Session 7: Meaning of democracy.

Democracy is the name given to the form of governments and procedures which have legitimacy because they are formed through general consent of the majority of the people living in those states. The criteria for a state to be called a democratic one is firstly that officials exercising power have legitimate authority because they are elected, as opposed to inheriting  authority or holding it by force such as in the case of Monarchism or Totalitarianism.

Secondly, the mechanism for changing the government is through peaceful and regular elections, as opposed to revolts, coups, or civil war as the performance of the elected government is what determines its future prosperity.

However, democracy as we know it in the modern world is based on a peculiar compromise. The word, to which we pay such reverence, means the “rule of the people.” But this claim of self-governance we make is in a remarkably indirect way. Citizens of modern democratic countries cast their votes for a limited set of candidates every election and once this task is accomplished, their elected representatives take over. In this daily functioning of democracy, public role is marginal though.

Therefore, it can be concluded that in a democratic system, every citizen has a vote and is committed to respecting the decision that wins but the decision made does not necessarily has to be the most efficient and effective one. Democracy simply is a mechanism for enabling everyone to be involved in the decision making process, which gives the decision binding legitimacy but there is no guarantee that the decision would be the optimum one.