- Hedwig Richter. Demokratie. Eine deutsche Affäre. Vom 18. Jahrhundert bis zur Gegenwart. München: C. H. Beck, 2020 [podcast]
- Paul Cartledge. Democracy. A Life. Oxford University Press, 2016.
- Laura Sancho Rocher. El nacimiento de la democracia. El experimento político ateniense (508-322 a. C.) Barcelona: Ático de Libros, 2021.
- Pierre-Henri Tavoillot. Comment gouverner un peuple-roi. Traité nouveau d'art politique. Paris: Odile Jacob, 2019.
- Nancy Isenberg & Andrew Burstein. The Problem of Democracy. The Presidents Adams confront the cult of personality. New York: Viking, 2019 [VIDEO]
- David Stasavage. The Decline and Rise of Democracy. A Global History from Antiquity to Today. Princeton University Press, 2020.
Of all the authors surveyed here, Hedwig Richter comes on top in terms of conveying the importance —for democracies— of political/institutional checks and balances. I am fascinated by the way political terms are created, and I have traced the origin of 'checks' in checks and balances all the way to Plato's τό ψάλιον in Laws (III.692a) (1, 2). For that reason, I find it strange/amusing that no satisfactory German translation exists for checks and balances. Neither Gewaltentrennung nor Gewaltenteilung will do. This is all the more surprising since Germany regularly features among the top-fifteen countries in my Index of Checks and Balances. Dr. Richter uses the English term four times in her book. She also uses Einschränkungen (limitations) to emphasise the need for checks and balances.
- Paul Cartledge. Democracy. A Life. Oxford University Press, 2016.
- Laura Sancho Rocher. El nacimiento de la democracia. El experimento político ateniense (508-322 a. C.) Barcelona: Ático de Libros, 2021.
- Pierre-Henri Tavoillot. Comment gouverner un peuple-roi. Traité nouveau d'art politique. Paris: Odile Jacob, 2019.
- Nancy Isenberg & Andrew Burstein. The Problem of Democracy. The Presidents Adams confront the cult of personality. New York: Viking, 2019 [VIDEO]
- David Stasavage. The Decline and Rise of Democracy. A Global History from Antiquity to Today. Princeton University Press, 2020.
Of all the authors surveyed here, Hedwig Richter comes on top in terms of conveying the importance —for democracies— of political/institutional checks and balances. I am fascinated by the way political terms are created, and I have traced the origin of 'checks' in checks and balances all the way to Plato's τό ψάλιον in Laws (III.692a) (1, 2). For that reason, I find it strange/amusing that no satisfactory German translation exists for checks and balances. Neither Gewaltentrennung nor Gewaltenteilung will do. This is all the more surprising since Germany regularly features among the top-fifteen countries in my Index of Checks and Balances. Dr. Richter uses the English term four times in her book. She also uses Einschränkungen (limitations) to emphasise the need for checks and balances.
Members of these élites wrote up the 1949 constitution, in which —as the author judiciously notes— the sovereignty of the people was forced, for understandable reasons, to take a back seat: « Keine Frage: das Grundgesetz hält das Volk auf Distanz » (p. 264). In fact, the sovereignty of the people shows up in the Constitution for the first time in Article 20, well behind the enumeration of individual rights. Einschränkungen, anyone? And while Dr. Richter mentions the role of the Bundesverfassungsgericht, lauded by Mogens Herman Hansen in an important paper on mixed government and the separation of powers (1, 2), she fails to mention the impact of Germany's independent central bank, the Deutsche Bundesbank.
This is a pity because modern, independent central banks are a force to be reckoned with in terms of political power, a fourth power of sorts (1, 2). And their collaboration in times of crisis illustrates Hedwig Richter's excellent point about the growing and important international cooperation amongst élites [see]. All in all, Demokratie. Eine deutsche Affäre does a great job at showcasing the importance of checks and balances in terms of democracy's capacity to survive and thrive. It is a very Aristotelean notion indeed! Too bad that the author speaks, somewhat negatively, of a kontaminierte Mischform (p. 137). We desperately need more positive views/representations of mixed government and checks and balances.
I'm working on it!
The 'Greek' authors: a love-hate relationship with checks and balances
Our 'Greek' authors, Paul Cartledge and Laura Sancho Rocher, display a telling love-hate relationship with the notions of mixed government and checks and balances. Both are staunch defenders of Athenian democracy, although they take pains to highlight its dark side in terms of slavery, empire (polís týrannos), and women's subordinate position. They both recognise, however, that the mighty polis of the Athenians, towards the end of the 5th centurty, needed a modicum or stability. So they set out to discuss political checks and balances. Dr. Sancho Rocher's book is particulary disappointing on this point. On the very last page of El nacimiento de la democracia, she writes that the governance of Athens "se basaba en [...] los contrapesos entre las diversas instituciones" (p. 316). A few pages before, sounding very much like Paul Rahe on Sparta [see], she mentions "un sofisticado modelo de equilibrios y contrapesos" (p. 310).
Our 'Greek' authors, Paul Cartledge and Laura Sancho Rocher, display a telling love-hate relationship with the notions of mixed government and checks and balances. Both are staunch defenders of Athenian democracy, although they take pains to highlight its dark side in terms of slavery, empire (polís týrannos), and women's subordinate position. They both recognise, however, that the mighty polis of the Athenians, towards the end of the 5th centurty, needed a modicum or stability. So they set out to discuss political checks and balances. Dr. Sancho Rocher's book is particulary disappointing on this point. On the very last page of El nacimiento de la democracia, she writes that the governance of Athens "se basaba en [...] los contrapesos entre las diversas instituciones" (p. 316). A few pages before, sounding very much like Paul Rahe on Sparta [see], she mentions "un sofisticado modelo de equilibrios y contrapesos" (p. 310).
But what are the elements of this purportedly sophisticated system of checks and balances? This is where she fails to deliver. On the one hand, as she admits, there was no such thing as a separation of powers in 5th and 4th century Athens. On the other hand, in her discussion of Thucydides' famous passage on the mixed constitution of the Five Thousand in 411/10 (8.97.1-3), Prof. Sancho Rocher concludes that the notion of "mezcla" did not really apply to Athens. So there we have it: there was no mixed government, and no separation of powers. The two key components of a system of institutional checks and balances were conspicuously absent from the picture. Yet she insists that Athens had a "sofisticado modelo de equilibrios y contrapesos". How's that even possible? Now let us consider Paul Cartledge's solution.
Once again, we are taken to Thucydides 8.97.2, the very first mention in the extant literature of a mixed politeia, a "moderate blending" of oligarchy and democracy. Reluctantly, Mr. Cartledge admits defeat: "I have to confess defeat" (p. 311). Because "eternal vigilance" is needed to protect our "too-fragile democratic liberties", the much maligned notion of πολιτεία μικτή does seem to make practical sense after all. But exactly what kind of mixed regime does he favour? He settles for the Aristotelian version, which he deems "at least democratically-inflected", as opposed to Thucydides', which he sees as more inclined towards oligarchy. So this is it. Even staunch admirers of Athenian democracy like Laura Sancho Rocher and Paul Cartledge end up admitting —reluctantly and rather imprecisely— the need for some sort of political balance.
An excess of checks and balances?
A good illustration of our authors'difficulties with the notions of the mixed constitution and political checks and balances is provided by Paul Cartledge's discussion of Polybios and by David Stasavage's views on the American political system. Both authors complain about an excess of checks and balances. In republican Rome, "there were simply too many checks and balances on the initiative and power of ordinary citizens [...] the (Polybian-style) checks and balances were both too many and operated too much against the interests of the poor majority of citizens" (Cartledge, pp. 255 and 261). In the United States, "the ability of presidents to rule by executive order [...] is magnified by legislative checks and balances" (Stasavage, pp. 304-305).
This is a mistake. The term 'balance' in checks and balances is not meant to convey a sense of paralysis, but a mechanism to enforce good, even energetic, governement. As Montesquieu puts it in EL XI.6, different elements —broadly known as the monarchic, aristocratic and democratic principles— are forced to act in unison par le mouvement nécessaire des choses. Political balance or equilibrium is not about inaction. It's not about injustice either—it's about cooperating, albeit reluctantly, to carry on with the necessary task of making government work. The situations described by Cartledge and Stasavage do not correspond to a well-functioning system of checks and balances at all (provided that such a thing can exist). Rather, they illustrate situations of un-balanced government, to the detriment of the masses in the case of Rome, and to the benefit of acting presidents in the case of the United States.
One last point about David Stasavage. He is, in my view, too cautious about the role played by the institutions of balanced government in modern democracies. (As discussed in the first part of this review, he reduces 'early democracy' to mixed government). In a chapter on "Why England was different", he argues that the wave of innovations at the dawn of the Industrial Revolution was prompted by entrepreneurs' need to counter the high cost of labour prevalent in Britain. The "parliamentary system" had little or no influence in promoting this massive change. Fair enough. But what was the underlying cause of the high cost of labour? Was it not, precisely, the presence of balanced government and its impact in reducing the cost of capital, thereby forcing the cost of labour upwards? This is, at any rate, what is implied by Adam Smith in the neglected, but brilliant, Book V of Wealth of Nations [see].
Conclusion: a lot of work remains to be done
The title of this review says it all: while (hopefully) most of us agree about the need to defend democracies, we are rather shy or confused when we discuss what needs to be done in order for democracy to survive and thrive. The answer lies in the intertwined notions of mixed government and checks and balances. And while I dream of writing a 'history of checks and balances' in Spanish, I wonder whether I should emphasise the 'pain points' of unbalanced government —all too visible these days, for example, in Venezuela, Nicaragua and Argentina— or the positive aspects of balanced government.
Among the latter, we would do well to mention the notions of homeostasis in inmunology [see], negative feedback and biodiversity in geoscience [see], mental equilibrium in psychology, the danger of corporate monopolies in economics, the balance of power in international relations, and many other such instances. But above all, we should not "confess defeat" as Dr. Cartledge puts it. We must put all shyness aside and keep on reading and writing about what John Adams famously called "the most stupendous fabric of human invention [...] Not the formation of languages, not the whole art of navigation and ship-building does more honor to the human understanding than this system of government".
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