Passage Summary: If you think people only care about themselves, you must think democracy is a lost cause, because democracy needs people to agree to be governed, which self-interested people supposedly won't do.

Conclusion: Social theorists who believe people are purely self-interested must also believe that pursuing democracy is pointless.

Reasoning: Self-interest makes government by consent impossible, and democracy is impossible without government by consent.

Analysis: This is a classic 'belief' flaw where the author assumes that because a premise leads to a conclusion, anyone who believes the premise must also believe the conclusion. Just because the *view* of self-interest implies democracy is impossible doesn't mean the *theorists* have actually connected those dots or accepted that implication. They might be perfectly happy holding two contradictory beliefs, or they might define 'self-interest' in a way that allows for consent. Look for an answer that points out the author is unfairly attributing a belief to someone based on a logical deduction they might not have made.