A propósito da prioridade dada pelo Governo ao casamento entre pessoas do mesmo sexo, têm-se ouvido alguns disparates que importa denunciar. [continuado…]
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Artigos do tema referendo
E perguntais vós: mas que raio de democracia é esta em que se repetem referendos até o povo dar a resposta certa? Simples: não é uma democracia.
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It appears you’ll be voting again on the Lisbon Treaty (yes, this one’s for you, my Irish friends) on October 2. Now, I hear that some of you are bothered by the fact you’re being asked the same question barely one year after you rejected the Treaty. Understandably so. One ought to respect the democratic will of the people. There is no right or wrong answer to a referendum, right? There is the people’s answer, and the Irish people made it quite clear they didn´t want the Lisbon Treaty.
Or did you? I mean, did the Irish people realize what it meant to reject a hard-fought, long-negotiated agreement among 27 countries when they cast their ballots? Did you realize what it meant not only for the other 26 countries or for Europe as a whole, but for yourselves as a nation? Did you actually know what you were doing?
Probably not. No wonder: no one told you. This referendum thing can be really misleading: people tend to believe they’re entitled to choose according to their own preferences. Which is a laughable idea, really, when it comes t a compromise among 27 States. No one gets full satisfaction out of a 27-party negotiation: you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to realize that.
Now, faced with such an agreement, responsible statesmen (and women) have to wheigh pros and cons, not just on the content of the agreement, but on the actual being part of it. And then they make a choice, regardless of their personal views on this or that part of the package. When called to vote upon such matters, citizens should act like responsible statesmen. Yet when political leaders prefer to flatter the electorate rather than lead it – which is most of the time in any given democracy – people lose sight of the responsibility that goes along with their power.
That’s where Spiderman comes in. Just before dying, Uncle Ben told Peter Parker: With great power comes great responsibility. The Irish people desperately need to find their Uncle Ben on this. You need to hear that while there is no right or wrong answer in the realm of abstraction, there are very different price-tags attached to your options on the Lisbon Treaty. You have to realize that your vote will have a consequence, but that consequence may not be what you expected. You have to factor in the cost of blocking a decision upon which 26 other States are depending. And then you choose. Yes or No. Freely, and responsibly. As it ought to be in a democracy.
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O melhor amigo dos pequenos países nas instituições europeias sempre foi a Comissão. Agora, a reforma que permitia estancar a sua perda de influência vai ser sacrificada. Porquê? Porque um pequeno país deu pretexto para que assim fosse.
Os homens fazem a história, mas não sabem a história que fazem.
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É esse o conselho de Bronislaw Geremek para resolver o impasse europeu. Não sei se concordo, mas merece pelo menos ponderação esta sua proposta:
Ce qui ne peut pas être réalisé à la base des traités existants peut être soumis à une consultation populaire à l’échelle de l’Union européenne, organisée le même jour dans tous ses pays membres. Une ou deux questions précises concernant le système de vote européen, une campagne d’information sur le sujet, un débat dans l’Europe entière sur le problème, et les Européens seraient appelés aux urnes (cela pourrait se faire en même temps que les prochaines élections au Parlement européen) : le Conseil et le Parlement sauraient quoi faire après une telle consultation.
Mas o melhor é ler o artigo por inteiro.
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A democracia é tanto mais virtuosa quanto mais o conjunto de votantes coincide – por via directa ou representativa – com o conjunto de pessoas sujeitas às consequências da votação. Quando essa coincidência não se verifica – quer por serem muitos a decidir sobre o que respeita a poucos, ou por serem poucos a decidir sobre o que respeita a muitos – a democracia começa a perder virtudes.
Quando muitos decidem por poucos, violam-se esferas de autonomia que importa preservar. Quando poucos decidem por muitos, o inevitável free-riding anula a racionalidade da decisão.
Vem isto ainda a propósito do referendo irlandês: desde há duas semanas que se assiste à tentativa de transformar uma decisão de poucos numa decisão para todos. Em nome da democracia. Estranha democracia essa.
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