Review 2: On Voting by Gordon Tullock (1998)
Reviewed by:
David Gordon,
The Mises Review, Spring (1999)
"... Professor Tullock is no more inclined to accept the pieties of democracy than he is those of egalitarianism. Most people profess belief in majority-rule democracy as the best method of making governmental decisions; but (Tullock's familiar question) do we really believe this? Do we favor abolition of jury verdicts by unanimous vote, the presidential veto, a Senate in which the states are represented equally without regard to population and similar non-majoritarian institutions? If we are not prepared to jettison these institutions, then we are not the majority rule democrats we claim to be.
Tullock's style of argument is unsettling. I shall in conclusion suggest a very speculative replay to the argument he advances. He says: "If you support A, then you should support B. But you do not. Therefore it is questionable whether you support A." Can an escape be found by saying this?: "I acknowledge that if I support A, I ought to support B. If in fact I do not, this is an interesting psychological peculiarity about me; but it does not suffice to show that I don't in fact support A. Neither does it show that it is irrational for me to continue to support A. Perhaps it is irrational of me instead not to endorse B"
Revenons sur la terre. Tullock is a thinker from whom all classical liberals can learn a great deal. With Nietzchean force, he summons us away from hypocrisy."
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