What Democracy is . . . and is not

1
What Democracy is . . . and is not

• Ideas of Phillippe C. Schmitter and Terry Lynn
  Karl

2
A general definition

• Modern political democracy is a system of
  governance in which rulers are held accountable
  for their actions in the public realm by citizens
  acting indirectly through the competition and
  cooperation of their elected representatives

3
A system of governance

• A regime or system of governance is an ensemble
  of patterns that (1) determine how people gain
  access to public office, (2) the characteristics
  of people who are allowed to gain this access,
  and the strategies they may employ, and (3) the
  rules that are followed in making publicly
  binding decisions.

4
To work, the ensemble must . . .

• Be institutionalized, or habitually known,
  practiced, and accepted by most or all of the
  actors.
• A constitution is not necessary, but it often
  helps codify the institutional arrangements once
  the ensemble of patterned behavior is accepted as
  an institutionalized fact.

5
The public realm . . .

• This is the making of collective norms and
  choices that are binding on the society and
  backed by state coercion.
• In the liberal view, this public realm should be
  minimalized. In a more socialist perspective,
  the public realm is larger and extends via
  governmental intervention.

6
Citizens

• All regimes have rulers and a public realm, but
  only to the extent that they are democratic do
  they have citizens.
• Modern formal criteria for participating
  citizenship are fairly standard . . . all native
  born adults.
• Informal criteria vary.

7
Competition

• Originally, democracy was built on the idea of
  dialogue leading to consensus.
• This is obsolete. Now competition among factions
  is considered an essential ingredient of a
  successful democratic process.
• This modifies Madisons ideas in Federalist Paper
  10.

8
Elections

• The existence of elections does not guarantee
  democracy
• Merely holding elections does not guarantee
  political action into peaceful contests among
  elites and give public legitimacy to winners.
• But democracies MUST have elections.

9
Democratic participation

• Elections must happen intermittently, and voters
  choose between highly aggregated alternatives
  offered by political parties.
• Between elections, citizens may influence public
  policy through various intermediaries, such as
  interest associations, social movements, locality
  groupings, etc.

10
Competitive variety

• Modern democracy offers a variety of competitive
  processes and channels for the expression of
  interests and values associational as well as
  partisan, functional as well as territorial,
  collective as well as individual.

11
Majority Rule

• Democracy does not require majority rule.
• But all democracies must have some means of
  aggregating the equal preferences of individuals.
• The problem with majority rule arises when
  factional sizes conflict with intensities of
  feelings.

12
Numbers meet intensities

• When a factional minority feels very strongly and
  negatively about a decision that is adopted by a
  majority, successful democracies tend to modify
  majority rule to include the protection of
  minority rights.
• The protection of minorities can assume a variety
  of forms.

13
Protecting Minorities

• Bill of rights
• Requirement of concurrent majorities
• Local autonomy
• Grand coalitions
• Negotiating social pacts

14
Cooperation

• This is an essential feature of all democracies.
• Actors must voluntarily make collective decisions
  binding on the polity as a whole.
• Actors must cooperation in order to compete.

15
Representatives

• Modern democracies require representation due to
  large population sizes.
• Representatives tend to be professional
  politicians.
• Democracies need professional politicians.
• The question is how these politicians are chosen
  and held accountable for their actions.

16
Robert Dahls procedural minimal conditions for a
polyarchy

• Control over governmental decisions about policy
  is constitutionally vested in elected officials.
• Elected officials are chosen in frequent and
  fairly conducted elections in which coercion is
  comparatively uncommon.

17
Dahl, 2

• Practically all adults have the right to vote in
  the election of officials.
• Practically all adults have the right to run for
  elective offices in the government.
• Citizens have a right to express themselves
  without the danger of severe punishment on
  political matters broadly defined.

18
Dahl 3

• Citizens have a right to seek out alternative
  sources of information. Moreover, alternative
  sources of information exist and are protected by
  law.
• Citizens also have the right to form relatively
  independent associations or organizations,
  including independent political parties and
  interest groups.

19
Schmitter and Karl additions to Dahls list

• Popularly elected officials must be able to
  exercise their constitutional powers without
  being subjected to overriding informal opposition
  from unelected officials.
• The polity must be self-governing. It must be
  able to act independently of constraints imposed
  by another overarching political system.

20
How democracies differ

• Consensus
• Participation
• Access
• Responsiveness
• Majority rule
• Parliamentary sovereignty
• Party government
• Pluralism

21
Democratic structural differences

• Federalism
• Presidentialism
• Checks and balances

22
Democracies are not . . .

• Economically more efficient than nondemocracies
• Administratively more efficient than
  nondemocracies
• More orderly, consensual, stable, or governable
  than nondemocracies
• Economically open as a necessity