good outcomes despite their limitations — or the model is wrong. (Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews: Against Democracy)

Instead of taking voters' votes away, we can teach them to vote better. Deliberative democracy builds on Jürgen Habermas's idea that legitimacy stems from the quality of discussion, not from a mere tallying of preferences. (Cambridge Core: Habermas — Deliberative Democracy)

In practice it looks like this: you select a group of citizens by lot, give them balanced materials, access to experts, several days for discussion — and the results are surprisingly good.

Ireland is the most successful case. The Citizens' Assembly (2016–2018), composed of 99 randomly selected citizens, recommended repealing the constitutional ban on abortion — the subsequent 2018 referendum passed with 66.4% of the vote. The earlier Constitutional Convention led to the referendum on marriage equality (2015, 62.1%). A country where the Catholic Church dominated politics for generations resolved its two most toxic cultural questions through a deliberative process with participants chosen by lot. (Frontiers: Irish Model for Deliberative Democracy)

James Fishkin of Stanford developed the method of deliberative polls: a representative sample of citizens is surveyed about their attitudes, then undergoes a multi-day structured debate with experts, and finally is surveyed again. The results shift toward the center and toward evidence-based positions. The experiment "America in One Room" (2019), with 526 Americans, showed that the share of participants rating the other side's views as "well reasoned" rose from 34% to 54%, and the effects persisted for at least a year after the event. (Deliberative Democracy Lab: America in One Room; Wikipedia: Deliberative opinion poll)

In 2019 the Belgian region of Ostbelgien established the world's first permanently institutionalized deliberative body — where citizens, not politicians, control the agenda. (Publicdeliberation.net: Ostbelgien Model)

Weaknesses? Selection bias (the more educated and engaged take part), most recommendations are non-binding, group polarization, and the problem of scalability. In France, roughly 20% of the climate convention's proposals were fully implemented, with another roughly 50% in modified form. Deliberative bodies are a complement, not a replacement — but a complement that demonstrably works.

Populism? No — that's democracy looking into a distorting mirror and claiming the image is reality.

Idiocracy? No — humanity isn't growing dumber genetically; it has merely chosen more efficient methods of spreading stupidity (see: algorithmic content recommendation).

Epistocracy? No — because no one can fairly define who is smart enough to rule, and historical attempts to restrict the right to vote turned out catastrophically.

The highest form of democracy is probably the one that does not yet exist in full form: hybrid deliberative democracy — equal suffrage complemented by institutionalized citizens' panels, strengthened civic education, and constitutional safeguards against populist erosion. Ireland, Ostbelgien, and deliberative polls show that this is not a utopia — it works, just on a small scale.

Democracy is not epistemically optimal. But as the only system, it possesses mechanisms by which it can identify and correct its own errors. Authoritarian regimes have no such feedback — and when they do get it, it usually takes the form of a revolution, not an opinion poll.

John Dewey wrote in The Public and Its Problems (1927): the cure for the ailments of democracy is more democracy. He was right — but he should have added: a qualitatively better democracy, not just more ballots.

And the half of voters with below-average IQ? That's a statistical necessity — an average works such that half are always below it. The real problem isn't that they're below average. The problem is that even those above average don't vote rationally. We're all in this together. And that is probably the most compelling argument for democracy there is.

Transparency of creation:

The concept, structure, and editorial line of the article are the work of the author, who prepared the content sketch, established the key theses, and directed the entire creative process. Generative AI (Claude, Anthropic) was used as a tool for research, fact-checking, and fleshing out the author's outline.

The author edited the outputs throughout, verified the key findings, and approved the final wording. No part of the text was published without human review. All factual data were verified against the publicly available sources cited in the text.

The procedure complies with the requirements of Article 50 of EU Regulation 2024/1689 (the AI Act) on transparency of AI-generated content. #poweredByAI