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Essay on ancient greece government
History of modern democracy
Aspects of American democracy
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Democracy can be defined as a type of government in which individuals are guided by representatives whom they elected. It is a society of people, everything for the people and by the people. In this type of government, it is the individuals who are superior and independent. They are able to have control over the government and are free to elect a government of their own choice. Freedom has a lot to do with democracy, as it is the core component in this subject. Democracy relies on the following conditions: co-existence of ideas and of parties, the right to free discussion, universal adult suffrage and periodic relations. In a historical aspect, democracy was highly regarded in ancient Rome and Greece. However, it had very little success. In …show more content…
Voting, political gathering, and official citizenship are all concepts that can be linked back to traditional Grecian ideas. The Romans developed the perception of the representative democracy .This was best demonstrated by the Roman Senate. The higher house of the U.S. Congress is the Senate to this ancient model. Although American Democracy is well-defined as a demonstrative democracy, that is to say citizens elect those who make decisions. They therefore owe a great deal to Greek philosophies and notions. The thirteen British colonies in North America declared their independence in 1776. These colonies stated that “governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” This translated to them wanting a government for the people, run by the people. This was this the epitome on which America was established. The “colonies” were required to have a written constitution to explain and consequently more precisely limit government influences. Shortly after the Articles of Confederation failed to work in the 13 colonies, the U.S. Constitution was produced in 1787.The preamble of the constitution is the idea that majority is favored. In our government, the congress uses the majority rules to follow through with the bills which connects to the congress and the president. As per having so many payments and balances, sometimes they do not make it as bill. This is one of the principles found in the Constitution. The parting of powers occurs inside the three inter-connected branches; the parliamentary, administrative, and judiciary branch has no authority over the others. It was intended to stop any branch from invading individual liberties maintained by the constitution. The American constitutional rights are very significant.
According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary Democracy is a form of government by the people; especially: rule of the majority(Webster). This is what the United States is represented as, and this is based on the United States Constitution from which the United states draws all legal powers. In Robert Dahls book How democratic Is the American Constitution? He challenges this idea by trying to appeal to his readers in a way that they may view the United States Constitution in a different light. Dahl does this by pointing out flaws that the Constitution has and, draws on facts based on the other democracies around the world that the United States is compared too. He points out how many democratic ideas and innovations have a occurred since the conception of the American Constitution yet it has only adopted some of those idea.
Democracy is the structure of government still used today in many countries.The definition of democracy is a system of government where people who rule directly are freely elected representatives.In addition, democracy comes from the Greek word demokratia. Demo meaning people and kratia meaning power of rule. For instance, here is an example, Great Britain has a democratic government since elected officials and laws are voted on by the people and also the representatives they elect. Therefore Athens exemplifies a democratic government. “Athenians would meet and vote on a simple question …. is anyone becoming a threat to democracy? If a simple majority voted yes,then they dispersed and reassembled two months later,
The Roman Republic can be seen as a template for how the United States Government was formed, and still to this day consists of. The First influence that the Romans had on our government was their idea for a republic. They, our country as well, wanted their people to have a vote on who would represent them in government. The U.S. representative type of government was influenced by this. Today we vote for the people representing us in our Senate, House of Representatives, and our President. One of the main influences that the Ancient Romans had on the U.S. Government was the idea of the division of power. Today we have executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government. The Ancient Romans had a very similar set-up. In Rome when organizing a government, there were many different styles between monarchies, the Senate that was the aristocracy, and the voice of democracy in the people. These acted as their different branches of government. As the U.S Government has an executive branch which consists of our President and Vice President, the Romans had counsels which acted as executive leaders for a year, and controlled the military (“The Roman Republic”). The Ancient Romans also obtained a Senate, similar to our government. In Rome, it was 300 members of the wealthy and self-serving. Today, there are career senators, and elite men in society. This is the legislative branch of our government that has been derived from the Ancient Romans. Also within the legislative branch of the Romans, they had numerous assemblies like that of the U.S. Government’s House of Representatives, based on where each member lives. Our judicial branch was based off of the Roman’s Praeto...
America’s form of representative democracy came as a result of the transgressions Britain committed against their colonies. Several hundred years of salutary neglect served well for those living an ocean away from their motherland. Realizing the prosperity that colonies had obtained through a semi-free market society, the King of England and the parliament began enacting many taxes and acts. Taking away the colonies freedom was unsettling amongst the colonists and eventually led to a revolution. This revolution secured freedom from Britain as well as founded a new nation with the first ever constitution. Although the process to achieve democracy in America was a long, laborious road the freedom, prosperity and equality of opportunity shared by those amongst the states could not be denied.
The Ancient Greeks were the first to put the power of a nation in the hands of the average citizen, they created the idea of the democratic government, practiced as a direct democracy. Voting, political assembly, and official citizenship are all concepts that can be traced back to Classical Grecian ideas .The Romans developed the concept of the representative democracy .This was best exemplified by the Roman Senate. The upper house of the US Congress is the Senate in ode to this ancient ideal. Although American Democracy is defined as a Representative Democracy, that is to say citizens elect those who make decisions, they owe a great deal to Greek ideas and concepts.
The United States of America is a republic, or representative democracy. Democracy, a word that comes to us from Greek, literally means the people rule (Romance, July 8). This broad definition leaves unanswered a few important details such as who are the people, how shall they rule, and what should they rule on (July 8). Defining the answers to those questions means defining a model for a democratic system. William E. Hudson defines four such models in his book American Democracy in Peril: the Protective, Developmental, Pluralist, and Participatory models of democracy (Hudson, 8-19). Of these models, perhaps Participatory comes closest to an ideal, pure democracy of rule by the people (16-19). In practice, however, establishing a stable ideal democracy is not entirely feasible. In a country the size of the United States, it quickly becomes unwieldy if not impossible to have direct rule by the people. To overcome this, the compromise of the representative system allows the people to choose who will rule on a regular basis. The political culture that defines American politics shows that despite this compromise, America is still very much a democratic society.
The system of government we have today was starting to developed centuries ago by the Athenians and Romans. Both governments were established with the intent to give power to the people, even though it did not always play out that way in society. The Athenian democracy and the Roman republic were two very different governments in practice, but also maintained similar characteristics in both systems of government.
The term democracy comes from the Greek language and means "rule by the people."(Democracy Building 2012) The democracy in Athens represents the events leading up to modern day democracies. Like our modern democracy, the Athenian democracy was created as a reaction to a concentration and abuse of power by the rulers. Philosophers defined the essential elements of democracy as a separation of powers, basic civil rights, human rights, religious liberty and separation of church and state. The most current definition of a democracy is defined as a “government by the people; a form of government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised directly by them or by their elected agents under a free electoral system.”(Dictionary.com). The American democracy was greatly influenced by the Athenian democracy. The Founding Fathers of the American democracy borrowed ideas from the Athenian way of governing. Presently, Americans live in a democracy that is much different than that the Athenian democracy, and what the Founding Fathers of the American Democracy envisioned. Although there are some commonalities between Athens and what our Founding Fathers intended, there are major differences as well. Differences between the modern American democracy the Athenian democracy and what the Founding Fathers envisioned are size of the democracies, the eligibility of a citizen to participate in the democracy and how a citizen participated.
The American government prides itself on the foundational principle of democracy which allows individual voices to be heard. Afterall, the roots of power in our nation stem from the people. The Constitution was established to ensure the balance of powers among the federal government, state legislature, and the common people. Time, however, has worked against the American people in the battle towards democracy. The idea of a governing body drawing its power directly from its constituents has been undermined by the corrupt nature of modern politics where politicians act out of self-interest. While the Constitution and later amendments had every intention of securing basic liberties, certain limitations later undermined the original intentions of the founding fathers to give power back to the people by placing the larger majority of power in the hands of the state.
A memorable expression said by President Abraham Lincoln reads, “Democracy is government of the people, by the people, and for the people”. Democracy, is a derived from the Greek term "demos" which means people. It is a successful, system of government that vests power to the public or majority. Adopted by the United States in 1776, a democratic government has six basic characteristics: (i) established/elected sovereignty (where power and civic responsibility are exercised either directly by the public or their freely agreed elected representative(s)), (ii) majority rule(vs minority), (iii) (protects one’s own and reside with) human rights, (iv) regular free and fair elections to citizens (upon a certain age), (v) responsibility of
Firstly, K. Isbester mentions that democracy has a different meaning for everyone, as some can define democracy as a good aspect for development, on the contrary other believe that it is nothing more than voting after several years. Although, Latin America see democratic g...
One of the contemporary definitions of democracy today is as follows: “Government by the people, exercised either directly or through elected representatives; Rule by the majority” (“Democracy” Def.1,4). Democracy, as a form of government, was a radical idea when it manifested; many governments in the early history of the world were totalitarian or tyrannical in nature, due to overarching beliefs that the strong ruled over the weak.
Democracy is “...the word that resonates in people’s minds and springs from their lips as they struggle for freedom and a better way of life...” (Schmitter and Karl, 1991:75). However, the word democracy has many different means depending on the country and context it is used in. “Every country has is own culture and comes by its political system through its own history” (Greenberg, 2007:101, cited in Li, 2008:4). Li, (2008) states that because of China’s political structure the usual road to democracy may be difficult for it to achieve. The western idea ...
Democracy has come to mean a principle under whose flag has most of the developed countries aced in their race for Imperialism. It has gone beyond all previous governing systems and has made room for progress and development. By offering free and fair elections, democracy has redefined human dignity and patriotism. It has also helped to improve decision-making among the citizens, and brought down the crime level. Democracy is for sure the most fitting among the other types of government, and needs to be implemented fully for effective functioning of a state.
What is democracy? Democracy a form of government in which the people freely elect representatives to govern them in a country, democracy guarantees free and fair elections, basic personal and political rights and independent court of law. There are two types of democracy, direct and indirect democracy. Direct democracy or pure democracy is where there is direct participate of the people; people make decisions for them instead of letting them representative make decision for them. Indirect democracy the decisions are made by the representative on behalf of the people that voted for them. All over the world people are having different views with regard to democracy and how it operates. “It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried” ~ Winston Churchill, some have said democracy is the worst government form of government which I also think it’s! Due to the how it operates.