POL 100 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Liberal Democracy, Deliberative Democracy, Representative Democracy
12 Mar 2016
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Document Summary
Democracy comes from ancient greek and means rule by the people . Direct democracy, which was adopted by athens about 2,500 years ago, meant that citizens (did not include women, slaves, and the foreign born) made the governing decisions. Direct democracy still exists in a few new england towns and small swiss cantons but is viewed as impractical for large states. The french revolution (1789-99) challenged the divine right of kings and brought back the idea of rule by the people. However, the transition to a representative democracy in which all persons had a right to vote was often controversial. The development of working class and socialist movements pressured governments to adopt universal adult sufrage. In canada, women were given the right to vote in 1918. Representative democracy involves citizens electing representatives to the legislature to make decisions on their behalf.
