Why the Pirates Will Fail

Day 2,991, 15:26 • Published in Belgium Belgium • by Konrad Neumann


I would hazard a bet that it is extremely unlikely the Pirate Party (whatever version and names they called themselves) will ever be successful in securing dominance in eBelgium. Despite their lack of activity and action, both the game and themselves are rigged so that they cannot succeed in a fair and democratic means. It all comes down to the voting rules of the game (game mechanics). It is because of this, the anti-establishment camp will never secure power via democratic means.

If we looked at eBE history, the party which we called the Pirate Party tried democracy. They failed poorly. Members of that party tried opened referendums on every issues in our congress. They wrote articles and taking a tally via the article comment sections. The brainchild of this project is Lin0lium who did not get their desired result. All of the issues and agendas they tried to pushed failed terribly. Their lack of success caused them to use more direct and tyrannical methods to secure power.

But this article is about voting rules. There are two real life voting rules we need to understand for our analysis. The first political science law we should investigate is Duverger’s Law of Two Party System. While some political scientist prefers to calls it as notions instead of law, Duverger is vital in our discussion. Duverger's law is a principle that asserts that plurality rule elections structured within single-member districts tend to favor a two-party system. This is especially true with the presidential aspect of the game. A single member district can be defined as single-winner voting or winner takes all politics. It is when a electoral district that returns one officeholder to a body with multiple members such as a legislature. While there are no multiple members in the presidential position, it is a winner takes all system unlike that of the Germanic/ Western European proportional representation system. This structure favors a two party system. If we look at elections of the presidency in many country, it tends to have two main dominate candidates while the 3rd, 4th, etc candidates received little to no votes.

I would argue in the case of our congressional politics is more or less a two party system. Due to the radical ideals of the members of Pirate Party and its past versions this moved many of the other establishment closer and closer with each other. While there are differences between different establishment parties, this moved them to a much closer state in which becomes a de facto two party system. One of the biggest down fall of the anti-establishment is the general labeling of any parties and group who are not a part of their cohort as corrupt and evil doers. This really united and consolidate the establishment party into one camp.

eBE is more or less a two party/ two faction system. Duverger’s Law of Two Party System explains the presidential election while the consolidation of the "establishment" vs anti-establishment of the congress also creates a two party system. Two party system greatly change the way people vote. Therefore, we need to look at Anthony Downs's model of politics. Downs's Model states the following:

1. A two-party democracy cannot provide stable and effective government unless there is a large measure of ideological consensus among its citizens.
2. Parties in a two-party system deliberately change their platforms so that they resemble one another; whereas parties in a multi-party system try to remain as ideologically distinct from each other as possible.
3. If the distribution of ideologies in a society’s citizenry remains constant, its political system will move toward a position of equilibrium in which the number of parties and their ideological positions are stable over time.
4. New parties can be most successfully launched immediately after some significant change in the distribution of ideological views among eligible voters.
5. In a two-party system, it is rational for each party to encourage voters to be irrational by making its platform vague and ambiguous.

Following Downs's Model, he laid out how a two party democracy should look like. The government must resembles that of the common constituency. Criteria Two is very important as it explains a lot. Relating it to Duverger’s Law of Two Party System, the reason why winner takes all favors a two party system is due to saliency. Voters do not want to throw away votes and commit acts that does not make an impact. Therefore people tends to support the two major parties. This also explain why two party system should resembles one another. As in any two party system countries, the two dominate faction tends to be moderate and establishment. Therefore, if we look at the RL American politics, despite which party wins, the difference are paper thin. The Gill Steins and the Ron Pauls will never secure power as they are far from the equilibrium point in the countries ideological position. [Criteria 3]

Since eBE is a de facto two party system the voting laws for the presidency and the self generated two party system of the congressed domed the anti-establishment faction from securing power via legitimate and democratic means. Their positions are radical and non-mainstream. Many of them rejects all notion of the law and traditions of the land. Their often crude and disdainful comments towards both the individual and the community as a whole also turned off many voters. If they become more mainstream and moderate, they could secure power democratically. But due to the voting laws (game mechanics) of this game, it limits the ability and means for them to secure power. With their refusal to moderate their politics, this doomed and kill of any democratic change for them to secure power. I believe and argue this as one of the main reasons why they seek power via open boarders as well as their harsh stance against the forums. As they cannot meaningfully secure power in other ways without a huge reformation of their ideals and message. So instead of continuing their true ideals of democracy established my Lin0lium via their referendums, they resort to anti-democratic takeovers in the hollow and empty cries of liberation. In the end, the anti-establishment faction are ignorant of the theories and operations of a democratic two party system as well as the voters and people of the community. For if they want to win, they need to be more moderate and come closer to the community. Instead of bashing people and reject the forum, they should embrace them. For the system itself is against the anti-establishment from the start. So they have a choice. Reform and prosper or resist and stagnate... the ball is on your court.