Democracy in the 21st Century

By far the most difficult task which can be placed before men is that of founding a government with the purpose of allowing every person across thousands of square miles to all have an equal say in the policies and laws which will govern them. The most obvious solution to this problem (as was realized by America's founding fathers) is to structure a balanced representative democracy wherein each citizen can be represented in government, if they cannot personally be involved with the governmental process. However it is the citizen's responsibility to see that he is well educated on the laws and policies of his government, and the government's duties to make its laws and institutions publicly advertised. For a man who remains ignorant of his government remains powerless in a political system, and is on the road to ruin. In this essay I hope to explain how to identify a modern democracy, and how to recognize its distinctive features- the quality of life of its citizens and its internal structure and institutions. I also aim to explain the duties of citizenry and responsible government, and whose job it is to correct the government when they stray from the path they outlined in their constitution. Hopefully, after reading this essay, any citizen but a learned teacher or a student of politics, could more clearly understand the democratic method, and why democracy has become such a widely popular form of government.

As often as the term democracy is used in modern literature and news programs, it is very seldom associated with systems whose nature is truly democratic. Oftentimes nations claim to be democratic, earning the faux title of democracy, when really their democratic system is little more than a façade for one form or another of political domination. In the modern world we see despotic leaders label themselves as democratic presidents, and their authoritarian dictatorships are called 'free republics'. However, not all democracies are faux democracies, and those nations who practice traditionally more conservative forms of democracy (such as representative democracy) are not as equally villainous as tyrannical presidents with faux political systems, but one must naturally wonder how many degrees of separation a government can have from its people, and still be called a 'democracy'. Like Rousseau, I believe that smaller states have an easier time being, and becoming democracies, but to identify a democracy is more than a matter of political geography. A democratic government is almost immediately recognizable by looking at the population of a nation, and finding out how well their government is representing their best interests. In true democratic nations, one will find that the people are not usually separated from their lawmakers and legislators, but instead they are one and the same. In a democratic government one recognizes that the laws reflect the common desires of the people, and rarely violate any of the established civil rights or social privileges of members of the community. This is because the cornerstone of most modern democracies is equality of all men under the law, and a true democracy's first obligation is to its citizens; to ensure that the laws and social changes it institutes, or social policies it maintains, are in the best interest of the society. A democracy's loyalty (engendered by the consent of the ruled to adhere to the policies and principles established by their peers) ensures that it will always act in the kindest and most sensible way possible towards its citizenry, given the universality of democratic laws, as it would be equally to the detriment of lawmakers to expect an unreasonable sacrifice on the part of their citizens. And while this is a distinct characteristic of democratic systems, the fundamental democratic principles and institutions underlying this characteristic are what define modern democracy. Those fundamental democratic institutions are the Democratic Constitution and the Social Contract between the citizenry and the government.

A Democratic Constitution is a complex and multifaceted document whose nature it is to establish the legitimate democratic social order in a fledgling state during its period of founding, and to outline the offices and institutions of the democratic government which will be brought into being following its ratification. A constitution is an essential documented history of both the founding of a nation, and of the principles upon which the nation was conceived. Though it exists to serve a multitude of purposes, such as formally listing the fundamental rights of its citizens, a constitution's primary purpose is to serve as an educator and reminder, so that no man will remain ignorant on the subject of his government or on that subject his rights to be represented in the affairs of government, to speak and to vote, and most importantly, so that no citizen will ever forget the founding policies and goals of the founders of the nation.

The constitution must be informative, so that members of the newly-founded democratic state can understand and accept their responsibilities and freedoms under the constitution with as little complication as possible. The constitution must come from the heart of the people whose desire it was to establish the democratic order, so that once citizens become informed of governmental policy and the operations of this new system, they can immediately identify with the goals of their new government. In a democratic government the people have awarded the right to rule over one another to themselves, but without being able to identify with their fledgling government, the people will feel alienated and question the legitimacy of the new laws and government. Once the people have embraced democracy and have begun to elect officials who will write their legislation for them, the actual democratic process begins to happen, followed by the simultaneous creation of laws to protect the freedoms of the citizenry made with their consent, and growth of the government. In early democracies citizens will become involved in government to ensure that their rights will be protected and the democratic principles upheld, and the more involvement on behalf of the citizens there is, the more well-established the democratic government can become. This mutually beneficial exchange is a result of the constitution, but is actually attributed to (my personally defined) Social Contract.

The Social Contract is the agreement between the state and citizens that the state shall rule but only with the consent of the ruled, that the state shall be called upon to provide for its citizens and likewise the citizens will be expected to make sacrifices on behalf of the state, that state will protect the basic rights and freedoms of all citizens and all men will be equal under the laws of the state, that the state will never unfairly violate the rights of its citizens and likewise citizens will be expected to respect the rights and freedoms of others. The social contract ensures that the basic freedoms of one individual are protected by the government itself, and any infringement on those rights will be immediately addressed and taken care of by a government more capable of directly ruling its citizens (a benefit of small democracy). At the same time entrance into the social contract is an agreement on the part of the citizens that they will acknowledge and accept their own freedoms and the freedoms of their fellow citizens, any will accept sacrifices the government will ask them to make (within reason) for the greater good of the community. While at first this may seem like an alarming principle, the inherent control placed on democracy is that it is rule by the people, for the people; it would be equally to the detriment of lawmakers to expect an unreasonable sacrifice on the part of their citizens. Therefore, any sacrifice a government can call on all citizens to make, would be reasonable- and only in cases where an individual or individuals would be requested to make the sacrifice alone could the legitimacy of such a request be questioned.

Democracies naturally earn the loyalty and admiration of their citizenry through direct response; that is, that each citizen in need should be able to go to the government or one of the governments established programs for need, or if none exist, the citizen can start an initiative to create whatever programs he or she feels is lacking in the nation. Because it is in the best interest of a self-ruling system to look after itself, the citizenry will always find themselves well taken care-of, and usually involved in some type of political discussion or social evolution, naturally engendering a sense of pride and loyalty in the citizenry. One can even go so far as to assume a sense of allegiance would also be engendered into the citizens, which would allow for the establishment of a powerful volunteer military force. However, for citizens to full understand and appreciate their governmental system (particularly the generations of citizens who have no recollection of any time prior to the founding) they must be very well educated on the democratic process, on the subjects of national and international history, and they must be educated on the alternative forms of government. Here we have yet another example of the social contract at work- this time the give-take relationship of government and citizenry is replaced by a cause-effect system. This cause-effect system allows a democratic government with a traditionally gentler hand towards its people to engender them with appreciation, and allows the government to shape (to an extent) the opinions of its citizenry. Being subject to the Social Contract, however, this cause-effect can be used only so long as the government continues to write laws that express the general will and desires of the people, and do not violate the founding principles of the government.

It is difficult for any group of people, even the entire citizenry and authors of the constitution, to imagine every possible contingency. That being said, what becomes of the Social Contract when the democratic government abandons its basic founding principles in exchange for a more authoritarian or totalitarian policy of rule cannot be completely anticipated, however one can speculate that just as the Social Contract gives and takes, and causes and effects, that there would be an incredible social backlash to the transformation from democracy to dictatorship. There is no greater political crime in a democratic state than the abandonment of those fundamental principles upon which the state itself was founded, but in order to re-establish itself and the good faith of its citizenry following a violation of one of its founding norms, the government (if it does survive in its democratic form at all, the potential outcomes of civil wars and rebellions have no place in a theory essay) must be willing to execute those men who had conspired against the Social Contract of the nation and their fellow citizens. As Machiavelli said, one cannot afford to leave counter-government radicals and political prisoners alive, especially in a state where those people close to the radicals as well as the radicals themselves still have the basic rights to be represented in government.

The response of the citizenry to attempted coups and hostile takeovers of government can easily be shaped by the government into aggressive patriotism, but the citizenry also have a responsibility to question their government at all times, regardless of whether or not it is violating any of its founding principles or the civil and social rights of an individual. With an education on the subject of the political systems, comes an alertness on the part of the citizen to changes in the political climate. When by the gauge of the citizenry the government has become infested with corruption and the basic control on the democratic system (that is, all men being equal under the law) has failed, then disenfranchisement will take hold of the citizenry- who will generally begin to lose faith in their government. At that point the citizenry can either try to salvage their government or they may attempt to overthrow their government and replace it with a system better designed to fight potential control, and better designed to maintain the control on democracy (such as a checks and balances system).

Modern democracies have come into being only recently, but already democracy is the predominant form of government on this planet. Today, hundreds of independent democracies are changing and evolving every day, ushering in new social changes or clinging hard to old traditional values the world over. Democratic systems are bringing free press and trade to formerly isolationist countries, but also bringing war and disenfranchisement to places like the Middle-East. There's no guarantee that democracies are in fact the perfect form of government for every state on every continent of the globe- there are many states who have not wanted and do not want democracy, and there are many more who are trying to figure out just how to get it to work. Regardless of national prejudice, one can take pride in knowing that the basic inalienable rights which we have inherited in this country are traveling around the world and people can finally begin to stand up and have their voices heard- whether they are liberal or conservative doesn't matter, that they now have a voice is all that is important. Understanding democracy we can gain insight into our own political system as well as into ourselves and others, to see how our government has shaped and molded us. As we mature, we earn the right to chose those who represent us in political office (or if they don't represent you, you get to make fun of their inability to form a coherent sentence for 8 years), something that perhaps many people who were raised in democracies have come to take for granted.