LEVEL OF DEMOCRACY

Level of Democracy in USA and Russian Federation

Level of Democracy in USA and Russian Federation

Introduction

The process through which a political system becomes democratic is called democratization. One of the goals of U.S. foreign policy is promoting democratization in other countries. Democratic nations historically have not engaged in war with one another; thus, spreading democracy is seen as one way to increase national security (Brogan, 1973). Since World War I, the United States and its allies have attempted to impose democracy on several formerly authoritarian countries. However, the nation's history of promoting and sustaining true democracies abroad is uneven.

Thesis Statement

Democracy today most often means liberal democracy, although this simple conflation in popular speech belies the historical tensions between classical liberalism and democracy. In a liberal democracy, certain basic rights are protected in equal measure for all citizens, regardless of what the majority of their fellow citizens might desire.

Democracy in America

The concepts of equal freedom and majority rule are not perfectly congruent, as citizens who tend to be in the minority need not be treated fairly by democratic majorities. Examples include those whose race, ethnicity, religion, or way of life gives them interests truly or seemingly contrary to those of their fellows, a problem long noted. Aristotle and the American founders both warned, for example, that unrestrained majorities might seek to use government to divest the wealthy of their property and redistribute it to the people, undermining the economic system upon which politics relies. Political philosophers have insisted on the distinction between the good of the majority and the good of all; when the former supplants the latter, it is often called the “tyranny of the majority.” (Busky, 2000)

Solutions to majority tyranny are numerous but entail two broad strategies. Classical political philosophy sought to curb the excesses of the democratic faction by recommending a mixed regime—one in which government is divided among offices representing members of the various social classes. The modern approach eschews any institutional recognition of class, relying instead on various procedural mechanisms to guard against majority tyranny. These include (a) requiring a supermajority or qualified majority vote on certain important measures, (b) the aforementioned checks and balances among branches or levels of government, (c) the concept of enumerated powers outside of which government may not act, (d) proportional representation of various groups within society, and (e) the provision of individual rights, which the government may be barred from infringing. Governments that employ such strategies to protect minority interests are often referred to as liberal democracies (Callinicos, 1993).

Republicanism is best defined as a commitment to the principle that there is a public element (res publica) that can only be legitimately interpreted by the citizens at large. An influential, if irregular, stream of Western political thought since the city-states of ancient Greece and the Roman empire, republicanism is devoted to the development of political structures based on the participation of citizens at large demonstrating a willingness to undertake political action on the basis of commitment to the common ...