Monday, May 4, 2009

Pogge-Chpters 6&7

I really enjoyed Pogge's discussion of democracy and its components, as well as the process by which it was possible to achieve it. He expected that his example of kidnapping and overtake of government would be a good parallel, and it was. It helped me better understand the difficulties of punishing after democratic order is restored. Also, I wanted to comment on his definition of democracy, because it brought a different idea for me. At the beggining of ch. 6 he writes that democracy should make voters "safe from extreme economic need and from arbitrary physical violence and pshychological duress, any of which might make them excessively dependant on each other". This part of the definition is not one commonly known; most times one will only hear the basic definition involving voting and representation. This is a nice addition to his overall idea, and how people need to be politically free, as well as independant to thrive.
In his discussion of the Democracy Panel, he speaks of the influence this panel may have in keeping coups away from taking over fledging democracies. Pogge thinks that an organization like the UN should be in charge of this panel, but I could not help but wonder about enforcement. This panel would have the power to determine whether the countries were under take over, and lending issues, but how would they enforce their desicions?
*Democracy involves the fulfillment not only of important rights, but also of important responsibilities of citizens. (166)
Prior to this he writes about the lack of involvement and awareness in affluent countries as well as developing ones. People are not well informed about foreign policies and international practices that their governments practice in their name. This reminds me a bit of Dagger, and his call for greater involvmenet and community. It is easy to ignore international happenings when one is preocuppied at home, yet those practices might lead to real suffering worldwide.

"Dispersing political authority over nested territorial units would decrease the intensity of the struggle for power and wealth within and among states, thereby reducing the incidence of war, poverty and oppression...borders can be redrawn more easily to accord with the aspirations of peoples and communities" (168-169).
This is quite intriguing to me, but I am not sure how feasible it would be. Through colonization and several world conflicts borders have been drawn in countries, languages changed and customes ignored. The west is largerly to blame for the suffering of developing nations because of its beliefs of superiority.

I wish he would have spent a litte more time writing about opression in 7.3.3. I agree with his suggestion of a multi-branch government, but a country that is facing serious problems as he mentioned might have a difficult time achieving this. Perhaps these countries would need an international forace that is non partisan, but this would infringe on their sovereignty.I hope we talk a little more about this in class.
Also, I hope we get to spend some time talking about the changes and shaping of political units.

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