The world throughout history has constantly been making evolutionary changes; this is no different for the United States Democracy. There are many models of democracy, such as protective democracy, developmental democracy, pluralist democracy and participatory democracy. However, most of these democracies if not all are governed by the elites in our governmental society, thus they are privileged with more access and benefits from the United States Government. Nevertheless, this has been changing year by year, as we face multidimensional crisis and lead our government into an inclusive democratic system.
An inclusive democracy is a political theory and political project that aims to address the diverse crisis in our political, economical, social, ecological spheres caused by the concentration of power in various levels (Inclusive Democracy, 1997). Thus, inclusive democracy is the abolition of this concentration of power at the institutional level, the abolition of this concentration of power in all its forms and the creation of conditions of equal sharing of power, of political, economic power, and so on (Inclusive Democracy, 1997). The inclusive democracy project is influenced by two major historical traditions, the socialist tradition and the democratic tradition. In is also influenced by the currents that developed in the last 30 or 40 years, the new social movements, i.e., the feminist movement, the ecological movement, the identity movements of various sorts (Inclusive Democracy, 1997).
First, one of the foundations of the growing U.S inclusive democracy is that it has a focus on our political system in bases of a direct democracy and the crisis that this entails because mass participation is weakening. The inclusive democ...
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...racy is growing a democracy, which focuses on balancing power and crisis with in the political, economical, social, ecological spheres. Many people such as President Reagan believe that, “ Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem” (Hill 2002 p.170). Nevertheless, with the developing inclusive democracy and growing expansion of Civil Rights and protection of our Civil Liberties the government has the potential to develop into our solution and not our problem.
Works Cited
Dye, T. R., Zeigler, H., & Schubert, L. (2012). The Irony of Democracy (15th ed.).
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Hill, Steven.(2006).10 Steps to Repair American Democracy.Sausalito, CA: PoliPointPress.
Inclusive Democracy.(1997). Our Aims. ( http://www.inclusivedemocracy.org/)
Merriam-Webster.(2011). Dictionary (http://www.merriam-webster.com/)
Janda, K., Berry, J., Golman, J., & Hula, K. (2009). The Challenge of Democracy: American
Janda, Kenneth, Jeffrey M. Berry and Jerry Goldman. The Challenge of Democracy. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2004.
The government in the United States supposedly revolves around American ideals such as equality and diversity; however, this is simply not the case. The meaning of democracy has been skewed in the United States to represent something entirely different than it did in 1776 when the country was founded. Today, our democracy behaves more like an aristocracy, where the upper class exercises power within the government and state, influencing discourse and therefore the laws and resources in our country, purportedly “for the people”. Democracy is presumed to provide everyone with equal political power, but the government in today’s America, although seemingly following this ideal model, does not. Instead, the elite upper-class have a monopoly over
Schiller, W. J., Geer, J. G., & Segal, J. A. (2013). Gateways to democracy: introduction to American government, the essentials. (2nd ed.). Belmont, Calif.: Wadsworth ;.
Adding this all up, I have concluded that the United States democracy is unhealthy, yet I still believe there is hope. If I had to give the current condition of democracy a letter grade, I would give it a C. I got this grade because even though the United States maintains many civil right and liberties, a strong number of interest groups, and diverse political parties, it just isn’t enough to carry the poor conditions of ideologies, voter turnout, education, economics, and media. Democracy is surly not thriving in America, but at this point, there is still hope.
Dye, T. R., Zeigler, H., & Schubert, L. (2012). The Irony of Democracy (15th ed.).
The United States of America is a republic, or representative democracy. Democracy, a word that comes to us from Greek, literally means the people rule (Romance, July 8). This broad definition leaves unanswered a few important details such as who are the people, how shall they rule, and what should they rule on (July 8). Defining the answers to those questions means defining a model for a democratic system. William E. Hudson defines four such models in his book American Democracy in Peril: the Protective, Developmental, Pluralist, and Participatory models of democracy (Hudson, 8-19). Of these models, perhaps Participatory comes closest to an ideal, pure democracy of rule by the people (16-19). In practice, however, establishing a stable ideal democracy is not entirely feasible. In a country the size of the United States, it quickly becomes unwieldy if not impossible to have direct rule by the people. To overcome this, the compromise of the representative system allows the people to choose who will rule on a regular basis. The political culture that defines American politics shows that despite this compromise, America is still very much a democratic society.
1. Janda, Kenneth. The Challenge of Democracy. Houghton Mifflin Co. Boston, MA. 1999. (Chapter 3 & 4).
Barry, Brian. "Is Democracy Special?" in Philosophy, Politics, & Society, 5th Series, ed. Peter Laslett & James Fishkin. Hew Haven: Yale University Press, 1979.
In deciphering what constitutes the brilliance of democracy then, we find that it is not citizens’ ability to make informed decisions or an unflawed and subtly manipulated election process, but the unapparent way in which democracy persuades citizens – informed or not - and leaders – corrupt or not – toward working to build better, more prosperous societies.
Several forms of government have been formed since the development of centralized power. The form of government that has showed the most international growth in the last century is democracy. There are currently over 160 democracies in the world today. These democracies, however, are not complete democracies. They are representative democracies that have been created by the leaders of our predominantly patriarchal international system. Due to this, many citizens of these democracies are considered second class citizens and their views are not heard by their supposedly democratic society. A solution to this problem is participatory democracy. Participatory democracy is better than the existing patriarchal society because it allows the progression of society as a whole, eliminates political oppression, and creates a predominantly equal political culture for the citizens it governs. There is much evidence that proves that the advantages of participatory democracy heavily outweigh the drawbacks and that it is a better way of government than patriarchy. This evidence can be found in historical analysis, scrutiny of the patriarchal international system, the development of participatory democracy, and the values of a participatory democracy versus the values of a patriarchal democracy.
Democracy is robust, widely accepted and highly anticipated around the world. It is the triumphant form of government; dominantly used in Europe, North and South and America and becoming reformed and taking new roots in Africa and Asia. Although the term democracy is based on its Greek origin, demos kratos, meaning people rule, the term cannot be simply understood as such. Due to vast coverage, the adaptation of democracy has varied greatly, whether regionally, nationally, by state or through different branches of government. Perhaps this can be advantageous when the different categorizations listed above can use democracy to rule and suit themselves best, but other factors, such as globalization and neoliberalism, has caused the need for
In On Democracy, Robert Dahl presents five criteria that states are required to meet in order to satisfy the primary aim of democracy, which is to provide political equality to all of its citizens (1998, 37). The criteria include effective participation, equal voting, enlightened understanding, open agenda setting and inclusion. (Dahl, 1998, 38). Above these criteria, this paper will only focus on effective participation and enlightened understanding to apply them to India; this is because its citizens are going through a tough time with the two criteria to become a state with effective democracy. Therefore, this paper will demonstrate that India is in the process of achieving effective participation, but significantly lacks enlightened understanding.
The current challenges of democracy around the world should prioritize each encounter that should be addressed through networks, global gatherings, and various activities. As a continuous concern, the progress of democracy discusses various strategies and activities. These various strategies and activities lead to lessons that are learned in advancing democracy, making democracy deliver, strengthening democratic fundamentals, and more current challenges. Democracy faces threats from every spectrum as the threats surge the need to reinforce democratic forces through aid and greater international solidarity. Each country reflects on a certain assessment towards the current status of democracy.
The link between democracy and human rights has been recognized by many scholars. For example O’Donnell (2004) summarized the quality of democracy as: Quality of Democracy = human rights + human development. This viewpoint indicates that democracy encapsulates human rights. Several research findings strongly support the idea that states with higher levels of democracy, regardless of their election rules, are more respectful of human rights (Davenport 1997; Poe, Tate, and Keith 1999).