Thinkers have marveled for centuries at how the simple tastes and animalistic habits of the lower orders rise to dominate democratic society.
From our torn jeans and primitive ass shaking twerk dances, to our child rapist idols; our mobs burning down their own cities, to our politicians who promise everyone, everyone else's money -- how long can all this continue??
--probably for a while longer.
The same sort of degeneracy was noted as the identifying features of democracies as far back as ancient Greece.
Isocrates, writing circa 350 BC, in his book Areopageticus, notes of Athenian democracy:
"...Athens ruined itself by carrying to excess the principles of liberty and equality by training the citizens in such fashion as they looked upon insolence as democracy, lawlessness as liberty, impudence of speech as equality,
and license to do as they pleased as happiness."
The ancient Greeks already answered this question: the difference between democracy and ochlocracy...
The answer to the posted question could be theoretical or practical. The term democracy is a subjective term, and as such, we could discuss it theoretically indefinitely without any consensus. On a practical, factual level, we know that the democracy phenomenon is very recent and very short compared to 44 thousand years of humankind's history (since the moment when Homo Sapiens became "behaviorally modern"). The democracy of ancient Athens lasted for about 180 years. Modern democracy is also about 200 years old. In other words, the total duration of democracies on Earth is about 400 / 44000 * 100 % = 0.9%, which is less than 1% of the duration of humankind's history!!!
There is nothing certain about the outcome of this experiment - will democracy prevail, or will it be buried. And, of course, we don't know which deficiencies or advantages of democracy will play a central role in that outcome.
Athenian democracy was conquered by Sparta.
The simple truth is that all society structures collapse and die. The growth phase of society has a structure that seems to mirror natures (cruel) rules (weak die). And many type structures have been tried.
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