POL101Y1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: Robert A. Dahl, Roman Republic, Liberal Democracy
Document Summary
Demos people ; kratos power = rule by the people. Demos was associated with the majority of people (common people), not ruled by everybody but by the majority so the rule of the largest portion. Aristotle had a distinction between regime that pursued common good and regimes that pursued particular good. In this case, democracy is considered to be pursuing a particular good of a large number of people. At first, democracy was considered a bad name. It was associated with the narrow interest with the majority of people along with the idea that the less educated people would be ruling, and the poorest. Since athens, democracy has not disappeared from the face of earth. Common practice - it was still spread in the world like: the roman republic, medieval assemblies, they were called things , six nations governance, long tradition of consultation, american republic. Republic public thing or public concern, a government that had input from anybody.
