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1. Classical democracy has had a long tradition. Some of its features are:
(a) Equal participation by all freemen in the common affairs of the polity;
(b) Participation as an essential instrument of good life;
(c) Public decisions in an atmosphere of free discussion;
(d) General respect for law and for the established procedures;
(e) Majority opinion determines legislation (Dicey: Law and Opinion in England, 1905);
(f) People expressed their sovereign will through majority votes;
(g) Test of government is the welfare of the people; and
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(h) Participation is the ‘essence’ of democracy (Bryce: Modern Democracies, 1921).
2. Liberal democracy:
Until the 19th century, was not at all democratic. Much of it was antidemocratic. The individual has the right to unlimited acquisition of property and to the capitalist market economy. It implied inequality in the political spheres also. It insisted on property qualifications for the right-to-vote. This was contrary to the democratic principles. This classical liberalism fostered capitalism responsible for large-scale industrialisation and urbanisation. There was concentration of workers in large industrial cities.
They were forced to live under sub-human conditions created by competitive economy. This class became conscious of its strength and insisted on its rights. In this way the liberal state was forced to accommodate democratic principles in order to save its own existence. A combination of free-market economy with universal adult franchise came up. Conflicting claims of the capitalists and the masses were accommodated under the ideology of ‘welfare state’.
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Procedures and institutional arrangements stood by the new principles (C.B. Macpherson: Democratic Theory: Essays in Retrieval, 1973).
Principles of liberal democracy include:
(a) Government by consent,
(b) Public accountability,
(c) Majority rule,
(d) Recognition of minority rights, and,
(e) Constitutional government.
Mechanism includes institutions and procedures. Accordingly, there should be more than one political party freely competing for political power. Political offices should not be confined to any privileged class. Periodic elections based on universal adult franchise should be held regularly. Civil liberties should be protected and granted to all citizens. Independence of judiciary is a must to maintain them.
3. Elitist democracy:
Elitist democracy relates to elitist theories which come from sociology. Gaetano Mosca (The Ruling Class, 1896) and Robert Michels (Political Parties: A Sociological Study of the Oligarchical Tendencies of Modern Democracy, 1911) found the society divided into two groups: the rulers and the ruled. The former control most of the wealth, power and prestige.
The ruled remain to replace them. Vilfredo Pareto (The Mind and Society, 1915-19) used the terms ‘elite’ and ‘masses’ which are respectively superior and inferior groups of a society. Michel observed ‘iron law of oligarchy’ in every organisation, which is rule of the chosen few. The ‘elite’ show highest ability in every field while masses feel safe in following the direction of the elite. Karl Mannheim (Ideology and Utopia: An Introduction to the Sociology of Knowledge, 1929) reconciled elite theory with democratic theory.
According to him, society does not cease to be democratic by entrusting the shaping and making of policy to the elites. The masses cannot directly participate in the government. They can only make their aspirations felt at certain intervals. This is sufficient for democracy. The people can always act to remove their leaders and force them to take decisions in their interests. Selection of leaders is made on merit. Joseph A. Schumpeter (Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, 1942) stood for market-theory of democracy.
According to him democracy is ‘an institutional arrangement by which individuals acquire power of decision-making on the basis of competitive struggle for people’s votes’. He insists on methods of appointment and dismissing the makers of law and policy. Political decisions are taken by the ‘leadership’ and there is a free competition among the leaders for winning people’s votes. Rulers are different from the common people. The people choose their leaders from the competing elites. This arrangement does not allow the leaders to grab absolute power. Political leaders have to earn larger support of the voters than their opponents.
The initiative remains in the hand of the leaders while the people simply respond to policies offered by them. Raymond Aron (Social Structure and the Ruling Class, 1950) draws attention on the general system of checks and balances and plurality of the elites. The elites are divided in a liberal democracy. Plurality of the elite makes government a business of compromise. This makes them sensitive to public opinion and conscious of the opposition. They have to change seats with the opponents in due course of time. Initiative remains in the hands of the elite.
Masses keep limited to choosing the ruling elite and to put pressure on them in their functioning. Giovanni Sartori (Democratic Theory, 1958) is more realistic. His views on democracy are similar to Schumpeter. Sartori finds most definitions of democracy half-truths and misleading. They limit democracy to ‘government’ only. Sartori makes a distinction between democracy as (i) an ideal, (ii) an illusion, and, (iii) a reality. One should keep these three aspects of democracy separate, though the first and the third interact. The three ideals of democracy: (i) popular sovereignty, (ii) equality, and (iii) self-government contradict each other, and make democracy an illusion.
One has to be realistic. Everyone likes to have the ‘ideals’ of democracy. This is so till democracy is accepted as ideal. After its acceptance, when we begin to execute the ideal, it turns into an ‘illusion.’ In countries, having several crores of people, there cannot be ‘rule by the whole people.’ Any self-government by them is impossible.
If a few are to be governor, and the rest are governed, then the aspect of ‘equality’ suffers. If self-government is extensive, it cannot be intensive, and vice versa. Excessive democracy ultimately tends to kill itself. Power to all means power to none, or some charismatic leader (later dictator) would take over, leading it to dictatorial form of government.
In reality, the people themselves do not rule. They do condition the democratic system or create environment for it. The people elect, influence and control the group of governors. This group is often a political party or some parties. There are many such groups or parties. Thus, democracy, instead of being a self-government, is a polyarchy. A political party selects its leaders. But the people select political party or parties to govern. This selection is an election by the people. It has to be done in a fair, free and independent manner. In practice, democracy is the government only by and of the people.
In democracy, power remains with ‘active demos,’ who actually are minorities or small groups. Their dominance in this system is treated as ‘democratic’ because entry in them is ‘open’ or un-restricted. All are free to participate or not to participate. None is coerced for doing so. Therefore, only active citizens have power in democracy. Democracy is rule of the leading elite: or leading minorities.
This is the reality of democracy. However, the use of the word ‘democracy’ must be retained as it represents an ideal or a set of popular aspirations. It opposes the very idea that democratic government can ever be the rule of one person or group. The role of the elite does not suggest any imperfection of democracy. It is the core of the democratic system. Governance is the business of competent leaders. The people exercise their right to govern only at elections.
Danger to democracy emanates not from the existence of leaders but from the absence of leadership. In that case masses would be exploited by anti-democratic counter-elites. Leaders also educate public opinion. Sartori says that, ‘Actually, I am taking sides for, but against the inconsistency of the many who refuse with one hand what they demand with the other, who refuse the means and yet want the ends.’
4. Pluralist democracy:
Pluralist democracy appears in two forms: (i) the elitist-democratic, and (ii) the group theories. The former regards, on lines of Karl Mannheim and Raymond Aron, plurality of the elites as the foundation of modern liberal democracy. The latter finds democracy as a process of bargaining among autonomous groups. These groups form the character of the polity pluralistic. A.F. Bentley (The Process of Government, 1908) and David Truman (The Governmental Process, 1951) find the game of democracy played by a great variety of groups.
The task of government is to make policies which reflect the highest common group demand. It is the focal point for public pressure groups. A democratic society is a pluralist or differentiated society. The management of public affairs is shared by a number of groups. Robert A. Dahl (A Preface to Democratic Theory, 1956) developed a model of polyarchy. It is similar to the models of Bentley, Truman and Latham {The Group Basis of Politics, 1952). Their analysis of the nature of democratic society is pluralistic.
It is done in the sociological sense. It is sociological explanation of the political process. They find it as different from the elitists in that the bargaining process among the relatively autonomous groups is highly decentralised. There is interaction among all such groups in claiming upon or showing interest in a particular issue. A group will get its way on the basis of its strength and the intensity of participation.
The pluralist theory stands apart from the liberal theory as well as the elitist theory. In it law and policy making is the product of group interaction. It does away with the role of the representatives or a coherent majority or of the autonomous and unrepresentative elite. In this way the form of government becomes redundant. Public policy reflects only the interests of the more organised and vocal groups. Interests of producers dominate over the interests of consumers.
The former are usually more organised than the latter. The pluralists repudiate the authoritarian basis of policy-making in a democracy. However, both elitist and pluralist theories favour maintenance of the status quo. They justify the phenomenon of domination either on grounds of certain outstanding inborn qualities of persons or on better organisation of certain interests.’
5. Participatory democracy:
Participatory democracy maintains that the ultimate authority of governance rests with the people themselves. Bachrach, Bay, Hayden, Lynd, Kariel, Kenniston, Pateman and others stand for it. In representative democracy people become inactive and passive after electing their representatives. In big countries, democracy expands geographically. Distance between the people and their representatives widens. Few citizens are able to contact with their representatives.
According to the elitist theorists citizen participation is not a necessary condition of democracy. Citizens only vote for their leaders at the time of periodic elections. Polyarchy of Robert Dahl reconciles democracy with a low level of citizen participation. Both Schumpeter and Dahl treat democracy as a mechanism to maintain equilibrium. They consider it as a competition between two or more elite groups for gaining power. They desire only a low level of citizen participation.
Participatory theory regards political participation as the basic principle of democracy. Individuals and groups actively take part in the governmental processes affecting their lives. They play an active role in the process of formulation and implementation of policies and decisions. Political participation includes voting, contesting elections, campaigning, canvassing, celebrating national festivals and functions and the like.
Political participation also includes opposition – signing petitions, peaceful demonstrations, organising protest marches, passive resistance, satyagraha and the like. Jean Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract, 1762) was pioneer of participatory democracy. He claimed that sovereignty originates in the people. It is retained by them even after the transition from the state of nature to civil society. It can neither be represented nor alienated. Representatives are mere agents of the people. Government is only an instrument to execute the instructions of the general will.
The latter is the real will of all members of a community. It. reflects the true interest of each individual as well as the common interest of the whole community. The people constantly deliberate on public issues and issue instructions to the government. The government cannot depart from these instructions. If it fails to implement, it can be revoked and replaced forthwith by another set of executives.
Presently, the people have little knowledge and understanding of political problems. Majority of them do not vote and do not discuss. Representatives avoid public accountability. There is rampant corruption and abuse of power. Political participation can remove most of these problems. This can be realised through a decentralisation of administration, b. use of referendum on a wider scale. In this manner, it can prove useful on (i) instrumental, (ii) educational, and, (iii) communitarian grounds.
Many socialist countries had also adopted political participation as a counter- measure to elitism and dominance of capitalism. They call their governments as ‘people’s democracy’ or ‘people’s democratic republic’. But in practice, their attempts merely hide reality. In fact, advocates of participatory democracy are overoptimistic. Excessive political participation may prove harmful. Ordinary people cannot make correct assessment of the situation and concerning issues. They may exaggerate their grievances and demands and resort to streets demonstrations, indiscipline and anarchy.
6. Marxian democracy:
Marxian democracy stands on totally different grounds. Marx found matter, productive forces, or modes of production as the basic material. His materialism is scientific and dynamic which grants no place to soul, God or Creator. It is matter-in-motion that operates in a dialectical process – thesis, anti-thesis and synthesis. Modes of production or social existence makes up the basic economic structure, the rest is the political superstructure. Political power or state is a handmaid of economic power. In order to derive legitimacy, political institutions of liberal democracy elections, voting etc. pay only lip-service to the principle of ‘sovereignty of the people’.
Representative institutions, equal political rights etc. are only ideological misconceptions. Liberal democracy grants only formal equality. The workers who have right to vote with other dominant classes are led to believe that they have an equal share in governance. This type of political system simply lends legitimacy to the prevailing property relations. Liberal institutions do not provide an effective mechanism for transforming the property relations to serve the common interests, particularly, of the workers. Marxian democracy stands for a violent revolution by forcibly taking over the means of production through organisation of workers.
It establishes the dictatorship of the proletariat. It implies a stage where there is complete ‘socialisation of the major means of production’, and planning of all the material production to serve the social needs, and grant rights to work, education, health and housing for the masses. There is fuller development of science and technology to multiply material production to realise greater social satisfaction.
The dictatorship of the proletariat is ‘concrete democracy. It is coercive power of the majority over the minority. Exercise of domination and coercion is necessary to contain the forces of capitalism and of counter-revolution. Lenin called it ‘democratic decentralisation’. This democratic dictatorship was to remain in force for a transitional period. All property or the means of production will be socially owned. Along with classes, the state would gradually wither away. The power of the state will be ‘transformed into simple administrative functions’ (Karl Marx: Capital, Vol. 3).
It will be “people’s democracy” and a classless society. The state will represent uniform interests of all the workers. Marx anticipated that bourgeois democracy would be replace by ‘commune system’. In communes, the members own everything in common, including the product of their labour. They would manage their own affairs, elect their delegates for the larger administrative units.
The larger units would elect their delegates for the still larger administrative areas, such as, national administration. This system is described as ‘pyramidal structure of direct democracy’. All delegates would be bound by the instructions given by their electorates or their committees.
In case of violation, they would be removed or recalled. Both Soviet Union (1917) and China (1949) tried this model in their own ways but failed miserably. In fact, in the usage of “people’s democracy”, the term “people’s” is tautological, because democracy means ‘the rule of the people’. However, Marxian democracy rules out the existence of democracy itself. It does not include middle and upper classes. It is committed to a particular set of interests. After the ushering of the ‘communist’ revolution, social conflicts do not end as was witnessed in Soviet Russia and China.
Still competition for power, sharp political rivalries and suppression of political opponents broke out. Abolition of classes was negated by occupational grading forming a ruthless pyramid of power. Antonio Gramsci (Prison Notebooks) has pointed out that the ruling class in capitalist society now rules not only by force, but also through the consent of the ruled and derives its legitimacy from the cultural and intellectual orientations of the people. The dominant economic class does not exercise its coercive power through the state and governmental apparatus alone.
7. Gandhian democracy:
Gandhian democracy claims to be the best of all democracies. Whereas all other democracies stand only for welfare relating to this world, it caters to the needs of man living here and hereafter. It means man at all levels, local, regional, national and global, and in all matters, moral, social, personal, religious, economic and political. All it does on the basis of its metaphysical and religious ethos. Accordingly, there is all-pervading Reality of God or Truth. Spiritual freedom finds God or Truth everywhere. The Gandhians ask human beings to look beyond, and rise above temporal present.
The goal of life is realisation of ‘moksha’ or God. This can be attained through faith, meditation, prayers, ascetic life, good will and self-suffering. One has to live by doing disinterested performance of duties and obligations. As God is everywhere and in all living beings there is no room for violence anywhere and in any form. Practice of non-violence, being related to faith in God, generates power.
There is power of creed-based non-violence which they regard it as invincible and unfailing. Another is power of policy or expediency based non-violence. If one is not able to obtain first form, as Gandhi himself could not, they would like to employ the second form. It emerges out of organisation, discipline, demands and vast number of protesting satyagrahis. The Gandhians claim to bring about any political, social, economic and moral change by using power of non-violence.
Both of them are ultimately based on self-suffering. But their goal remains the same: realisation of ‘moksha’ or God. According to them, if that goal is adopted by men, women and communities world over, there would not be any cut throat competition, conflict, hatred, war and violence.
They believe in freedom of soul, and want to fight against all forms of authoritarianism, coercion and violence. To obtain this goal they adopt means and methods of satyagraha. To them only the individual has soul. The state has no soul. Individual is at the root of all progress. Individual, State and society are separate. For men of non-violence, there is no need of sate.
Till the individuals reach that ideal stage or ‘Ram Rajya’, they are not in favour of eliminating the state. Presently, state and political power both are necessary. However, the scope of state activities could gradually be reduced to minimum. In the Gandhian state, everybody is to have ‘swaraj’ that is to be his own ruler. There would be no need of army, navy, air force, police, courts and laws. It would be a democracy based on non-violence.
They would launch election and representative system on the basis of unanimity and consent. The candidates contesting elections must be unselfish, able, and have self-control. They oppose Western form of parliamentary democracy and repose their faith in statements of the Hind Swaraj. The basis of right to vote must be physical labour, and not the possession of property or social status. The Gandhians, preferring ‘Gram Swaraj’ want to conduct all social construction and welfare activities on voluntary basis.
They want to restructure the present world order on principles of Gandhian economy, such as, (a) non-possessions; (b) opposition to industrialisation; (c) support to cottage and rural industries; (d) trusteeship and personal property for moral upliftment and ending economic exploitation; and (e) class co-operation. They say adoption of these principles would lead to solution of all current problems. They are totally against the prevailing global economic order.
Their ethos of religion usher a new social revolution. They adoption does not permit any kind of racialism, casteism, gender discrimination, untouchability etc. They Gandhians propose to take up many programmes of uplift, social reform and reconstruction as part of their treading on the path of dispassionate performance of duties to realise goal of attaining ‘moksha’.
8. Radical democracy:
Radical democracy has been advocated by C.B. Macpherson (1911-87) in his Democratic Theory: Essays in Retrieval, 1973- In 1966 {The Real World of Democracy) he made clear that only universal suffrage, plurality of political parties and civil liberties do make democracy. Democracy can be existing even when there is intraparty democracy and an open bureaucratic system.
Prevalence of mass-enthusiasm in developing countries also makes them democratic. For the classical theorists democracy was founded upon moral foundations to emancipate humanity. For the elitist-plural theorists it was a mechanism to maintain market equilibrium. Radical democracy wants to emancipate human beings from the constraints of prevailing competitive capitalist order. It believes in ‘creative freedom’.
Western democratic theory operates on (a) the principle of utility-maximisation, and (b) the principle of power-maximisation advocated respectively by Bentham and J.S. Mill. In the latter sense, man is a doer and creator as well. However, Macpherson makes a distinction between two types of power: developmental power and extractive power. First is man’s ability to use his own capacities creatively to realise his own goals, and, the second is his power over others to extract benefit for himself. In capitalism non-owners of property enjoy negligible amount of developmental power.
Extractive power remains the sole preserve of the owners of land and capital. In a simple exchange economy an individual is the owner of the means of production as well as the means of labour. In capitalist economy the means of labour are detached from the means of production. Labour is regarded as a commodity which can be bought and sold in an open market. The means of production are owned by the capitalists. They operate them solely for earning profit, having no regard for human values. They indulge in possessive individualism.
9. Cosmopolitan democracy:
There is rise of the new elites in the global order. These elites include experts and specialists, senior administrative personnel, and transnational business executives, politicians and intellectuals. They constitute a distinct minority whom Held calls ‘cosmopolitans’. According to Held, unlike political nationalism, cosmopolitanism registers and reflects the multiplicity of issues, questions, processes and problems that affect and bind people together, irrespective of where they were born or reside.
Cosmopolitanism discloses the cultural, legal and ethical basis of political order in a world where political communities and states matter, but not only and exclusively. But cosmopolitanism is multidimensional. Cosmopolitanism grows on three principles: one, the ultimate units of moral concern are individual human beings, not state or collectivities; two, individuals carry the status of equal worth with reciprocal recognition; and, three, each person enjoys impartial treatment of their claims. Cosmopolitanism endures only when it leads to a cosmopolitan democracy. Held stands for cosmopolitan democracy at global level.
For the first time its principles found expression in the legal and institutional initiatives taken after World War II. These can be seen in the UN Declaration of Human Rights and the subsequent 1966 Covenants of Rights. Acceptance of the equal worth of all human beings is found in the laws of war and weapons diffusion.'” Recognition of democracy is found in the International Bill of Human Rights, new codes of conduct for IGOs and INGOs and the many other regional treaties. Existing international laws generate a new structure of cosmopolitan accountability and regulation. The ‘sovereign rights of states’ are affirmed alongside more and more cosmopolitan leanings.
All this is proposed to be done by transforming a club-driven and executive-led multilateralism to a more transparent, accountable and just form of governance. Held calls it as ‘cosmopolitan multilateralism’.”
The proposed cosmopolitan polity would have a division of powers and competences at various levels of political action and interconnectedness. It would embrace diverse and distinct domains of authority, linked reciprocally in both vertical and horizontal manners. States and agencies would be committed to cosmopolitan principles and rules.
The UN system has to live up to the UN Charter. This would ensure enforcement of prohibition on the discretionary right of states to use force. There must be a basis for the UN system to generate political resources of its own with an autonomous decision-making centre. Cosmopolitanism involves the development of administrative capacity and independent political resources at regional and global levels as a necessary complement to those in local and national politics.
Therefore, it has to create, on lines given below, an effective, and accountable administrative, legislative and executive capacity both at regional and global levels:
(a) Creation of regional parliaments and governance structures to meet with problems and challenges which states alone cannot resolve;
(b) Establishment of an authoritative assembly of all democratic states and agencies as a reformed General Assembly of the United Nations or stand as a complement to it. It would work out rules, standards and institutions to realise cosmopolitan values and priorities;
(c) Opening of important international organisations to public examination and agenda setting. They would be open and accessible to public scrutiny;
(d) Arrangement of general referenda concerning contested cosmopolitan priorities and their implementation. There can be many kinds of referenda involving a cross-section of the public, and of targeted groups in particular policy areas; and
(e) Development of a cosmopolitan law-enforcement and coercive capability, including peacekeeping as well as peacemaking. There would be provisional deputation of a proportion of a nation-state’s military to the new regional or global authorities. These authorities could also establish a permanent independent force recruited directly from among individuals belonging to all countries. The use of force would always be the last resort. A cosmopolitan polity does not call for a diminution per se of state power and capacity across the globe. It wants to develop new institutions as a necessary complement to those at the level of the state.
10. Tele-democracy:
‘Tele-democracy’ (literally “democracy at a distance”), is attracting a lot of attention of the democratic elite. It makes use of new communications technologies. Its advocates and contends that innovative forms of electronic discourse can remedy many of the shortcomings of representative democracy of contemporary mass society. The prevailing form of deliberative democracy is mainly founded on the principles of reasoned dialogue and deliberation.
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The rationale for tele-democracy is consistent with an approach to political theory variously termed as “rational choice”, “negative liberalism”, or “the logic of collective action”. It is founded on a marketplace conception of the political world in which interests conflict and compete. By contrast, deliberative democracy is rooted in the ideal of self-governance in which political truths emerge not from the clash of pre-established interests and preferences but from reasoned discussion about issues involving the common good. This model is known as “collective rationality”, “unitary democracy”, or simply “deliberative democracy”.
Political thinkers, dating back to ancient Athens, have stressed the importance of public discourse and debate. In the fourth century BC, Pericles, the orator and statesman recognised discussion among the citizens of the polis as an “indispensable preliminary” to political action. In the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle articulated an extensive philosophical rationale for the importance of this process, noting that “the art of legislation” was impossible without reasoned dialogue and deliberation.
Modern philosophers, such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau and John Stuart Mill, have reflected on the importance of public discourse. Rousseau deemed it essential to the formation of a “general will”. In his work On Liberty, Mill outlined a philosophical rationale for something he called “government by discussion.” The US Supreme Court Justice, Louis D. Brandeis also observed,
Those who won our independence believed that the final end of the state was to make men free to develop their faculties; and that in its government the deliberative forces should prevail over the arbitrary. They believed that… the greatest menace to freedom is an inert people; that public discussion is a political duty; and that this should be a fundamental principle of American government.
The advent of new technologies such as the telephone, mobile, radio, and television, has radically changed the nature of public discourse in the twentieth and present century. Today political communication has mutated into something the ancient, and even, modern scholars, could scarcely have foreseen. The voluntary associations, public spaces, local newspapers, and neighbourhood assemblies of their day have given way to computer bulletin boards, satellite television, tele-conference and radio call-in programmes.