Representative Democracy Essay

Democracy signifies participation of the people in the execution of their regime (Beramendi 2008). A democratic government is run by the people and its aim is public interest. Similarly, Backer and Raveloson (2008) explain democracy as a government which comes into power through general public, is practiced by the public and is there to work for the best interest of the public. Democracy can also be understood in opposition of other government systems; dictatorships, monarchies and aristocracies. In government systems, other than democracy, mostly, people have no or minute control over who will rule their state; contrarily, in democracy, people themself decide who will govern them or how their country will be run (Zimmermann 2012). It is widely

Representative democracy has a “channel” to ensure the direct participation of the people (i.e. citizens) in the political system, through elections for “Parliament and local self-government bodies” (Belov, n.d.). Moreover, if voters (i.e. public) is not happy with the electors or elected members of the parliament, it can replace those representatives with new elected representatives (Do We Really Live in a Democracy, and Do We Really Have the Right to Vote?, 2010). Thus, the ultimate control, even in the case of representative democracy, is placed in the hands of the citizens; it is they who decide and elect the members of the parliament and the elected members make the political decisions on their behalf. It implies that the people are taking political decisions but through a formal

However, managing a state at macro level is not always as easy as it might seem from the micro level. The larger size and population of contemporary states make it next to impossible to implement the pure form of democracy. On the other hand, Representative democracy is arguably the most practical form of democracy. It conforms to the fundamental objective of democracy; it allows the citizens to control the governance of their state. The citizens possess the right to elect or vote out the representatives. What is more, direct democracy poses the threat of “tyranny of majority” (Way, n.d.). The political decisions, in a direct democracy, will be made on the majority basis which might lead to the infringement of the rights of minorities. Conversely, it is the responsibility of a state to protect the basic rights of every citizen. Representative party-based democracy, through the use of constitution, allows a government to guard the minority rights, who are equal citizens of the