Democratisation Localisation of Democracy - Essay Example

?Democratisation Localisation of Democracy A democracy is a government in which citizens in a country participate in making decisions that affect their lives. Primarily, this involves making decisions that affect legal aspects of people’s lives including drafting, debating and enactment of legislation to become law. In addition, democracy involves people participation in making social, economic and cultural decisions. In democracies, representatives or leaders put in record people’s contributions towards making of laws of the land, by-laws and other relevant social instruments depending on the extent of democracy. The constitution is the supreme law of the land in most modern democracies, and all other laws, including customary laws must be consistent with the constitution. Otherwise, they are null and void and cannot be enforced by any law enforcing agency in the country. According to historical events, democratic rule and governance is the fairest and most preferable of all types of governance as citizens are free to decide their fate by offering their views in various ways (Dahl, Shapiro and Cheibub 2003; Lansford 2007). Forms of Democracy There are many types of democracies depending on how the people express their views, and how they implement them. However, these many types have two main characteristics, where the people present their views on governance directly, and where people choose representatives to present their views; direct democracy and indirect democracy, respectively. In indirect democracies, the people elect political representatives. For instance, they elect parliamentarians who go to parliament to debate and pass laws, and each representative presents the key issues affecting his or her people. The various forms of indirect democracies include parliamentary, presidential, semi presidential, constitutional, and liberal constitutional democracies. In presidential democracies, the people elect a president who is the head of state and wields many executive powers. This democracy has other political leaders, but all leadership revolves around a powerful presidency. A semi presidential democracy has both a president and prime minister, with both sharing the powers of an executive president. A constitutional democracy is similar to a parliamentary democracy, but the parliamentarians make all decisions in accordance to the country’s constitution. The people have the power and mandate to petition against the parliament if the latter oversteps the limitations of the constitution on their duties. Finally, representative democracies include liberal constitutional democracies. A liberal constitutional democracy is just like the constitutional democracy, but its parliamentarians have the capacity to alter the constitution to fit the prevailing circumstances (Dworkin 2008, p. 218). Apart from representative democracies, there is the direct form of democracy whereby the people participate directly in governance. In this case, there are usually no representatives and the central government has to consult the people every time it wants to make a decision that affects the legal, socioeconomic, and customary aspects of people’s lives. However, due to the number of people in each country, this democracy is not common and the preferred form of democracy is representative. People practice direct democracy in scenarios where the people involved are few, and it is an economically viable option. Subjects in a representative government vote for sensitive matters like changing a government, altering or changing a constitution, petitioning a non-performing leader, and subdividing the country among others directly in referenda. A referendum is one of the cases where citizens in a representative democracy express their direct opinion to the central government without their parliamentary representatives coming into play. However, these processes are expensive due to the number of people involved and, therefore, having a referendum is rare (Gaus and Kukathas 2004, p. 144). Other scenarios where people express their opinions to the governing body are in open town meetings. Here, the residents of a certain town meet their leaders on a regular basis and express opinions on the way they think things should go in their town. This way, citizens are able to critic and correct their leaders in addition to the latter giving, their subjects a breakdown of town activities, including income, expenditure, and development projects. Characteristics of democracies Equality One outstanding characteristic of both direct and representative democracies is the equality of all citizens in all national matters. For instance, every vote cast by each citizen has equal weight and counts as one unit of a whole, which are the total votes of all citizens combined. The government in power has the duty of informing all citizens of a coming election, in addition to educating the citizen, what the state expects of them during the exercise. Before the law, all citizens in a country are equal, and the ruling bodies should not discriminate between the citizens in any way. This means that the citizens in a democratic country have equal rights to express their nationality regardless of their tribe, ethnicity, colour, gender, wealth, or age. The major function of the supreme law of any democracy is to ensure that all residents enjoy equal rights, and ensure that the law enforcing systems correct anyone who threatens this equality (Diamond and Plattner 2006, p. 156). Freedom Another important characteristic of democracies is the freedoms that citizens have as offered by the supreme law and enforced by the government. These freedoms include the freedom of assembly, freedom of political expression, freedom speech, and freedom of the press. All citizens in a true democracy are free to meet others, and form associations for any purpose as long as their activities do not go against the laws of the land. Freedom of political expressions allows citizens to express their political opinions and ideas without fear or favour. This includes the desires one may have to vie for political office without undue restrictions by the law, associations or individuals. When expressing their opinions or communicating in any way, the freedom of speech clause in supreme laws protects citizens from undue influence if they do so in accordance to the law (Fairfield 2009, p. 98). The other freedom in a true democracy is the freedom of the press. The media can report on any matter affecting the people without fear of oppression. This means that as long as news representatives do not break the law, there are no limitations as pertains news reporting. Since people have the right to information, the law protects the press from unfair influence from those in power, for them to do their job in a certain way. However, the law forbids the press from altering news items to suit their personal needs and limits them to reporting truthfully and critically, including both positive and negative criticism. In democracies, the media act as a regulatory agent, telling the people of the doings of the ruling elite (Fitzpatrick 2003). The media in these countries usually uncovers crime happening in high places but due to the protection offered by law, the implicated officials can do nothing about it. In a democracy, transparency, integrity, and accountability are valued characteristics in government positions. Freedom of the press ensures that people know of leaders who do not make deals transparently, or when government officials do not do their duties in accordance to the law and accepted moral ethics. In addition, freedom of the press ensures that people hold leaders accountable for all decisions made while in office. However, the role of the media is limited to giving information, leaving the mandate to act to the people (Fairfield 2009; Shiva 2006). Criticism to democracy Democracy is a form of the rule that allows everyone in a country to have a hand in decision making, on matters that may affect him or her directly or indirectly. However, if not controlled, a democracy can lead to anarchy whereby every citizen wants his or her views implemented without any consideration for others. These people may abuse the rights and freedoms offered by a democracy by using them to make the lives of others miserable. In addition, democracy involved a lot of vote casting and the government takes the views of the majority to be the views of every citizen. The majority may have shared personal interests or may be ignorant about the subject in question. This means the minority, who have different views or know about a subject more than the majority, suffer due to majority tyranny since the governing bodies cannot implement the views of the minority (Hines 2004). Localisation of democracy In accordance with the law of evolution, changes always happen in such a way that the existing situations and phenomena improve to suit the species involved. Once societies became civilised, the best form of governance was democracy where the highly educated acted as representatives to the rest of the population. However, the individuals represented by one representative have increased over time and hence the need for better representation methods. First, the people divided their countries into representation areas, but the ruling elite represented them from a central place, usually a capital city. The latest trend in the evolution of democracy is localisation, or decentralisation. Localisation is the system of democratic governance whereby, not only does a country has a central government, but it also has semiautonomous regions with their own governments that make decisions on matters affecting the residents within their jurisdiction (Akinyode 2010, p. 56). Characteristics of a localised government A decentralised government has two levels of governance, the central government and the local, regional, state or county government depending on the country and the names specified in the supreme law. The central government handles all matters that are common for the whole country’s economic, social, political, or cultural well-being. This includes allocation of funds to the local governments, consolidating revenue from local governments, facilitating infrastructural development, and audit of local governments among others. The local governments make decisions and implement all projects that affect the locals in the regions. These are things like local revenue collection and implementation of projects, and upholding the law among the locals. The judiciary may be part of the central government or the local governments depending on the form of decentralisation that the country adopts. However, the central government cannot be without a judiciary for handling cases that are national in nature. In summary, the local governments act autonomously but the central government acts as an overseer to the activities of the former, only intervening when necessary (Barak 2006, p. 27). The second characteristic is the change in approach of the nation building process. Instead of focussing on building the nation as a whole, process is decentralised, and different localities develop independently depending on the income generating activities of locals. The individual developments achieved by the local governments add up to overall national development. Since citizens can identify with the developments and have a direct role to play as compared to the centralised democracy, they are inclined to put more effort to improve their place. This, in turn, gives the people a sense of belonging that motivates them to work hard and achieve more development. In addition, the leaders at local governments are not in a city but right there with the people, and the latter can hold the former accountable for all the decisions they make during their regime. On the other hand, people elect individuals they are familiar with and whose leadership qualities they know. In this case, decentralisation is more likely to agree with their chosen leaders and participate more in the process of developing their region and by extension, building the nation (Buckman 2004, p. 158). The third characteristic of localisation is that both conservative and liberal individuals agree that it is more efficient than a centralised form of government. This form of government emphasises on the local civil society, and listening to the opinions of people. The only reason for consulting experts is to make a choice on the best of the various paths of action offered by residents. This means that the decentralised form of democracy considers people’s opinions due to adequate representation. Conservatives and liberalists have considered the available evidence since central governments are characterised by corruption, and discrimination among other vices. Though these vices are not entirely absent in regional governments, at least they are reduced, and some regional governments have proved remarkably efficient and effective (Goldman and Abbot 2004, p.118). Advantages of localisation Of all forms of democracies, the localised democracy is the most stable as citizens concentrate on nation building since there is no power concentrated in one place or person that people would oppose. Localisation makes people feel that they are part of the government, and there is no reason for one to go against oneself. Due to its potential for integrity and transparency enforcement, localisation promotes sound governance where the local government performs its duties diligently. Most of the vices characterised with central governments are due to indirect interaction with the people, something that does not happen in localised democracies. Decentralisation also promotes public participation since the people know that the projects undertaken in their areas affect them directly (Bertolino 2004). Socially relevant projects get significant attention from citizens since in the final analysis; these projects will the relationship of a region with others in the country. If a region does not develop, then that will be the characteristic that the whole country associates the region and its residents. Since people are social beings, the spirit of competition makes them work extra hard on their projects to have the most developed region in the country. However, these individual growths add up to the total growth of the nation and nations with localised democracies exhibit exceptionally high economic growth rates (Lane and Ersson 2003). For a region to experience as much growth as possible, all, or at least most of its residents must be involved in the growth process. This means that the local government must have economic stimulus plans for all its locals to utilise in development of the region. However, as the people work hard to develop their region, their full potential for personal growth is realised and they all get the ability to develop their families. This advantage of localised government results in empowerment of all residents regardless of gender, age, or economic status. The groups of people who benefit most from these systems include marginalised groups like the youth, the poor, the physically challenged, women, and anyone else who takes advantage of the available resources (Patrick 2010). Conclusion Localisation of democracy involves giving power to the people by taking the role of managing a country’s resources from the central governments. These governments manage resources and develop their respective areas independently, though they are all answerable to the central government. The role of the central government is to oversee and ensure that these local governments perform their duties in accordance to a set of stipulated guidelines. The people choose officials in both levels of government and the people have the power to relieve them of their positions. As is the case in all democracies, the supreme power in a localised democracy lies in the people and it is they who make decisions on how the central government shares resources among the regions, and projects for which they are used. The localised form of democracy is the most stable and results in development more than a centralised democracy. References Akinyode, O 2010, Localization of democracy in Africa: Problems and prospects; a case study of Nigeria and Ghana, Amherst College, Massachussetts: US. Barak, A 2006, The judge in a democracy, Princeton University Press, New Jersey. Buckman, G 2004, Globalization: Tame it or scrap it? Mapping the alternatives of the anti-globalization movement, Zed Books, London: UK. Bertolino, M 2004, Decentralisation, democracy and the 'post-Washington consensus': illustrations from Indonesia and Thailand, ISS. Dahl, R, Shapiro, I and Cheibub, J 2003, The democracy sourcebook, MIT Press. Diamond, L and Plattner, F 2006, Electoral systems and democracy, Johns Hopkins University Press. Dworkin, R 2008, Is democracy possible Here?: Principles for a new political debate, Princeton University Press, New Jersey: US. Fairfield, P 2009, Why democracy? SUNY Press, New York. Fitzpatrick, T 2003, After the new social democracy: Social welfare for the twenty-first century, Manchester University Press, Manchester: UK. Gaus, F and Kukathas, C 2004, Handbook of political theory, SAGE, London: UK. Goldman, I and Abbot, J 2004, Decentralisation and community-based planning, IIED, London: UK. Hines, C 2004, A global look to the local: Replacing economic globalisation with democratic localisation, IIED. Lane, J and Ersson, S 2003, Democracy: A comparative approach, Routledge, London: UK. Lansford, T 2007, Democracy: Political systems of the world, Marshall Cavendish, Singapore. Patrick, H 2010, Essentials of comparative politics, W. W. Norton, New York. Shiva, V 2006, Earth democracy: Justice, sustainability and peace, Zed Books, London: UK. Read More