Kinds Of Democracy

Firstly I want to say, that analyzing the trends for the period 1990 – 1991 there were 65 fully free states of the world’s 165 sovereign states. Nowadays the number rise to 115 states. What is the idea of democracy? Without doubts this idea is durable but its practice is precarious. The desire for freedom maybe innate but the practice must be learned. It is like a challenge.Secondly I want to pay more attention that democratic values are resurging today. When we look from the French Revolution to the rise of one-party regimes, most democracies have been few and short-lived.Thirdly I want to speak about kinds of democracy. So, I divide democracy into two basic categories: direct and indirect. In the direct democracy all citizens can participate in making public decisions, without the intermediary of elected or appointed officials. This system is practical with small numbers of people – in a community organization, etc. Where members can meet in a single room to discuss issues and arrive at the decisions by consensus or majority vote. Ancient Athens was the world’s first democracy, which practiced direct democracy. There was an assembly with about 5000 persons. And now I want to represent alternative model of direct democracy: it is electronic direct democracy (EDD). Also it is called Internet democracy. It is a form of direct democracy in which modern communication media are used to ameliorate to bureaucracy involved with referenda on many issues. EDD requires the ability to register votes on issues electronically. As in the direct democracy, in the EDD citizens would have the right to vote on legislation before Parliament, author new legislation and recall representatives at any stage. Today the most common form of the democracy is indirect democracy. This term is a broad term describing a means of governance by the people through elected representatives. Indirect democracy we could divide into representative and delegative democracies. Now I will try to describe each of them. Representative democracy is democracy, in which citizens elect officials to make political decisions, formulate law and administer programs for the public good. Officials are working in the name of the people and remain accountable to the people for their actions. Another form of indirect democracy is delegate democracy. In delegative democracy delegates are selected and expected to act on the wishes of the constituency. In this form of democracy the constituency may recall the delegate at any time. And what about representatives – the officials in representative democracy? They are expected only to transmit the decisions of electors, advance their views and if they fail to do so they are subject to immediate recall with only minimal process. Now I will stop at the stage of representative democracy because I want to speak more about it. I found out that representative democracy is divided into liberal and constitutional democracies. Liberal democracy is a form of representative democracy where elected representatives that hold the decision power are moderated by a constitution that emphasizes protecting individual liberties and the rights of minorities in society, such as freedom of speech or religion, etc. Such constitutional rights (also named liberal rights) are guaranteed through various controlled institutions and various statutory laws. Do you think about the relation to indirect democracy? The relation is that all liberal democracies are representative democracies. Another form of indirect democracy is constitutional democracy. This democracy is when the representative democracy operates in accordance with a constitution that limits the powers of government and guarantees fundamental rights to all citizens. In such a society the majority rules and the minority rights are protected by laws. There is also electronic democracy. Electronic democracy is the utilization of electronic communications technologies, such as the Internet, in enhancing democratic republic or representative democracy.

At the end of this project I would like to say the short phrase of Abraham Lincoln, which I like the best because it is simple, short and clearly defined. So he said, that “democracy is a government of the people, by the people and for the people.”