Talk:Liberal democracy/Archive 1

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Today 146.124.141.250 made a lot of changes to the text. Most of them are his personal opinion about Liberal Democracy, but isn't an encyclopedic text on Liberal democracy. I deleted most of it, but put his text below for the sake of argument. Gangulf 11:59, 2 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Liberal democracy is a form of representative democracy where the voting rights of citizents in order to take decisions are not respected (exception to that rule is a single vote for a representative, that takes place every four or every six years) and in which majority is restricted by a constitution that among many other things defines also the constitutional rights that are about to protect several minorities, such as freedom of speech and assembly, freedom of religion, the right to private property and privacy, as well as equality before the law and due process under the rule of law, and many more.

Such constitutional rights (also named liberal rights) are guaranteed through various non democratic controled institutions and various non democratic decided statutory laws in order to protect the rights of individuals and minorities from the 'Majoritarianism'.

Contemporary "liberal" representative "democracy", as long as it requires a constitution in order to function, is not as liberal as the original ancien Democracy was. In the original Athenian Democracy definition, no constitution took place. The only and few restrictions were: The total respect to the vote of every citizen to every and to all polls that took place in order to decide something, the Graphe Paranomon, the equal respect for all citizens (Isotimia), the equality in front of the laws that all citizents voted together (Isonomia), and the equal right for all citizents to speak the same amount of time in front of the assembly (Isegoria). Obviously original ancien definition of Democracy, due to the absence of constitution and due to those very limited restrictions, is a much more liberal political regime than contemporary "liberal" "Democracy" is.

Thats why the name "liberal" for the contemporary "democracy" is not the appropriate one, as long as the word "democracy" isnt also. It should be named "protective constitutional representative time-limited Oligarchy" or "Republic". "Time-limited Oligarchy" comes from the fact that not all citizens, but only a few ones are about to take the decisions, but their power to decide may be canceled every time a representative election takes place.

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I was about to put a POV message on this page when I hit refresh and found you'd (Derksen) made substantial changes! Your changes seem sensible. I was wondering why its necessary to have a seperate page for Democracy and for liberal democracy when the democracy page actually talks mainly about liberal democracy. Various other more 'pure' forms of democracy are refferenced by the Democracy page but the page itself is about liberal democracy. I think these pages ought to be combined with maybe more effort made to outline the original greek notion of democracy on another page. Barnaby dawson 12:10, 2 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Athenian democracy is supposed to cover the original Greek notion of democracy. I also don't see an issue with combining this article with democracy, as long as all the other variant descriptions of democracy are given their respect. -- Stevietheman 15:59, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I have just reverted the text because there had been POV added by 146.124.141.250 and by 213.16.157.70. Whoever you are may I offer some advice: Read the policy page NPOV on writing pages and remember that this wiki is meant to be an encylopedia. If you want to add these criticisms of liberal democracy to this page please cite some promonent adherent of your position and put it in a new section called perhaps pros-cons. Barnaby dawson 09:51, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I shall justify my reasons for thinking that the changes are POV:

 Liberal democracy is a form of representative democracy where
 majority rule (also called 'Majoritarianism'] is not valid most of 
 the times and where elected representatives are moderated by a 
 constitution which defines the major procedures the regime has to 
 follow in order to function.

This is clearly a viewpoint rather than fact. I am not saying that it is an extreme viewpoint but I think it should be included if at all as a quote from some prominent adherant. It shouldn't be that hard to find such an adherent. Also it is not NPOV to start off with a viewpoint. I will change the text back again but I will leave in the point about generations and just edit it slightly. I request that 146.124.141.250 whoever they are justifys any further changes on the talk page. I don't think we need to take a vote yet as we may be able to come to a consensus. I for one would be willing to listen to rational arguement and I'd stress that the changes 146.124.141.250 has made can be incorporated in a NPOV manner.

May I suggest that you look at [[1]] which I think may provide a source to give for your viewpoints. I think the author of the actual article may not agree with you but there are plenty of quotes from famous critics of liberal democracy given in the text. Barnaby dawson 11:06, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)

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 ok, lets try again to see what what you are saying to us:

 Are you claiming that:
 "Liberal democracy is a form of representative democracy where
 majority rule (also called 'Majoritarianism'] IS valid most of 
 the times and where elected representatives are NOT moderated by a 
 constitution which defines the major procedures the regime has to 
 follow in order to function"

???????????????

Does this makes sense? Please answer me to those two question:

1) Is majority rule valid most of the times in "liberal" "Democracy" or not?

2) Are elected representatives moderated by the constitution or not?

Whatever is your answer to those questions, you HAVE to write the answer to those questions in the definition of "liberal" "democracy", in order to define "liberal" "democracy" accurately and not leave notional gaps that may mislead people.

I am not going to come to a consensus with you, unless you are going to add an ACCURATE definition of what "liberal" "Democracy" is, and not an intentionally blurred one.

In case you insist to intentionally blur the definition of contemporary "liberal" "democracy", prepare to vote!

-)

Anonymous Greek Athenian

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I agree totally with Barnaby Dawson. The article developed into a POV, though I tried to change it some times. Gangulf 11:54, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)

American-centric

“Liberal democracy is a form of representative democracy where elected representatives that hold the decision power are moderated by a constitution“

A constitution is required for a Federalist government but is not necessary for a Liberal Democracy. The United Kingdom has no written constitution.

“A constitution that emphasizes protecting individual liberties and the rights of minorities in society, such as freedom of speech and assembly, freedom of religion, the right to private property and privacy, as well as equality before the law and due process under the rule of law, and many more.”

These rights feature in the American constitution but once again is not necessary to a Liberal Democracy, Australia has no bill of rights in its constitution.

“They would argue that, by prohibiting citizens the right to cast votes on all issues (especially for serious subjects like going to war, constitutional amendments”

In Australia constitutional ammendments can only be made by decision of a public referendum where people vote for or against the proposed ammendments.

This article seems very American-centric to me and ignores the fundamental aspects of Liberal Democracies and instead opts for a discussion about majoratarianism and protecting minorities.

A textbook defintion is more along these lines: “A liberal democracy is a political system in which democratically based institutions of governance exist alongside liberal conceptions about the rights of individuals and about market-based mechanisms for economic production and distribution” -- Aumimk 19:49, May 8, 2005

Please feel free to carefully edit the article to deal with the bias. It also might be useful to propose your rewrites here and get comments first. — Stevie is the man! ^{Talk | Work} 01:21, May 9, 2005 (UTC)

Read the article about R. J. Rummel.Ultramarine 01:12, 14 February 2006 (UTC)