Part 2 – So let’s step into this book a bit.

The reason to prefer a realistic view of politics is fear.  Fear that your unrealistic premises will lead to unfortunate outcomes.  So political scientists have spun up models for voter behavior. And then, tested them!  If you want to win elections it’s probably best to pay attention.

Personally my thinking about politics was entirely up-ended by the work on the voting patterns in Congress.   This book may be forcing a major resorting in my head.  I’m not sure how that will settle out.   It’s very discomforting to think that the model I took on board from that book might be wrong, that I’ve been extremely deluded.

Books that are attempting to force a painful dose of realism into their audience probably need to spend a lot of time addressing their audience’s bogus beliefs.  Scientists to this with studies, data, statistics.  It takes years to convince people that the world is not flat, the sun doesn’t spin around us, that punishment is effective, that bleeding out the bad blood doesn’t help.

So let’s start with the most popular model of how democracy works.  It’s widely presumed that voters vote their preferences.  Say Sam is extremely concerned about Global Warming.  We’d assume he’d seek out the candidate who is most aligned with his concerns and then vote for him.   What the data say?  The data says:  NO!

If you take that to heart you really need to stop taking seriously sentence like:  “The voters, outraged about X, voted for Mr. P.”  Because it’s not true!  Talk of the “will of the people” is aspirational, but it too is not true.  The whole idea of a mandate splits through your fingers like sand.

Good science is all about disconfirming models   Postulate a theory/model and then see if you can prove it’s wrong.   The audience may hate that, they may love the model, but science doesn’t care.

So this first model of politics in the democratic states is wrong.  The authors call this the folklore theory.

Once it became clear that the folklore theory doesn’t fit the data the political scientists went looking for other theories.  But that’s a story for another day.

I’m reading “Democracy for Realists: …”   It has triggered a bemused fantasy about a series of “… for Realists: …” books.  In the tradition of those “… for Idiots …”.

Books stores have lots of shelf space for self-help books.  It’s a popular genre.

Let’s imagine some titles:   Schooling for Realists, Vacations for Realists, Project management for Realists, Home brewing for Realists, Gardening for Realists.

So’s why not?  I have my theories.  For example picking up a book of this title would seem to signal one’s appetite for disconfirmation.  Where’s the fun in that?  Or possible like the Monty Python argument skit it implies your shopping for a scolding or abuse.  At a minimum it would seem to signal that the author is war weary, scarred, old and cranky?

One take on self-help books is that they are selling a treatment for stress.   Realism doesn’t sound like a miracle cure, more like chemo.