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As a Chinese journalist, you may have your own definition of democracy which corresponds to your history and your way of seeing the world.
I wonder what his definition of democracy is, and to what history and what seeing the world it corresponds.
Has he graduated from the kindergarten already?
Update. Apparently, my point was not understood. Read inside for more enlightenment.
Update. The editor is now saying he was misquoted by the Chinese agency. His point was milder, but still along the same lines.
I wonder what his definition of democracy is, and to what history and what seeing the world it corresponds.
Democracy in one sense means the majority decides, but it also means the rights of the minority are protected. As UK late Prime Minister Winston Churchill said, democracy is the least bad system that we have ever thught of. So democracy is never perfect. It always has problems. Our democracy here in the US has many contradictions, problems and challenges. So democracy is not a cure that could turn everything bad into good. It has its own advantages and its disadvantages.
Has he graduated from the kindergarten already?
Update. Apparently, my point was not understood. Read inside for more enlightenment.
Update. The editor is now saying he was misquoted by the Chinese agency. His point was milder, but still along the same lines.
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At the same time, this guy does not understand that what he is saying is that democracy is culturally defined. Maybe when he is saying "democracy" he means "good life", I do not know. But the word "democracy" has a certain meaning loosely understood by everyone and denoting the same thing all over the world. Elections did not make Slatinist USSR a democratic country, and neither did the declared principle of the "democratic centralism", and corruption in Brooklyn does not make the USA a non-democratic country.
I thought you would understand this.
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A few ... ago tried to enlighten some guy about North Korea. As little as I knew about the subject, I carelessly mentioned, that's not even the country's real name, but, more like, a location. The name would be something like Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
A shock. REPUBLIC?! PEOPLE'S??! DEMOCRATIC???!
In fact, the longest leisure trip he ever took was, I think, Cape Cod. The guy doesn't even have a passport...
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Interestingly, this fella has masters in computer science. Go figure...
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Tell me this, when are you going to choose to come over here and milk some yaks?
Actually, yak milking is quiet optional, and there might be some other options, if you will.
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His response to me was "I do not think Bennet was condescending. I think he said the right things about democracy"...
The point: what you see as kindergarden stuff, other people do not.
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There is a trivial claim that each country is different, and there is a (less trivial) claim that there is something common for all. Whether we call it "democracy", "socialism" or "self-determination", while they look different in different cultures, they usually have a global meaning. Sweden is different from Israel, both countries are democratic. Self-determination and sovereignity of Lebanon is less than perfect, still it is an independent and sovereign country, like Taiwan or Belgium. (I am not sure about "socialism" though, the word has too many meanings to choose from without getting confused.)
The point of the editor was that the world is multicultural in the narrow sense of the word. This logically leads to a conclusion that, like I wrote before, Soviet "democratic centralism" was simpy a Soviet kind of democracy, no less democratic than Great Britain. To me, this is absurd.
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I did not get a feeling that he was saying "anything can be thought of as a form of democracy." I think, rather, he was making the point you are making - that democracies differ, only with slightly more negative overtones.
There are two subjects for conversation here: (1) categorization: drawing a line between democracies and non-democracies and (2) the implications of calling something a "democracy." The negative overtones come from his discussion of (2) - just because you call something a democracy does not mean that it is suddenly a perfect world.
Democracy
The word "democracy" is a code word in the modern political discourse. Somewhat less so than "socialism" used to be during the Cold War. Then a warlord could have come to Moscow, declare his interest in the "socialist way" and get money. Another warlord would come to Washington, declare his interest in fighting against the "socialist way" and get money.
These days the situation is different: proclaiming democratization is not sufficient, but pretending is, in many cases. And claiming that a nondemocratic society is democratic (because that is how democracy appears in its culture) is one popular way to perform this demagoguery. I think I recall hearing Soviet talking heads talking like that too, before they were swept away with the events. And I am sure there were Western journalists then who took it at its face value.
Re: Democracy
you appear to be mixing your metaphors a bit. On one hand you are talking about the "democracy is in the eye of the beholder" crap of the "Russia has its own unique way to do democracy, conveyed President Putin today..."
On the other hand you seem to be equating it with the statements of the form "Democracy by itself does not mean that everything is good." What the WP editor was saying, in my opinion was that "democracy is implemented differently in different DEMOCRATIC countries" (and here "DEMOCRATIC" corresponds to your common sense understanding of the term). The continuation of the thought was that US implementation of it is far from perfect - a feeling I wholeheartedly support, and will continue supporting until this country moves to direct presidential elections.
PS. I am leaving town, but will continue this conversation with you at some other time and place.
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This is exactly the kind of attitude that I consider absurd, and this is precisely why I chose those examples.
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So, the above attitude is not necessarily unrealistic in terms of this secondary reality, I agree. But not in terms of the primary reality: facts of life.
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Definition of democracy
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I think your estimation of the level of ochlocracy in the US and its dynamics is not correct, but I am not sure I have the facts to support my point of view.
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