Road to Democracy

© Dr. M. Emdadul Haq

PRELUDE:
Democracy is a slippery term, which is often used as lip service by political leaders in
different contexts. The meaning of democracy may vary as it depends on the shape of a
person’s head to pick up a right size cap. Its perception, meaning, and understanding
of democracy may vary based on the socio-economic and political conditions of a society
at a given time. Often democracy is termed as the ‘rule of majority,’ ‘representative
government,’ ‘people’s rule,’ ‘participatory government,’ ‘constitutional governance,’ or
even as ‘a way of lie.’ Most often it is referred to a system run by the elected
representatives. Any critical examination of the use of ‘democracy’ immediately unfolds
its multiplicity and ambiguity of meanings that it carries in different times and contexts.
The US President Abraham Lincoln, during the mid-nineteenth century, maintained
democracy as ‘government of the people, by the people, and for the people.’ Critics of his
definition came up with several parodies by saying that democracy is a system of
government ‘off the people, buy the people, and far the people.’ Others maintained
democracy as the ‘government of the rich, by the rich and for the rich.’ Some
impassionate critics might even argue that democracy is a system ‘of the corrupt by the
corrupt and for the corrupt.’ A more precise and complete definition of democracy was
given by the seventeenth-century English political philosopher John Locke, who argued
that ‘democracy is the rule of the majority with the consent of minority.’ Democracy is
a political system run by elected leaders coming through a competitive basis, and
opposition parties have legitimate say in the exercise of power. Terms such as ‘liberal
democracy’ or ‘people's rule’ are the synonyms for functioning democracy. To get a
complete understanding of the notion of democracy, we need to look at the fundamental
principles of democracy that used to work in diverse political systems. The diagram
below shows some of those variables.

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BASIC PILLARS:
The pillars or preconditions for the successful functioning of democracy are too many.
A real democracy ensures freedom and liberty of the people, not just as rhetoric or
buzzword, but in reality. It is a set of ideas, principles, and institutions that are
established to protect individual freedom and liberty. People’s sovereignty is also
established with their supreme power to install the government and to overthrow it, if
necessary. ‘Coalition-building’ among interest groups and negotiation with others is
allowed in a democratic system. Under a majority rule, elected leaders can freely make
their political decisions, but that must address the opinion of the opposition or members
of the minority party. In a democracy, ideally speaking, the government exists to serve
the people, but not to rule the people, and they are considered citizens of the country,
not its subjects. Given these preconditions, the French philosopher Jean Jack Rousseau
(1762) was apprehensive about the functioning of an ideal democracy. In his book The
Social Contract, Rousseau viewed that ‘if there were a nation of God’s, it would govern
itself democratically. A government so perfect is not suited to men.’ Rousseau felt that
humans couldn’t meet the conditions of democracy, but rather angels should be there
to practice it.
Ken Newton and Jan W Van Deth (2005), in their book Foundations of Comparative
Politics: Democracies of the Modern World, mentioned multiple preconditions for the
successful functioning of democracy. These are as follows:

 Strengthening parliaments for monitoring and controlling the executive.

 Strengthen the power and influence of the parliamentary committees.
 Freedom of information and open government needs to be established for public
access to official documents and the use of electronic media to improve
communication between citizens and lawmakers.
 Decentralization of power to be maintained among the regional, local, and
community levels of government. An example is the creation of regional units of
government for Scotland and Wales in the UK.
 Making bureaucracies more responsive and efficient by adopting cost-benefit
management and bookkeeping practices.
 Improving citizen participation and finding new ways of making their voice heard
by allowing boycotts, demonstrations, sit-ins, civil disobedience, and media
access to such information.
 Strengthening the role of associations like NGOs and civil societies in decision
making, especially at the local and community level.
 Strengthening the independence of mass media and finding ways to maintain
their professionalism.
 Protecting and strengthening human rights and guarantee their rightful access
and independence in the courts.
 Social security and welfare continue to be a central issue in democratic countries.

The rule of law, limited government, and constitutional governance are the other
important qualities of the democratic political system. Separation of powers,
accountable and transparent governance, etc. are other yardsticks in a democracy.
Decentralization, network governance, managing diversity and civility in politics are also
necessary preconditions for establishing democracy. We also need to bear in mind that
democratic governance is based upon the consent of the governed. Conducting

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periodical elections in a free and fair manner is obligatory in a democracy. In a
democracy, elected officials are accountable to the people, and they must return to the
voters periodically to seek their mandate to continue in office. Democratic elections are
inclusive that include a large proportion of the adult population and are definitive
because they determine the leadership of the government. On different occasions, voters
can also be asked to decide policy issues directly through referendums and initiatives
that are placed on the ballot.
In a democracy, the government’s power is limited by the constitution, but not that they
are weak. A system of checks and balances is developed to ensure that political power
is dispersed and decentralized. Any democratic government is best when it’s potential
for power abuse is curbed, and when the government is held as close to the people as
possible. It is a majority rule with the protection of minority rights. It also guarantees
basic human rights, equality before the law, and the due process of law. A healthy
democracy depends in large part on the development of a democratic civic culture
whereby the people are capable of governing themselves, especially regarding their
behaviors, practices, and norms. Values of tolerance, pragmatism, cooperation, and
compromise are practiced to encounter dogmatic faiths and belief systems. Liberal
education is a vital component of democracy. Thomas Jefferson wrote:

If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects

what never was and never shall be.

Individualism is also another cardinal principle; everyone is to be counted as single unit

and pursuing the principle of ‘live and let live.’ Other preconditions include:
participating in public affairs with a cooperative attitude, building rational capacity
based on reasoning and compromise, empirical observation before reaching into a
decision, stable standard of living as the starving people may be in no mode to observe
democratic values, managing diversity, and development of a democratic civic culture,
etc. A reasonable amount of socio-economic quality and stable standard of living is
desirable in a democracy, as starving people may be in no mode to observe democratic
values. It is also considered to be a participatory government whereby people can show
a cooperative attitude in public affairs, but the absence of rational capacity, reasoning,
and compromise are considered major problems until today.

The contemporary political systems combine constitutionalism and democracy to share

a common basis of the majority will that is expressed in free and fair elections.
Democratic governance rests upon popular participation in government activities. In all
such systems, political parties are key institutions, and these are the agencies by which
majority opinion in a modern mass electorate is mobilized and expressed. The essential
functions of political parties in a constitutional democracy, as viewed by Gabriel
Almond, are the ‘aggregation’ of a huge number of interests, beliefs, and values into one
or more policies or proposals for bringing about change in the society. The centralized,
autocratically directed, and ideologically orthodox one-party systems of totalitarian
regimes have limited scope of performing these functions. In a constitutional governance
system, the legitimacy of the government, power is derived from the people’s will. It
doesn’t practice MAJORITY dictatorship, rather emphasizes on consensual governance.
Thus, constitutional governance is an antithesis of arbitrary government and of despotic
rule.

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Every democratic society is a pluralistic society backed by varied institutions, political
parties, organizations, and associations for working harmoniously. Socio-economic and
political pluralism maintained in a democracy. Democratic pluralism is identified with
an emphasis on the role of the demos - the free association of citizens, the maintenance
of free elections, and the freedom of political expression. Popular democracy entails the
government by the people. Based on the fundamental principles, we can identify three
basic types of democracy: (a) direct, (b) representative, and (c) limited. In Athenian direct
democracy, all citizens could take part in legislative assemblies that took place in the
form of town meetings. Representative government was unknown and unnecessary to
them because of the small size of the city-states, which were comprised of only 5,000 to
10,000 citizens. In a modern democracy, citizens elect officials to make political
decisions, formulate laws, and consciously dealing with complex public issues in a
systematic manner. Representative democracy can be sub-divided into three forms: (i)
parliamentary democracy, (ii) presidential system, and (iii) semi-presidential system.
Additionally, limited or authoritarian democracy is prevalent in many countries of the
post-colonial world.

In a democratic system, office bearers treat themselves as the representatives of their

constituents and act in the legislature on behalf of their electorate who have elected
them in the first place. Periodical free and fair elections take place for ensuring the
representative nature of the governance. Legislative members maintain constant touch
with their electorate to make them aware of changing state policies and issues. In most
democracies, legislators are accustomed to receiving letters, emails, text messages, and
even phone calls from their voters regularly. Advises are mostly appreciated, and
suggestions are taken into account in the framing of laws and policies on emerging
issues. A regime with the one-party rule can be considered unrepresentative by
democratic standards, for example, the People’s Republic of China, but could still be
regarded as democratic so long as it’s officeholders maintain transparency and
accountability to the body politic in some ways or the other.

Modern democracy also rests upon disclosure of information and openness in the affairs
of government, and no culture of secrecy maintained by bureaucracy in their usual
activities. Information is disseminated to engage people pro-actively in the execution of
government policies and decisions. Traditional bureaucracies surrounded their
activities with a veil of secrecy and denied service seekers from their entitlements. Under
democratic governance, however, both administrators and public leaders are subject to
constitutional restraints, and they are now obliged to disclose information to the public
to whom they are socially accountable. Given the development, the Bangladesh
government adopted the Right to Information Act 2009 to facilitate public access to
government information. In pursuance of the new legislation, capacity building and
digitalization of the public records became the utmost necessary. Only security
measures or issues of business interest, however, could be exempted from the public
disclosure.

Since the 1970s, the vast majority of democratic countries - developed, developing, and
transitional - have adopted some form of decentralization. The type and extent of
decentralization have varied greatly from delegation to de-concentration and then to
devolution. In a delegation, power is shifted from the higher authority to subordinates
temporarily, keeping the latter accountable to the former. In de-concentration or
administrative decentralization, considerable balance is maintained between the elected

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representatives and members of the bureaucracy. The Upazila system in Bangladesh
can be cited as an example of de-concentration, even though the local MPs now
dominate the development activities. In a devolved democracy, however, the locally
elected body enjoys autonomy to adopt and execute decisions by collecting revenue from
local sources. Democratic governance suggests clear-cut arrangement in terms of
central-local relationship, the range of responsibilities undertaken by the local level
authority, and the generation of resources to accomplish their task for diverse groups
in the locality.

Democratic governance is, in many ways, related to managing diversity among

competing social groups for maximizing their interests. This competition must be
managed within certain limits so that all sides accept the results as legitimate. Secure
group representations in constitutional governance, with distinctly different and
significant group affiliations, has become a demand of the day as a philosophy Managing
Diversity has emerged with the changing labor market demographics in North America
in the late 1980s. The concept gained popularity in the UK as a new public management
approach in the 1990s. Diversity of workforce in terms of race, creed ethnicity, gender,
age, sexual orientation, and politico-religious belief expanded the importance of
managing diversity in public governance across the world in the 21st century. Any multi-
cultural society is like a mosaic, with colorful stones of separate color combinations.
The diversity theory suggests that being divided society can flourish if the individual
groups are recognized and respected as equal partners and maintain a common bond.
By essence ‘unity out of diversity’ is the core principle of managing diversity, and the
practice of inclusion rather than exclusion suggested by its experts.

DEMOCRATIC TRANSITION
The practices and procedures of democracy have been shaped through a prolonged and
difficult history. There has been a gradual transformation over the last 2,000 years for
democracy to reach its current stage and be regarded as the most desirable political
system of government. In ancient India, Shava (council of the people) and Shamiti
(council of the elders) controlled the authority of the tribal Kings before the dynastic rule
was introduced during the 4th century BC. Ancient Greeks are generally regarded as the
forerunners of direct democracy, and it is to them that the modern world is indebted for
setting the earliest examples of the theory and practice of democracy.

Etymologically the term democracy is derived from the Greek words demos, which
means ‘the people’; and kratein, which means ‘to rule.’ To the Greeks, thus, democracy
meant a system of government to rule the people. Greek political thinkers Plato and
Aristotle were apathetic towards democracy, what they called ‘mobocracy’ and ‘rule by
the poor’ respectively. As one of the earliest theorists of democracy, Aristotle contended
that: ‘In a democracy, the poor will have more power than the rich, because there are
more of them, the will of the majority is supreme.’ He was skeptical and wary of placing
power in the hands of the majority who were basically ‘low-educated and economically
dependent common people.’ When the first debates about democracy as a system of
government were taking place in ancient Greece, it was viewed with suspicion and
criticized as being ‘dangerous and unworkable’ (Hix and Whiting: 2012). Ancient
democracy did not practice equality of all individuals, as Aristotle had perceived, rather,
excluded the majority of the population being slaves and women from their political
rights. In Athenian democracy, the limited franchise was allowed only to native-born

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citizens. The practice of direct democracy in ancient Greek city-states or the Roman
Republic was unlike the democracies of the modern world.

Romans copied Greek democracy, although Rome sometimes granted citizenship to men
of non-Roman descent. The Roman Republic ended in the despotism of the empire.
Roman Stoicism, then the Jewish, Christian, and Islamic religions, which emphasized
the rights of the underprivileged and the equality of all before God, contributed to the
eventual development of modern democratic theory in the West. The free cities of Italy,
Germany, and Flanders practiced democratic tradition and applied principles of
democracy during the medieval period. With the decimation of feudalism, a rich
commercial middle class arose, which possessed both money and leisure necessary to
participate in governmental affairs. The resurgence of a spirit of freedom, based on
ancient Greek and Roman principles, paved the way for equal socio-political rights
during the Renaissance. The negative image of the Greek democracy, thus, continued
up until the Renaissance and Enlightenment eras, when it was revealed and linked to
liberalism as opposed to tyranny. Some of the subsequent benchmarks laid in the
evolution of liberal democracy were: (i) The Glorious Revolution of 1688 in UK, (ii) The
US War of Independence in 1776 and the introduction of constitutionalism in 1789; (iii)
The French Revolution of 1789, (iv) The Industrial Revolution (1760-1840), and (v) The
American Civil War of 1860. The success of the democratic transition in the post-
independent US served as a role model for many countries across the globe.

Nevertheless, the beginning of the first popular rebellion against the British monarchy
in 1642 was brought to a climax by the execution of King Charles I by the parliamentary
forces. Political and revolutionary action against absolute European monarchies
resulted in the establishment of republican governments. Even though some of them
remained autocratic, but there was an increasing tendency toward democracies. Such
challenges were inspired and guided largely by political philosophers, notably the
French philosophers Charles Louis de Montesquieu and Jean-Jacques Rousseau and
the American statesmen Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. Before the end of the
nineteenth century, every important European monarchy adopted a constitution
limiting the power of the Crown and giving a considerable share of political power to the
parliament. In many of these countries, a representative legislature was modeled and
instituted after the British Parliament. Although it was much expected from the French
Revolution to exert a powerful influence, possibly the greatest single influence on the
organization of world democracies was made by the British tradition.

As a legacy of the colonial past, the people of the Indian sub-continent have had limited
opportunities to achieve democratic experiences under British rule particularly from
1861 to 1947. The practice of parliamentary democracy was adopted in post-
independent India through the adoption of their constitution in November 1949. On the
contrary, due to lack of political vision, the post-independent government in Pakistan
refrained from adopting any concrete form of the democratic system and relied on civil-
military autocracy. Throughout the sixties, the so-called ‘basic democracy’ (BD), an
elaborate trick designed to remain in power, Ayub Khan, former president of Pakistan,
denied popular participation in the state machinery. The systematic undermining of
constitutionalism and democratic institutions by President Ayub excluded the Bangali
vernacular elites from their effective role in the state-building. The subsequent events
and circumstances that led to the independence of Bangladesh are complex, but it would
be no exaggeration to say that things might have turned out differently if democratic

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institutions and constitutionalism had a chance to flourish in the country. The origins
and growth of modern democracy across the globe, however, occurred over the last two
hundred years. Among others, Harvard University Professor Samuel P. Huntington
(1991) revealed in his groundbreaking book The Third Wave as follows:

THE THIRD WAVE:

According to this theory democratization across the globe has come across ‘three waves.’
The first wave lasted from the mid-nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century and
witnessed 25 to 30 states achieved a degree of democratic stability. Mainly, as a result
of decolonization, the second wave continued from 1950 to 1975. The third lasted from
about 1975 to 2000, mainly as a result of the disintegration of the former Soviet Union
and the spread of democracy in Latin America and Asia. In an article published in the
Journal of Democracy, Professor Samuel P. Huntington initially identified these three
‘long waves’ of democracy in recent history. Subsequently, in his book The Third Wave,
Huntington (1991) explained his thesis of the democratic transition across the world
during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Huntington explains each of these
changes in detail, providing examples and analysis whereby he says to overcome their
legitimacy problems, even authoritarian regimes increasingly used democratic rhetoric
throughout the world.

During the nineteenth century, democracy began its journey in Western Europe and
North America. The first wave began with voting franchise in the US in the 1820s, the
Reform Acts in the UK in 1832, and Universal Male Suffrage in France in 1848. Even by
the end of the nineteenth century, not many countries subscribed to the idea of
democracy in morn sense of the term. Countries like the US or Britain restricted the
voting rights of women or black Americans until then. Monarchies and empires were the
dominant state forms across the globe — a century-long process of transition required
for the completion of the first wave of democratization. In 1922, however, the advent of
Mussolini in Italy marked the beginning of a first reversal. The First wave lost
momentum in the interwar period between WWI and WWII when some dictators rose to
power. In 1926 there were a total of 29 democracies, but more than half of these
governments turned to autocracies by 1942, and the number of democratic states came
down to 12. The picture changed dramatically in the second half of the twentieth
century. By 1950, the total number of states had risen to 80, and 22 of them could be
characterized as ‘democracies.’ Major socio-economic and political factors, i.e.,
economic development, industrialization, urbanization, growth of the middle class,
victory of the Allies in WWI, and the dismantling of Empires, etc. dominated the period.
Most of the post-independent countries embodied some of the principles of democracy,
if not in practice.

The second wave of democratization ran from about 1945 to 1962 and reached its
zenith, with 36 countries being governed democratically. The decolonization process
expedited Second wave to a good number of number of countries in Asia, Africa, and
Latin America. In South Asia, India became one of the countries to start functioning
democracy during the period. However, the process ‘faded out’ in some countries,
because of political instability and the advent of military regimes during the 1960s and
1970s. With the Second reversal, the number came down to 30 by 1975. In this list of
reversal, Bangladesh was incorporated as a ‘failed state’ in the practice of democracy
after the 4th Amendment of the Constitution on 25th January 2075.

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From 1972 to ’75, Bangladesh adopted and practiced parliamentary democracy by the
adoption of the Constitution of 1972, which guaranteed political rights and freedoms for
citizens as a fundamental responsibility of the state. Nevertheless, due to the emergence
of a centralized body politic coupled with the socio-political and economic insecurity at
the societal level, and the absence of proper aid especially to the poorer segment of the
society, the support for the regime began to erode by 1974, and the country was gripped
by a famine in which hundreds of thousands died. In an attempt for a reorientation of
his policies, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman decided to bring radical reforms
that required significant constitutional changes in the body politic. Under his directives,
the constitution was amended on 25th January 1975 that provided him a powerful
presidency, with substantial powers to deal with ‘acts of terrorism’ posed by some
underground leftist organizations. Whatever might have been the motives of the
government, the leadership was hasty in abrogating the parliamentary system of
government with a monolithic state structure and one-party rule.

Nevertheless, Huntington argued that as a result of the global changes, more countries
began to embrace democracy since the late 1970s and is continuing now. For example,
religious changes in South Korea helped achieve a transition to democracy in 1988.
Pope John Paul II used the power of the Church to defend human rights. Politically
motivated papal visits also played a key role in countries like the Philippines, Korea,
Chile, Brazil, Poland, Nicaragua, Panama, etc. The US initiatives for the promotion of
world democracy through diplomatic action, economic pressure, material support for
democratic opposition forces, military action and multilateral diplomacy also helped the
process of transition. Increased economic well-being shaped societal values, increased
levels of education, facilitated compromises, promoted trade opening, and expanded the
middle class was the general causes of the Third wave of democratization, quite different
from the causes of the first two waves.
Under the Third wave, democracy began flourishing in Central, Latin, and South
America, as well as post-communist Eastern Europe and East Asia. With the collapse
of the Berlin Wall in 1989, freedom and liberty started to echo throughout the globe,
and the number of regimes that claim to be liberal democracies has increased since the
1990s. The decimation of the Soviet empire led several Central and East European
nation-states to establish themselves as democracies and the emergence of competitive
party systems in these countries. Eastern Europe has cast off the totalitarian
governments of almost half a century. The former Soviet Union has also installed multi-
party democracy after about 75 years of Communist rule. As a result of ‘third wave’ of
democracy, some 60 percent of the 190 or so states in the world, covering 58 percent of
the worlds’ population could be called democracies. Demonstration effects or
‘snowballing’ also occurred by the successful democratization in one country that
encouraged other countries. Also, US support was instrumental to the democratization
process in these countries. Despite the ongoing ‘Wave,’ however, Huntington was
apprehensive about whether a third reversal is knocking on the door. Huntington’s
concept suggests that there is no guarantee that a reversal won’t slow the Third wave
at some point in time.

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TYPOLOGY
Broadly we can categorize democratic governments as (a) Direct democracy, (b) Indirect
democracy and (c) Limited democracy. Under the category of Indirect democracy the
leading ones are (i) Liberal democracy, (ii) Pluralistic democracy, (iii) Participatory
democracy, (iv) Representative democracy, and (v) Parliamentary democracy. Within the
Limited democracy different sub-categories could be: (i) Christian democracy, (ii) Guided
democracy, (iii) Democratic socialism, and (iv) Democratic centralism. In a limited
democracy political activities are largely controlled by the state, for example, most
countries in the post-communist and post-colonial world. Some of the major patterns
are discussed as follows:

Participatory democracy:
In a direct or participatory democracy, all citizens can participate in making public
decisions. For example, in ancient Athens adult male members practiced direct
democracy in the City-states or Polity in a population of about 5,000 to 6,000. Female
members, non-adults, foreigners, and slaves were excluded from the list. It was built
upon the principle of free and equal participation of all, rather than representative
democracy. These days, Green parties in different countries oppose the traditional
centralized and hierarchical organization of political parties and favor direct
participation and the rotation of elites. Some Green parties have tried (often
unsuccessfully) to ensure that no one stays in a leadership position for long and that
no one is paid more than the average wage or multiple wages. Some critics argue that
Green thought is inherently anti-democratic because it puts the utmost importance on
taking action to protect the environment now before it is too late, irrespective of public
opinion and the slow processes of democracy. Others claim that the participatory thrust
of Green thought guarantees its democratic credentials.

Liberal democracy:

Liberal democracy developed in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries in the writings
of Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, Jean Jack Rousseau, John Stuart Mills, etc. It tries to
combine the powers of democratic government with liberal values about the freedom of
the individual. By essence, liberal democracy suggests protecting individual liberty by
limiting the powers of the state. Early liberalism emerged in the seventeenth century in
opposition to traditional government by kings, aristocracies, and elites, and to the social
order and hierarchy, they imposed. Liberals rejected the constraints of traditional
government by emphasizing on the importance of individual freedom. Classical
liberalism was built around the principle that the state should be limited to the ‘night
watchman’ function of protecting individual rights and property, and should not pretend
to any other function. The modern version of this belief claims that ‘government is best
that governs least.’ Contrasting conservatism, liberalism takes an optimistic view of
human nature, assuming that humankind is rational and reasonable when left to its
own devices. Liberals also assume that individuals should be formally equal before the
law – even though they are not equal in capacities, ability, or intelligence but those they
have equal rights and duties. Liberal democracy is the other side of laissez-faire
economics and free trade. It defends market economics along with its strong confidence
in a limited state, coupled with the protection of individual rights to make their own

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decisions in economic activities. It also advocates a degree of state intervention to
eliminate the obstacles of individual freedom in real-life situations.

Christian democracy

Pope Leo XIII (1891) founded the basics of Christian democracy, which was partly in
reaction to the prevailing classical liberalism of his times, which tended to be secular
and anti-papacy. It was also an answer to the escalating nonbelievers who were
supporting socialism. Moreover, it was also an attempt to incorporate the Catholic belief
system into the mainframe political ideologies. Christian democracy is neither liberal,
nor socialist, nor conservative, but somewhere in between. It believes in Natural law as
the basis of society, which is not given by the state but by God. Natural law is revealed
by human beings by their reasoning capacity that God has gifted them. Christian
democrats assert that Natural groups should be allowed to run their affairs in their way,
without interference or regulation by the state. They perceive that private and semi-
private agencies are morally superior to public ones because they exercise their
Christian conscience. They are also more effective in meeting human needs. The state
can intervene only to restore the natural community to its proper functioning. They
emphasize Christian morality, which requires the state to protect the weakest and
poorest members of society under its welfare policies to alleviate poverty and protect
people against illness and unemployment. Christian democracy also upholds social
harmony and integration and supports the reconciliation of class, religious and other
differences using formal social institutions to consult and discuss with one another. It
is a middle way, neither for nor against state intervention in principle, but suggests to
protect human dignity under natural law.

Social democracy

It is important to make a distinction between the Democratic centralism practiced in

the so-called ‘communist countries’, including China and the former Soviet Union, and
the social democracy found in the democratic world. Communist countries maintain
regimes controlled by the Communist party, and their dominant ideology is known as
‘Marxism-Leninism.’ The socialist or ‘communist’ countries followed planned economy
and everything was directed from the top. In the name of socialization of the means of
production, some form of state capitalism was formed. By contrast, Social democracy
follows the ideals of ‘bourgeoisie’ democracy. To distinguish themselves clearly from
Marxism or communism, some socialist parties prefer to call themselves social-
democratic. Social democracy has positive view of human nature. They perceive humans
as predominantly reasonable, rational and social and consider it is the bourgeoisie
(capitalist) education, religious culture and media that makes people greedy and keeps
them in ignorance. Inequalities in the capacities between individuals are the outcome
of their socio-political and economic environment. They argue the function of the social
democratic state is to eradicate inequalities of opportunity and recognize natural talents
and abilities of individuals.

Representative democracy

Within this system, citizens elect officials to make political decisions, formulate laws,
and administer programs for the public good. Representatives can deliberate on complex

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public issues in a thoughtful and systematic manner. Representative democracy could
be of three forms: (i) parliamentary democracy headed by a prime minister, (ii)
presidential democracy whereby both the head of government and head of state are
combined in the office of the president, and (iii) hybrid democracy whereby both
president and prime minister share political power and executive authority.

Pluralistic Democracy:
Every modern democracy is broadly considered to be pluralistic because here political
decisions are made based on competition and conflict resolution among different groups
and organizations representing many different interests. Pluralism stands as a protest
movement against ‘monism’ or centralism and emphasizes that diversity and
multiplicity must be taken seriously. The Anglo-Saxon democracies and their allies
adopt policy in a less centralized and hierarchical manner. In these countries, power is
dispersed among many different groups and organizations that openly compete with one
another in settling their political issues. This sort of policy process has been labeled as
‘pluralism.’ It is sometimes identified with the liberal democracy, wherein diverse
interests are counted for. The postmodernist argument displays pluralism as its key
value. For example, postmodern feminism argues that not only are women different from
men, but they are also different from one another. An infinite range of other factors are
now taken into account – a person’s class, religion, language, culture, region, and so
on. Pluralism can only be sustained as an outlook and approach if it operates for
bringing unity out of diversity, and stress upon similarities. Difference and diversity are
important, but they need to be linked to universality – what things have in common.

OVERVIEW:

The preceding discussions indicate that democracy is not fixed or static but grows
through a continuous process to make the government accountable and responsive to
the needs of the people it governs. Democracy seems to have survived quite well and
flourished at the turn of the twentieth century. Three successive waves of
democratization – driven mainly by post-war decolonization after 1945 and the collapse
of the Soviet Empire in 1989 – has expanded the number of democracies to
approximately 120 countries, covering about 60 percent of the world’s population.
Democracy has grown in depth and strength to cover far more than the most basic
human rights. It now includes universal adult franchise, referendum, a wide range of
socio-economic and legal issues, direct participation, greater control over government
and fewer privileges for political leaders. Reforming and developing democratic
institutions, therefore, is a regular aspect of democratic governance system.

The number of democracies in the world is still rising, but some of the newest ones have
problems protecting freedom and human rights. Organizing multi-party elections seems
to be less problematic. Even though during the second half of the twentieth-century,
democracies as a group have enjoyed a slightly faster rate of growth per capita income
than autocracies, but the example of populism in China is reverse. On average,
democracy does not seem to have the edge over autocracy in terms of economic growth.
Despite the collapse of communism in the 1990s, democracy is far from a sure success.
The practice of one-party rule, especially in China and North Korea is still considered a
challenge to the free world. Also, the emergence of Islamic militancy in different parts of
the world, as Huntington indicated, has added another new challenge in the functioning

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of world democracy. The contradictory roles pursued by some of leading democratic
countries, especially by the US and their allies, many people around the world still view
democracy with suspicion, distrust, or hostile attitude. The imperialistic policy pursued
by some Western countries and their associates in the name of ‘Arab Spring’
democracies is still rare in the Middle East and Africa. Government based upon consent
of the governed and people’s sovereignty and their supreme power has remained a far
cry in many countries of the world. Authoritarian forms of governments are still
prevalent in different parts of world, and lip service provided by dictators coexists with
democratic forms. In the name of majority rule, minority rights are rarely ensured in
these countries. Equality before the law and due process of law is maintained in few
democracies.

References
1. Ashley Lavelle (2008) The Death Of Social Democracy: Political Consequences in
the 21st Century, Hampshire: Ashgate.
2. Christian F. Rostboll (2008) Deliberative Freedom: Deliberative Democracy as
Critical Theory, New York: State University of New York Press.
3. Mulligan, C. B., Gil and Sala-i-Martin, Z. (2004) “Do Democracies Have Different
Policies than Nondemocracies?” Journal of Economic Perspectives, 18(1).
4. A. Przeworski, M. E Alvarez, J. A. Cheibub, and F. Limongi (2000) Democracy and
Development: Political Institutions and Well-being in the World, 1950-1990. New
York: Cambridge University Press.
5. Richard Sandbrook, Marc Edelman, Patrick Heller, and Judith Teichman eds.
(2006) Social Democracy in the Global Periphery: Origins, Challenges, Prospects,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
6. Robert Dahl, Ian Shapiro, and Jose´ Antonio Cheibub Eds. (2003) The Democracy
Sourcebook, Massachusetts: The MIT Press.
7. Roland Axtmann (2003) Understanding Democratic Politics: An Introduction,
London: SAGE Publications Ltd.
8. Stephen D. Tansey (2003) Politics: The Basics, London: Routledge.
9. S. Hix and M. Whiting (2012) Introduction to Political Science, PS1172, University
of London.
10. S. R. Osmani (2008) “Participatory Governance: An Overview of Issues and
Evidence,” in United Nations, Participatory Governance and the Millennium
Development Goals (MDGs), Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA),
United Nations: New York.

Solving questions:
 How can you define democracy in the light of any major political thinker?
 Discuss the basic pillars of democracy.
 How is democracy better than autocracy?
 Is there any mutual relationship between bourgeoisie rule and democracy,
according to the Marxists?
 Describe the historical growth of western democracy throughout the twentieth
century.
 Explain how the number of democracies increased in three ‘waves’ during the
last two centuries.
 Make a list of five countries in the world that have improved their democracy
since 1990, and another five that have slipped back.

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 What are the main reasons for the increase of democratic countries across the
world during the early 1990s?
 How likely is the possibility of a reversal of democracy in the current millennium?
 What democratic initiatives have been taken in Bangladesh in recent years, and
which of these have been realized?
 How can we search for a new understanding of democracy in the twenty-first
century?
 What are the major complaints about democracy?
 Can democracy survive as an ideology across the globe shortly?
 Discuss the differences between the theory and practice of democracy in different
countries.
 Compare and contrast the main explanations for why some countries become
and remain democratic.
 Discuss the hurdles of practicing democracy in Bangladesh.
 What reforms might help to preserve democracy in Bangladesh?
 Explain why your adopted country has become democratic, or remained only
partially democratic, or has switched between democracy and authoritarian
government.

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