Within each historical era, there is a dominant form of rule, from tribal affiliations to individual kingdoms to vast empires to, now, democracies. In the twentieth and twenty first centuries there has been a pattern of democratic forms of government emerging all around the world. Asking whether all of these are in fact true democracies is inconsequential; rather one should instead focus on why this trend is occurring and question the validity of the spread of democracy as the prevalent form of rule in the present era. There is no way for democracy to claim universal validity as the legitimate form of government throughout the world. The very notion that democracy could be universal, universally valid, or universally legitimate is impossible
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Aristotle stated “it is accepted as democratic when public offices are allocated by lot and oligarchic when filled by election” (Aristotle), believing, contrary to the structure of most modern democratic systems, that elections are inherently undemocratic. Jean-Jacques Rousseau in his work The Social Contract claimed that the only form of legitimate political organization was through democracy, but he had a very specific conception of what this system as supposed to be (Lecture 06/28). He believed that in a true democratic system, “the people, being subject to the laws, ought to be their author”(Rousseau, Jean-Jacques), and had to prioritize the public good over their own private interests (Lecture 06/28). James Madison’s understanding of democracy strongly differed from that of Rousseau. Instead, he believed that concentration of power in the hands of the masses was a dangerous, even toxic, to democracy. In …show more content…
The word democracy comes from the two Greek words “demos”, meaning people, and “kratos”, meaning power or rule (Lecture 06/30). In other words, democracy literally translates to “rule by the people”. Accepting the premise that not all peoples in the world are the same, which is a fairly non-controversial assumption, then the idea that it would be possible to create one form of government that would work universally is contrary to reason. Government is not a one-size-fits-all kind of venture, if it was, it surely would not have been so contested and revolutionized century after century. It would be impossible to have one form of rule that could suit every nation in the world, let alone calling that one form democracy. Democracy, at its core, involves rule by the people and if, as already stated, there is a wide spectrum of peoples populating the earth then it follows that there should be a wide spectrum of forms of democracies to rule said peoples. If there are a wide variety of democracies then no, there is no singular form of democracy that can be universally accepted as a legitimate form of rule because there is no one kind of democracy that works for all peoples. The universal application of one political system upon all polities
Aristotle stated “it is accepted as democratic when public offices are allocated by lot and oligarchic when filled by election” (Aristotle), believing, contrary to the structure of most modern democratic systems, that elections are inherently undemocratic. Jean-Jacques Rousseau in his work The Social Contract claimed that the only form of legitimate political organization was through democracy, but he had a very specific conception of what this system as supposed to be (Lecture 06/28). He believed that in a true democratic system, “the people, being subject to the laws, ought to be their author”(Rousseau, Jean-Jacques), and had to prioritize the public good over their own private interests (Lecture 06/28). James Madison’s understanding of democracy strongly differed from that of Rousseau. Instead, he believed that concentration of power in the hands of the masses was a dangerous, even toxic, to democracy. In …show more content…
The word democracy comes from the two Greek words “demos”, meaning people, and “kratos”, meaning power or rule (Lecture 06/30). In other words, democracy literally translates to “rule by the people”. Accepting the premise that not all peoples in the world are the same, which is a fairly non-controversial assumption, then the idea that it would be possible to create one form of government that would work universally is contrary to reason. Government is not a one-size-fits-all kind of venture, if it was, it surely would not have been so contested and revolutionized century after century. It would be impossible to have one form of rule that could suit every nation in the world, let alone calling that one form democracy. Democracy, at its core, involves rule by the people and if, as already stated, there is a wide spectrum of peoples populating the earth then it follows that there should be a wide spectrum of forms of democracies to rule said peoples. If there are a wide variety of democracies then no, there is no singular form of democracy that can be universally accepted as a legitimate form of rule because there is no one kind of democracy that works for all peoples. The universal application of one political system upon all polities