Sunlight versus Quantum Theory

 There is the argument that "sunlight is the best disinfectant". It means that in politics, if you can expose the truth to the public, it will prevent more abuses. 

That argument is not true, because the attention span of the public is limited. The ability of the average citizen to police its own politicians is finite. 

Conversely there is the other argument of the "quantum theory". It says that if you observe a system, the act of observation changes how the system works. A system that is too democratic will unfortunately turn into something where all the acts are performative. Governance becomes way too theatrical. Scoring of points and settling of scores will dominate the political discourse. Democracy will then devolve into its evil twin, populism. 

Democracy is not a panacea for everything. Democracy and dictatorship are both attempts at cracking the problem that humans are evil, but they are not inherently solutions. Building high functioning systems is not a science but an art, and when that art is lost, things will start to slide.