The Good State, A. C. Grayling
The Good State, A. C. Grayling
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The Good State
On the Principles of Democracy

Author: A. C. Grayling

Narrator: Julian Elfer

Unabridged: 6 hr 25 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 08/25/2020


Synopsis

The foundations upon which our democracies stand are inherently flawed, vulnerable to corrosion from within. What is the remedy?

A. C. Grayling makes the case for a clear, consistent, principled, and written constitution, and sets out the reforms necessary—among them addressing the imbalance of power between government and Parliament, imposing fixed terms for MPs, introducing proportional representation, and lowering the voting age to sixteen (the age at which you can marry, gamble, join the army, and must pay taxes if you work)—to ensure the intentions of such a constitution could not be subverted or ignored. As democracies around the world show signs of decay, the issue of what makes a good state, one that is democratic in the fullest sense of the word, could not be more important.

To take just one example: by the simplest of measures, neither Britain nor the United States can claim to be truly democratic. The most basic tenet of democracy is that no voice be louder than any other. Yet in our "first past the post" electoral systems a voter supporting a losing candidate is unrepresented, his or her voice unequal to one supporting a winning candidate, who frequently does not gain a majority of the votes cast. This is just one of a number of problems, all of them showing that democratic reform is a necessity in our contemporary world.

About A. C. Grayling

A. C. Grayling is professor of philosophy and master of the New College of the Humanities at Northeastern, London. Among his many books are Liberty in the Age of Terror, The God Argument, Democracy and Its Crisis, and The History of Philosophy. He has been a regular contributor to the Times, Guardian, Financial Times, Independent on Sunday, Economist, New Statesman, Prospect, and New European. He appears frequently on radio and TV, including Newsnight and CNN News. He lives in London.


Reviews

Goodreads review by GMO Burt on November 10, 2020

I heard Grayling on a podcast talking about this book. Political philosophy has long been an interest of mine and I liked the clear way he presented his ideas. Though I had heard Grayling's name before I don't think I had ever read any of his works. The book is essentially a critique of what Graylin......more

Goodreads review by Scott on October 16, 2020

Outlines the concepts of democracy and where it stands today in a clear manner.......more

Goodreads review by Baden on September 22, 2020

Potentially stodgy, but in fact a much needed resource in comparative politics in the time of Trump. He takes the intricacies of voting systems- especially first past the post- and argues (correctly) that this particular system means a denial of democracy in the US and the UK, and numerous other nat......more

Goodreads review by George on June 09, 2023

The cover sarcastically reads "While most philosophy is written in abstruse and ponderous prose, Grayling's is a model of clarity and elegance." Grayling says a little in a lot of words, and then rests some of his wildest and least defensible conclusions like the obviously sensible need to setup a mi......more

Goodreads review by Brandon on November 28, 2024

A very clear and relevant discussion on the deep absence of actual democratic principles in polities claiming themselves to be representative democracies today. however the book continues to imply that a democracy, granted a fulfilment of its key principles,is nevertheless the ideal system of govern......more