The ultimate purpose of government is to provide good government. This
means: to watch over a society so that it allows those who live in it
to get through their lives as happily and appropriately as possible.
Thus the government is in charge of providing safety, and apart from that,
should allow the citizens it rules the greatest possible personal
freedom.
The purpose of government is not to have been democratically elected.
Yes, good government should represent the interests of those that are
governed. But some forms of democratically elected governments do often
not achieve this. Take, for example, directly elected populist
presidents.
A democratic system in which presidents are elected directly often does
not produce rational results (results that would objectively represent
the interests of the electorate). Such systems typically favor populist
candidates. To get elected, populist candidates appeal on instincts and
emotions. The easiest emotions to address are those of envy and hate.
Populist candidates typically present clear pictures of enemies. They
often are elected on the basis of what they oppose, not of what they
support.
There are many variations, in which this tune can be played. It can be
anti a certain ethnicity, anti foreign, anti a successful minority,
anti other religions, anti immorality, anti liberty for others.
Such agendas typically are not in the best interest of those governed,
because their appeal to the broad base of the electorate only lies in
the assumption that only others will suffer from the hate policies, and
that the individual supporter of a hate populist will not be affected.
That can be a dangerous error, because governments that are popular
because of their opposition to certain "enemies" of society develop their
own momentum. When they got rid of one enemy, they will need another
one, and than another one, and another one. Such policies impossibly
serve a society as a whole, and sooner or later, even the initial
supporters of a populist will suffer.
Now, this, objectively, cannot be in the interest of the initial
supporter (even if we don't address the point that the populist government
from the beginning only represented its initial supporter's emotions of
hate and envy).
Populist governments are a nuisance, and anybody who can afford it is
advised to get out of harm's way early enough.
To avoid "populist" governments, it is best not to have direct
elections. Definitely, a country's president should not be elected directly.
Party-based elections are already a bit better, though they are no
guaranty against the populist pest.
The most level-headed governments are obtained through indirect
elections. The electorate chooses representatives that sit in a local body.
These representatives elect one of their members to sit in a regional
body. The members of the regional body elect one or several of their peers
to represent them in a national body. And the national body elects a
chief executive.
Such indirect democracy is hard to manipulate by populists, and it will
result in a government that represents a wide range of interests, not
just the emotions of hate and envy of the lowest (and therefore widest)
strata of a social pyramid.
