Chirong Jiang
Justin Rohrer
Comparative Politics
July 6, 2015
Democratic Utopia It has been said by Sir Winston Churchill that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried. In other words, democracy is the best form of government for now. But he also implied, that democracy itself is not flawless, it is only better than all the other political forms. In fact, there are a lot of problems that democracy is not able to fix. For example, the balance and the efficiency of government of the state is the most debatable one. Democracy means that a government is “made of the people, by the people and for the people”. People’s choices and opinions need to be represented, or else the existence of democratic institutions will be meaningless. But one cannot burn the candle at both ends. One could only achieve full representations at the expense of efficiency. Thus, at what extend to make a choice between representation and efficiency becomes an obstacle for every democratic government. I personally believe, that the best political form we can have so far is the democratic institutions of the United States: Presidential regime type, SMDP electoral system, pluralist for interest group representation and federal constitutions To start with, a Presidential regime type contains three branches: a legislative branch, an executive branch and a judicial branch. Each of these three branches holds different accountability and has separate power from one
The presidential system of government in the United States is broken into three branches: legislative, executive, and judicial. The legislative branch includes Congress, which is divided into two houses, the senate and the House of Representatives their Members are elected by American citizens. The legislative branch writes and enacts laws, confirms the presidential cabinet appointments, and has the ability to declare war against another country.
Richard Bellamy says that our dissatisfaction with our current democracy stems from our comparison with the “ideal” democracy we have imagined. Our “ideal” democracy would be direct participatory, meaning everyone is equally involved in making law. Also, there is no prejudice or private interest in this imaginary democracy. As nice as that system of government may sound, with it come a lot of problems. First of all, to vote on all decisions is too time-consuming and would be too much of a commitment expected from the citizens. Next, people can only rule themselves if they can come to a unanimous conclusion on every decision they have to make. If this doesn’t happen, the minority of voters will be ruled by the majority anyways. A more practical
A democracy, according to Abraham Lincoln, is a government of the people, by the people and for the people. The word "democracy" comes from the Greek word "demos" which means “people" and kratia, which means rule (http://educationportal.ontla.on.ca/en/ ). A democracy is a system where the people have a little of control over the government in some specific important processes like voting in elections and decision making. In a democracy, the majority rule and minority rights . Although there are positive sides of the United Kingdom’s democracy, there are negative sides which cause the reliability of democracy in the United Kingdom to be questionable. “Over half of the world’s countries employ some type of democracy” (Clark, 2001-2016). Democracy is a very popular system of government; In a democratic government, everyone is under the “rule of law”, people have the power to devise laws and decide how they want to be ruled. Different political scientists have come to a conclusion that without the four basic principles; Free elections,Political participation, Civil liberties and a Functioning government, a country cannot be called a democracy (http://classroom.synonym.com/). There are two main types of democracy, the direct democracy and the indirect or representative democracy. In this essay, I am going to critically analyse the democracy in the United Kingdom, stating the strengths and the weaknesses of the democratic system in the United
Every form of government is bound to have some shortfalls. Different people have different views about the various political systems. But in today's world, democracy is considered to be the best form of government, reason being that people are treated equally and have full rights to live a life of their liking. Unlike a Oligarchy government is not considered to be a
The United States is a representative democracy which means that the “leaders can make decisions by winning a competitive struggle” It also depends on the person when the question “how democratic should it be?” is asked. A representative democracy such as the one in the United States right now can be useful because it lessens the chance that power can be abused because there is an equal balance between the judiciary, legislative and the executive branch. Also, a representative democracy and its elections provide a chance for all of America’s voices to be heard through polls. For example, this year is an election year, so in a few months, many Americans will be expressing their views through a vote, Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump. However,
To conclude I feel that although democracy has its obvious flaws like all political systems it is most probably the closest that we have yet achieved in creating a perfectly fair system of shared power. Those who live under a democracy have the responsibility to ensure legitimacy through their active involvement in making decisions by voting and talking to
Why a Republic is the Best Type of Government ` There are many different types of government, but the best form of government is a representative democracy, better known as a republic. The reason that a republic is the best form of government comes down the three pros and three cons. The three pros are efficiency, balance, and the people controlling the government, the cons are the representative not doing what they said, gridlock, and the majority can overpower the minority very easily. A republic is very efficient.
For better or worse man has no choice but to live in society, but yet to live in society individuals are involved in multiple situations that lead to conflicts and disputes. Democracy is the only viable political framework and satisfactory for a society to move in harmony. Democracy allows us to find additional solutions that reflect the multitude of interests that exist in society. The authors of the books The Struggle for Democracy mention“ Some political thinkers think that democracy is the form of government that best protects human right because it is the only one based on a recognition of the intrinsic worth and equality or human beings.” (4) Democracy is good for the growth of a nation, through democracy people have been able to manifest in a peaceful way their needs, making agreements and disagreements, from my point of view, between this and other facts have led the United States to be a great nation. Democracy is a way to govern the people of a nation where every citizen agrees to the way the government governs the people. In other words, the people is part of the democracy. But, it has been with the help of the important factors that United States has achieve a fair political democracy. Next, you will find the three main features of Representative democracy of United States (Popular Sovereignty, Political Equality and Political Liberty)
Aristotle says that justice is thought of as equality among all, there is a disregard to merit (p.172). In a society, there is usually more poor people and because there is this demand of equality then the majority rule (p.174). Mob rule is then authoritative. All governments have their forms, which are good and are bad. Democracy to Aristotle is not the best regime because it is ruled by the poor or the ones that need from the government. Government is not chosen by those who pursue virtue, but instead pursue wealth. The democratic principle is that of freedom, wealth, and birth. Not virtue. He believes the best regime would not be exactly a democracy but a polity that would be a combination of freedom, wealth, birth and virtue. The best regime has ideal conditions in which it becomes a predictable regime and consists of values, choices, the inanimate, elements of the class of workers, and the education of rulers. Democracy has a big defect in that it does not have intelligence or wisdom. It is the rule of many. It is based on the idea of happiness by following pleasures (p.48). Democracy comes into play when the majority revolt against the oligarchy because of the ideas of freedom. The problem with it is that people are pursuing their pleasures, not thinking of the state as a whole. There is unity based on pleasure. Before long, everyone is pursuing their own pleasures and there is an undermining of authority
Democracy was the style of government system that the founding fathers pick for the nation. As it been used by other nations before and was a better system of government than tyranny. The ancient Greeks had a system of government that made them “famous for practicing direct democracy, a system in which citizens meet to discuss all policy, and then make decisions by majority rule. “(What is a democracy, para.4). The founding father used democracy as the form of government as would be the only good one, yet would use representative’s democracy to have elected leader by the people rule the government to be successful. At the time, the founding father thought that republic democracy would be the best form of government for the nation to be able
Winston Churchill once said “Democracy is the worst form of government on earth except for all the rest.” He’s saying democracy is awful, but then again it’s better than every other type of government that exist. I honestly couldn’t agree more, I think our government is somewhat corrupt and very confusing, but in reality it’s ups than downs compared to other countries. With our democracy “we the people” are free, we have freedom of speech, the press, and religion. In a democracy, no one person has all the power, everyone has the power. In other countries with different governments they don’t have that. Democracy has the best chance to achieve self-freedom.
Churchill’s claim that “democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried” is deliberately provocative and intended to challenge the reader’s simplistic ideal that democracy is without faults. There are an estimated 114 democracies in the world today (Wong, Oct 3rd lecture). A figure that has increased rapidly in the last century not necessarily because democracy is the best form of government, but primarily for reason that in practice, under stable social, economic and political conditions, it has the least limitations in comparison to other forms of government. Be it the transparency of a democratic government or the prevalence of majority rule, all subdivisions of democracy benefit and hinder its
Throughout history different types of instrumental regimes have been in tact so civilizations remained structured and cohesive. As humanity advanced, governments obligingly followed. Although there have been hiccups from the ancient times to modern day, one type of government, democracy, has proven to be the most effective and adaptive. As quoted by Winston Churchill, democracy is the best form of government that has existed. This is true because the heart of democracy is reliant, dependent, and thrives on the populaces desires; which gives them the ability for maintaining the right to choose, over time it adjusts and fixes itself to engulf the prominent troubling issues, and people have the right of electing the person they
Democracy is a form of government in which all eligible citizens have an equal say in the decisions that affect their lives. Democracy allows eligible citizens to participate equally—either directly or through elected representatives—in the proposal, development, and creation of laws. It encompasses social, economic and cultural conditions that enable the free and equal practice of political self-determination.
What is democracy? Democracy a form of government in which the people freely elect representatives to govern them in a country, democracy guarantees free and fair elections, basic personal and political rights and independent court of law. There are two types of democracy, direct and indirect democracy. Direct democracy or pure democracy is where there is direct participate of the people; people make decisions for them instead of letting them representative make decision for them. Indirect democracy the decisions are made by the representative on behalf of the people that voted for them. All over the world people are having different views with regard to democracy and how it operates. “It has been said that democracy is the worst form of