To many, the word “democracy” immediately evokes the sensation of freedom and equality. It is the antithesis of monarchy, dictatorship, tyranny, and all other oppressive forms of government in the long span of human history. One imagines George Washington riding on a high horse, defeating the British imperial army; or the famous painting Liberty Leading the People, in which lady liberty and people of all social classes united to overthrow the French royalty and establish a democratic republic. Long has democracy been hailed as the ultimate answer to fairness and equality, but in truth people fail to see its many flaws. Although democracy’s guarantee of individual rights and separation of political power make it preferable to other governmental systems, one cannot simply crown it as the best form of government. Democracy’s inability to make rational decisions and handle crises causes it to be “overrated,” not deserving of all the credits it has been given.

Democracy often does not yield the logical decision. Ages ago, famous Greek philosopher Plato had already criticized the direct democracy, in which every voting citizen has the same political power, that many of his fellow Athenians were blindly fond of. In his The Republic, Plato explained that irrational governmental decisions are caused by the varying educational levels of the citizens. Why would a farmer have the same power to influence a foreign policy decision as a diplomat? Plato inquired. In his mind, only the most educated and experienced individuals in society, the philosopher kings in his terms, are fit to govern, and the other citizens should yield their governing power to these people, knowing that their superior knowledge would produce better outcomes. Of course, Plato’s discrimination against people of low education level is not applicable in modern society, and direct democracy has since been replaced by representative democracy in most places, but his argument regarding expertise remains relevant. Should a country let all of its citizens decide on every matter, knowing that most of them have no clue about the nature of the matter to begin with? For example, in the past two years when Covid-19 ran rampant in America, a significant number of citizens opposed the federal government’s mask mandate, and heavily criticized the leading scientist team whose research led to this decision. If pure democracy is to be applied, these people’s opinions should be of the same importance as the scientist team, and hence they should not be compelled to wear masks, but that would surely have contributed to further spread of the virus and the endangerment of many citizens’ health. In reality, the federal government hardly gave any consideration to these people’s outrage and enforced the mask mandate anyhow, and as a result the spread of Covid-19 was contained. If democracy is to be held as an axiom and always respected, citizens’ lack of expertise on certain matters and the consequent irrational decisions they make would thwart the enactment of a governmental policy that is beneficial to the greater good. 

Democracy often cannot effectively handle crises. This is the result of the design of separation of power which, while should be praised for its checks and balances purpose, also has its downsides. As an example, in the United States, for a bill to be put into effect, it must undergo scrutiny in both the House of Representatives and the Senate, and then be agreed and signed by the president; should the president veto the bill, which is often the case, the House and Senate must conduct another round of voting in attempt to enforce the bill. In addition to this already complicated process, the House and Senate are divided by partisan rivalry, where Democrats and Republicans are often trying to thwart each other’s plans from fruition. All these measures turn democracy into a rather tedious, time consuming, and inefficient process, thus entailing its failure in times of crisis, when the speedy execution of governmental decisions is pivotal. In reality, under those circumstances democracy is often suspended altogether. When Athens fought Sparta in the Peloponnesian War, the citizens elected Pericles as their leader, and effectively granted him dictatorial power, which resulted in numerous military victories. Only when Pericles died in a plague did Athens begin to lose in the war. When the US was torn by the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln greatly overstepped his executive authority as president. Among other actions, he suspended the amendment right of habeas corpus and signed bills into effect without Congressional approval, which are all direct violations of the Constitution. However, like Pericles, Lincoln also brought triumph to the Union. Should Pericles or Lincoln be confined by the entire democratic process and need to receive approval of the general public before any swift military decisions, most war measures could not have been carried out on time, and their victories would not have been ensured. Historically, the two icons of democracy, both direct and representative alike, reduced to quasi-dictatorships in times of crises, proving the inability of democracy to handle such situations. 

Democracy is rightfully chosen over other governmental systems by many countries because of its relatively high level of equality. However, simply crowning it as the ultimate solution to the question of best political structure would be blind and illogical. Along with its prestige, democracy also has many weaknesses, two prominent ones of which are its inability to produce rational decisions and to handle crises. Hence, democracy is truly “overrated,” deserving of some but certainly not all praises it has been given in history.