18. On Elections:The System That Best Embodies the Spirit of Democracy

The electoral system allows the spirit of democracy to shine brightly. Citizens fully experience their role as masters of the nation through participation in elections, while candidates fully recognize that their power derives entirely from the people's endorsement. For this reason, all democratic nations today regard the electoral system as an indispensable institution for realizing democracy. No votes, no democracy—this is the shared understanding. While elections are indispensable for democracy, this does not imply that the current electoral system is flawless. Formally, it best embodies the spirit of democracy, yet in practice, it falls short of fully meeting democratic requirements.

First, although the law stipulates that everyone has the right to become a candidate, in reality, those who can actually run are always controlled by political parties. Outside of parties, ordinary individuals have absolutely no chance of becoming candidates. Since party affiliation determines candidacy, citizens can only choose between candidates endorsed by parties. These endorsed candidates inevitably represent the interests of their respective parties. During elections, citizens must choose between Party A's candidate and Party B's candidate—ultimately selecting someone who represents the interests of a particular party. Whether this individual genuinely represents the broader interests of citizens remains uncertain. Does this align with democratic principles? Clearly not. True democracy requires every citizen to have equal opportunity to become a candidate. Some may argue that parties can logically represent citizens' interests, and thus party-endorsed candidates should likewise represent those interests. Whether parties can represent citizens' interests will be explored in our essay "On Political Parties." Our conclusion is that parties cannot represent citizens' interests, and political parties in democratic nations should not participate in governance.

Second, citizens lack the means to assess whether nominated candidates possess administrative competence, particularly when faced with candidates devoid of any administrative experience. Under such circumstances, voting essentially becomes a competitive contest among candidates, failing to achieve the purpose of selecting capable individuals. Whether the eventual winner proves competent is scarcely distinguishable from the outcome of a lottery.

Moreover, the electoral contest itself constitutes a waste of societal resources. Election expenditures grow ever larger, yet the outcome differs scarcely from a lottery draw. What justification exists for such financial investment?

Through this analysis, it becomes clear that while the electoral format itself is sound, the source of candidates is profoundly flawed. Addressing the shortcomings of the current electoral system requires reforming the candidate selection process.

Let us illustrate this using the presidential election as an example.

I. Who Qualifies as a Presidential Candidate?

Only outstanding governors qualify as presidential candidates. An outstanding governor is a proven leader with demonstrated governance capabilities. If they can effectively manage a province, they are highly likely to govern a nation well. Thus, selecting governors as presidential candidates provides significant assurance of candidate competence. Our article "On Selecting Officials" details how to become an outstanding governor. Every citizen possesses equal opportunity to become an outstanding provincial governor. Thus, restricting presidential candidates to this pool ensures equal rights for all citizens to aspire to the presidency, guarantees candidates' governance competence, and eliminates the pitfalls of party-selected candidates. This approach perfectly addresses the shortcomings of the current electoral system.

II. How to Avoid Resource Waste in Elections

Since all candidates are outstanding governors with comparable governance track records, the core competition lies in their governance philosophies and policy measures for the presidency. Thus, the purpose of campaigning is to widely disseminate candidates' governance visions and plans to citizens. With modern information dissemination methods, achieving this campaign objective is remarkably straightforward. Consequently, massive campaign expenditures become entirely unnecessary. To prevent political donations from influencing a president's subsequent governance, all campaign funds should be sourced from the national treasury, with identical allocations provided to every candidate. Candidates must be prohibited from accepting any political contributions.

An electoral system only fulfills democratic requirements when it guarantees equal opportunities for all individuals to become candidates and ensures that the final candidates possess genuine competence.