Hello Anette, thanks for the very thoughtful response! My analysis (for what it’s worth) is that there’s no chance of modifying or reforming our present system of governance because most people can’t imagine an alternative. In addition, people would resist having something (their right to vote) taken from them prior to being replaced by something else, and there’s far too many players who’d lose dramatically were we to alter our present system. Therefore change can only occur once the present system has led us into complete catastrophe and everything is in ruins. In other words, a calamity far greater than that which enveloped the world in the 1930s and 40s. Post-catastrophe, assuming there are people who don’t want to repeat the error once again, there may be an opportunity to introduce a more adequate approach to governance based on demonstration of competence. Now that we know a great deal more about how evolution has shaped our cognition and behaviors, it ought to be possible to engineer structures that to some degree mitigate our hardwiring, just as we engineer airplanes to overcome the fact our pectoral muscles are too small and our bones too dense to permit self-powered flight like birds. Part of any new system would have to be inbuild constant evolution otherwise, as you rightly note, some would quickly adapt and game whatever new approach is implemented and we’d be right back where we are now.

I’ve covered some basic ideas in an early article here on Medium but my book Why Democracy Failed goes into much greater detail. It’s available on Amazon as a kindle version or paperback, but if you’re interested I can send you a PDF for free. I’m far more interested in creating a discussion around new ideas than on making any money from the book!