Everything about Tyranny Of The Majority totally explained
The phrase
tyranny of the majority, used in discussing systems of
democracy and
majority rule, is a criticism of the
scenario in which decisions made by a majority under that system would place that majority's interests so far above a minority's interest as to be comparable in cruelty to "
tyrannical"
despots.
Limits on the decisions that can be made by such majorities, such as
constitutional limits on the powers of parliament and use of a
bill of rights in a
parliamentary democracy, are commonly meant to reduce the problem.
The phrase has variously been sourced to
John Stuart Mill in
On Liberty (1859) and
Alexis de Tocqueville in
Democracy in America (1835, 1840); the
Federalist Papers frequently refer to the concept, though usually under the name of "the violence of majority faction," particularly in
Federalist 10.
The concept itself was popular with
Friedrich Nietzsche and the phrase (in translation) is used at least once in the first sequel to
Human, All Too Human (1879).
Rousseau's doctrine of the
General Will culminates in a kind of tyranny of the majority. By proposing that individuals alienate their rights to the General Will, they're thereby 'forced to be free'.
In 1994, legal scholar
Lani Guinier used the phrase as the title for a collection of
law review articles.
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