Democracy as representative government

In my continuing search for what I am missing in my version of democracy, I am rereading Przeworski’s book on representative government, an in depth and sensitive discussion of the issues involved in discussions of democracy. He points out that except for the brief use of the term democracy in ancient Athens, the term was not used until the 1500s and did not become popular until the 1800s. In his view democracy is equivalent to representative government and did not appear until the American and French revolutions. More precisely, representation was not applied to governments of large nation states until that time. It may have existed sporadically in small city states such as in Florence or Venice, but not on a large scale.

For Przeworski the issues involved in having a democratic government—indeed, in having any government—are those of dealing with economic inequality, ensuring political equality, ensuring the maximum freedom possible, and establishing a balance between liberty and order and stability.

Winters provides the perspective from which the issue of economic inequality needs to be discussed. It is not just a problem of controlling such inequality, as if the government could manipulate the oligarchs. It is rather the other way around, one of continued efforts of the government to placate the oligarchs so that they will allow the government to attend to the will of the people. The oligarchs set the limits within which the government operates.

In this context the issues of freedom and equality are ensured to the people through the democratic process--majority rule—and the rule of law and the sanctity of property, which are double-edged swords. The rule of law provides predictability to the people, but it also protects the wealth of the oligarchs. Oligarchs are afraid of majority rule because it provides the potential to upset their control of the people, and so they support restrictions on the application of majority rule. Without such restrictions they would have to rely on their ability to manipulate the people’s representatives to ensure continued protection of their wealth. The British example suggests that they need not fear.

But these issues of freedom vs equality are issues of any government, not just democratic governments, and are thus not intrinsic parts of the definition of democracy.