States, Citizens, and Democracies

What I've learn from my Comparative Politics class this week.

According to Orvis and Drogus (2015) from the textbook Introducing comparative politics: concepts and cases in context, the definition of democracy has numerous meanings depending on the group of people deciphering it. The authors (2015) refer to the most basic terminology of the phrase and use liberal democracy which means having many people’s ideas evolve into one idea (Introducing comparative politics: concepts and cases in context, p. 106). Liberal democracy, considered as a kind of regime and democracy, can be defined as a system guaranteeing freedom and participation amongst its citizens according to Orvis and Drogus (2015). From the Introduction to Comparative Politics PowerPoint, liberal democracy consists of the following benefits to citizens:

• Freedom of association

• Freedom of expression

• Right to vote

• Broad citizen eligibility for public office

• Political competition

• Alternative sources of information

• Free and fair elections

• Institutions that make government policies depend on various forms of citizen preferences

The spread of democracy has come a long way in the past hundred years from the 1900s to present day today. The different types of democracy are liberal democracy, social democracy, and participatory democracy. Social democracy can be described as a democracy focusing on the need of social rights amongst its citizens (Orvis and Drogus, Introducing comparative politics: concepts and cases in context, p. 110). This kind of democracy would support more of the public controlling both political and economic endeavors where markets can be regulated and everyone’s well-being is cared for. An example of social democracy would be Denmark, Finland, and the Netherlands according to Craig Brown (2009) from Common Dreams. Participatory democracy refers to the encouragement of citizen participation in political, social, and economic endeavors for a country or other group. The goal for this democracy is to have citizen involvement especially in their workspaces allowing these businesses to work in citizens’ best interest. An example of participatory democracy would be town meetings. Anyone who watches the original series Gilmore Girls would know that in the show, the small town of Stars Hollow has weekly town meetings with all the town citizens conversing and voting on potential store expansions, import taxation, or what to do in response to the occasional bad boy Jess causing a ruckus for the town and main character Rory Gilmore. It’s a silly fictional example, but it’s a good example of participatory democracy at its finest.

Liberal democracy is a type of democracy and standard for the modern state because it considers its people living within its community as citizens and not subjects. Modern states have citizens who do have a say in what goes on in their political systems whereas subjects do not. The medieval period can come to mind when it comes to ruling over subjects, people, who don’t have a say if they’re country hypothetically is expanding, accepting exports, or increasing taxation.

A citizen’s role in a modern state consists of practicing their civil, political, and social rights. If citizens participate in these activities, they can then be acknowledged as civil society, (Orvis and Drogus, Introducing comparative politics: concepts and cases in context, p. 102).

Regulation of citizen behavior can range out to the type of regime and ideology the citizen is ruled under. Such regimes and ideologies can range from Liberal Democracy, Communism, Fascism, Modernizing Authoritarianism, Semi-Authoritarianism, and Theocracy (Orvis and Drogus, Introducing comparative politics: concepts and cases in context, p. 104-105). Besides their characteristics which can play as differentiation between these regimes and ideology, there’s the consideration of whom the regime or ideology considers to have power, (i.e. specified leader, party, possible elite, or god).

An example of this could be the United Kingdom, a liberal democratic parliamentary system, and its “cradled” process in becoming more of a democracy, (Orvis and Drogus, Introducing comparative politics: concepts and cases in context, p. 102). The U.K. was the first liberal democratic regime, and its claim for legitimacy is justified through its practice in parliamentary and sovereignty. The relationship between citizens and the state has been gradual expanding adult citizens’ rights since the nineteenth century. During the new millennium, the democracy has gone through constitutional reformation specifically with the Supreme Court. The Constitutional Act of 2005 allowed the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom to take on the role of Law Lords which were the initial exercisers of judicial functions until this act was emplaced.

How have recent events, like Brexit, affected the United Kingdom’s democracy? If anything, it was the democracy that voted for the United Kingdom to succeed from the European Union. Whether it was recommendable or not, citizens were practicing or offered their civil, political, and social rights maintaining a liberal democratic status for the modern state. Henry Wismayer (2016) from TIME would not call this a triumph of democracy, however. Yes, citizens were given the right to vote ‘yes’ or ‘no,’ but were they given access to extensive information regarding the outcomes to either chose of the vote? It wasn’t until voting day, the most Googled term was either, “What is Brexit?” and “What is the EU?” (Wismayer, TIME, 2016). The question is, is a modern state really democratized if citizens’ freedom of knowledge and information isn’t fully accessible?

-Madison

References

• Brown, C. (2009, May 11). World's Happiest Countries? Social Democracies. Retrieved September 21, 2017, from https://www.commondreams.org/further/2009/05/11/worlds-happiest-countries-social-democracies

• Orvis, S. W., & Drogus, C. A. (2015). Introducing comparative politics: concepts and cases in context (3rd ed.). Los Angeles: SAGE/CQ Press.

• Wismayer, H. (2016, June 29). Brexit: Britain's Referendum Was Not a Triumph of Democracy. Retrieved September 21, 2017, from http://time.com/4386655/brexit-referendums/

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