scholarly journals Popular Government Without the Will of the People

Topoi ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Albert Weale
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Public Deliberation ◽  
Representative Democracy ◽  
Civil Society Organizations ◽  
Citizen Engagement ◽  
Representative Government ◽  
The People ◽  
Popular Government ◽  
The Will

AbstractPopulism sees representative government as intrinsically elitist, preferring to think about democracy in terms of the will of the people, expressed through devices such as referendums. However, this view is not one that can be made sense of and seeking to pursue the will of the people is dangerous to democracy. Citizen engagement is important in a representative democracy, but this is best conceived on a model of civil society organizations undertaking practical public deliberation. A philosophical model of deliberation leading to choice is introduced, and the argument that such a theory is itself elitist is considered but found wanting.

The Meritocratization of Civil Society

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Bovens ◽  
Anchrit Wille
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Third Sector ◽  
Political Influence ◽  
Public Affairs ◽  
Civil Society Organizations ◽  
Advocacy Groups ◽  
Interest Representation ◽  
The People ◽  
Professional Advocacy ◽  
Education Gap

Civil society organizations are, if not schools, at least pools of democracy. In the ‘third sector’, too, active engagement and participation ‘by the people’ have given way to meritocracy, or, in other words, to rule by the well-educated. Many popularly rooted mass organizations have witnessed a decline in membership and political influence. Their role as intermediary between politics and society has been taken over by professionally managed advocacy groups that operate with university educated public affairs consultants. First, the chapter describes the associational revolution, the enormous increase in the number of civil society organizations. Then it in analyses the education gap in membership and the shift from large membership organizations to lean professional advocacy groups, which has occurred over the past three decades. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the net effect of this meritocratization of civil society for political participation and interest representation.

scholarly journals Claims of Misrepresentation: A Comparison of Germany and Brazil

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 152-164 ◽  
Author(s):  
Petra Guasti ◽  
Debora Rezende de Almeida
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Conceptual Development ◽  
Political Representation ◽  
Representative Democracy ◽  
The People ◽  
Representative System ◽  
Elected Representatives ◽  
Alternative For Germany ◽  
Considerable Strain

The system of representative democracy is under considerable strain. Its institutions are struggling to maintain legitimacy, and its elected representatives are failing to keep their monopoly on (formal) political representation. An emerging multitude of (new) claim makers contests the authority of elected representatives as well as the functioning of the existing system of representative democracy by alleging misrepresentation. In this article, we identify a significant shortcoming in Saward’s claims-making approach; specifically, we argue that it offers little direction in addressing misrepresentation. We distinguish between claims of representation and claims of misrepresentation, and show how the latter can fulfill one, two or all three of the following functions: (1) they appeal to an enemy/antagonist (strategy), (2) identify causes of misrepresentation related to policies, politics, and polity (persuasion), and (3) claim to create a new linkage to “the people”, sometimes present themselves as new representatives (reframing). To test this proposed framework, we compare claims of misrepresentation in Brazil made by civil society groups (before and during the presidential impeachment between 2014 and 2016) and in Germany (focusing on the parliamentarians of the Alternative for Germany during the first six months of mandate). Our results suggest that claims of misrepresentation are not intrinsically democratic or undemocratic, but are instead ambiguous, have different manifestations and disparate impacts on the representative system. Our article contributes to the conceptual development of the claims approach and to further understanding several critical and current challenges to representative democracy.

scholarly journals State policy of Chile to overcome crime

2016 ◽  
pp. 25-32
Author(s):  
Liudmila Diakova
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
State Policy ◽  
Personal Experience ◽  
Civil Society Organizations ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Current State ◽  
The People ◽  
Special Programs ◽  
Main Factors ◽  
Perception Of Security

This article analyzes the current state policy of Chile to overcome crime. It is noted that the study of public opinion regarding the personal experience of the people, demonstrating the improvement of the security situation (public and private) for the last 10 years (since 2005). However, the respondents’ perception of security problems has become much more negative, which is associated with the general deterioration of these indicators in the region, as well as a keen attitude of Chilean society to social inequality, which is considered one of the main factors for the growth of crime. Special attention is given to special programs to ensure public safety, and various governmentalpractices of the fight against crime, including the interaction of the police with civil society organizations.

scholarly journals THE ROLE OF CIVIL SOCIETY IN HEALTH COMMUNICATION

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
pp. 127-139
Author(s):  
Satnam Singh ◽  
Siddharth Singh Tomar
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Health Communication ◽  
Mass Communication ◽  
Close Association ◽  
Civil Society Organizations ◽  
Communication Strategy ◽  
The People ◽  
Community Monitoring ◽  
Health Related

Health Communication is an emerging field, it involves the examination of various communication models and techniques used by healthcare professionals and policymakers to communicate health and influence the health-related behavior of the public. It is an interdisciplinary niche where social sciences, psychology, life sciences, and communication studies work in close association. It is also important to understand different theories of mass communication while working out a suitable health communication strategy. Various professionals and organizations are involved in the process of communicating health to society, civil society is the prime stakeholder in this process. It is clear from the analysis of historical and contemporary data that civil society has contributed greatly over a period of time in communicating health to the people. Civil society also had contributed in mobilizing, rights advocacy, and community monitoring of health centers and schemes. We studied the content of various civil society organizations having a rural footprint to ascertain their impact on health communication. The healthcare ecosystem in India is rapidly changing, in the view of continuous decrease in state spending over the healthcare role of civil society became increasingly crucial, so it is very important to ensure their greater participation at all levels of policy making and in implementation as well.

Populism and the Politics of Rights: The Dual Attack on Representative Democracy

1998 ◽  
Vol 31 (4) ◽  
pp. 683-705 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rainer Knopff
Keyword(s):  
Liberal Democracy ◽  
Public Life ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Representative Democracy ◽  
Representative Government ◽  
Checks And Balances ◽  
New Science ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
The People ◽  
The Cost

AbstractIn Canada as elsewhere, representative democracy is under attack by both populists and rights advocates. The populist challenge comes mainly from Preston Manning's wing of the Reform party. The rights-based challenge is grounded on the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. These two challenges are different in obvious ways, but from the point of view of representative government—and ultimately of liberal democratic constitutionalism—what they have in common outweighs their differences. What they have in common is the appeal to a mystical being or icon beyond ordinary politics. In effect, the People or Rights become what God was to pre-liberal theocratic politics: a transpolitical trump on ordinary political division, a way of placing opponents “beyond the pale,” a demand for unattainable purity in public life and policy. While bills of rights and populism appear to flow, respectively, from the liberalism and the democracy of liberal democracy, they are, in fact, vehicles for precisely the kind of politics liberal democracy was designed to overcome. Representative government, not populism or entrenched rights, was at the heart of the “new science of politics” designed to make liberal democracy possible. Representative institutions, properly arranged in a system of checks and balances, were a way of blending liberalism with democracy, giving each its due, but indirectly, so that neither would be taken to self-destructive extremes. Populism and the judicialized politics of rights threaten to dissolve this salutary blend, at the cost of liberal democratic constitutionalism.

Freedom of Political Communication in Australia

1996 ◽  
Vol 45 (2) ◽  
pp. 392-401
Author(s):  
Timothy H. Jones
Keyword(s):  
Political Communication ◽  
Freedom Of Expression ◽  
Public Affairs ◽  
Representative Democracy ◽  
The Political ◽  
Representative Government ◽  
High Court ◽  
Australian Capital ◽  
Political Processes ◽  
The People

In three important decisions,1 handed down on the same day in October 1994, the Australian High Court continued its exploration of the implied constitutional guarantee of freedom of political communication. Two years previously, in the judgments in Nationwide News Pty Ltd v. Wills2 and Australian Capital Television Pty Ltd v. The Commonwealth,3 a majority of the High Court had distilled an implication of freedom of political communication from the provisions and structure of the Australian Constitution.4 This was not an implication of freedom of expression generally, since it was derived from the concept of representative government which the majority considered to be enshrined in the Constitution: “not all speech can claim the protection of the constitutional implication of freedom … identified in order to ensure the efficacious working of representative democracy and government”.5 The extent of this implied constitutional guarantee was left rather unclear, since a number of different views were expressed. As Justice Toohey has now explained,6 there were two possibilities. The first was a more limited “implied freedom on the part of the people of the Commonwealth to communicate information, opinions and ideas relating to the system of representative government”. The second was a rather more expansive “freedom to communicate in relation to public affairs and political matters generally”. In the recent trilogy of cases a majority of the High Court was prepared to endorse the second of these alternatives.7 In Cunliffe v. The Commonwealth Chief Justice Mason concluded that it would be too restrictive to limit the implied freedom to “communications for the purposes of the political processes in a representative democracy”.8

scholarly journals Vocational Education in Indonesia Facing ASEAN Economic Community

2019 ◽  
pp. 168-176
Author(s):  
KASIM YAHIJI ◽  
CHOIRUL MAHFUD ◽  
MUHAMMAD ARFAN MU'AMMAR
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Vocational Education ◽  
Civil Society Organizations ◽  
Educational Policies ◽  
Economic Community ◽  
The People ◽  
The World ◽  
The Government ◽  
Asean Economic Community ◽  
Future Direction

Nowadays, vocational education and the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) are an interesting topic to discuss for contributing to the ASEAN future. This article explores the vocational education in Indonesia facing ASEAN Economic Community.  Vocational education is clearly significant not only to help the government but also to determine the future direction of the people and the nation. This article describes the condition of vocational education in facing ASEAN Economic Community. Also, this article explores the strategic roles in the development of vocational education in the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) era for the benefit of the nation which is expected by all, especially for society, nation, and the world through reviewing references and literature books, news, journals and opinions in mass media and various related publications and sources. The article discusses the contributions from all stakeholders of education from civil society organizations in Indonesia that are very significant for facing AEC. Implications for educational policies on vocational education are also presented.

scholarly journals Uzbek Laws Provide Responsibility For Violation Of Democratic Election Principles

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (05) ◽  
pp. 72-78
Author(s):  
B.D. Akhrarov ◽  
◽  
Sh.X. Alirizaev ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
The People ◽  
Democratic State ◽  
Election Process ◽  
The Will ◽  
Democratic Election ◽  
Democratic Elections

Building a democratic state governed by the rule of law and a free civil society is unimaginable without elections. After all, in the election process, the diversity of opinions in society, the will, aspirations, social moods of the people are clearly reflected. Democratic elections, which reflect the diversity of views in society, the aspirations and aspirations of the people, must be legally protected. Liability for violation of the principles of democratic elections has been established. Building a democratic state governed by the rule of law and a free civil society is unimaginable without elections. After all, in the election process, the diversity of opinions in society, the will, aspirations, social moods of the people are clearly reflected. Democratic elections, which reflect the diversity of views in society, the aspirations and aspirations of the people, must be legally protected. Liability for violation of the principles of democratic elections has been established.

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