User:American Lautaro/Representative Government

Representative Government is a system of government where citizens elect leaders to carry out and make public policy. It is usually by institutional guarantees like periodic elections of the leaders of government, a free press, freedom of public debate, freedom to associate, one man, one vote and some degree of governmental transparency.

We can largely trace the invention of Representative Government as we currently conceive it to the French Revolution, American Revolution and England after the English Civil War. Since then, it has become a very popular form of government, and many of the institutions it embodies have become synonymous with Representative Democracy and Democracy more generally.

The View of Bernard Manin
Bernard Manin argues in "The Principles of Representative Government" that political regimes labelled "representative governments" have 4 fundamental characteristics in common.


 * 1) Partial Independence of Representatives. Elected representatives are not be legally bound by campaign promises, or instructions from the public. They must have some agency in what parts of their agenda to enact, or whether to enact it at all.
 * 2) Freedom of Public Opinion. The public must have the freedom to form and express opinions that may disagree with their government. For this condition to be met, the public must have access to political information and the right to publicly express their opinions based on this political information.
 * 3) The Repeated Character of Elections. Elections must be frequent enough so as to provide the possibility of accountability. Repeated elections are important in large part because it is essential that elected representatives anticipate that they will be punished electorally by voters for bad behavior.
 * 4) Trial by Discussion. Decisions must be subject to some sort of persuasive discussion on the merits of the policy before being passed into law. This principle comes from the need to produce some sort of consensus among elected representatives and public interests that will have different, competing ideas. In a representative government, persuasive discussion is the mechanism by which a majority (parliamentary or otherwise) forms around a policy direction.

Polyarchy and The View of Robert Dahl
Robert Dahl re-labels representative government as "polyarchy", to highlight that none of our systems will ever reach the ideal of "democracy" (a government which is perfectly responsive to the wishes of its citizens). He defines a polyarchy as a form of government which provides its citizens the right to:


 * 1) "formulate their preferences"
 * 2) "to signify their preferences to their fellow citizens and the government by individual and collective action"
 * 3) "to have their preferences weighed equally in the conduct of government, that is, weighted with no discrimination because of the content or source of the preference".

Dahl establishes two different variables upon which we must judge a government before labeling it a polyarchy or representative government, inclusiveness and liberalization. Liberalization is a measure how much freedom the body of citizens have to formulate their preferences, signify them through action, and whether all their preferences are weighted equally. Inclusiveness is a measure how limited the body of citizens is, if the vast majority of people living in a country are afforded the full rights of citizenship, it can be said to be fairly inclusive. When a regime demonstrates high levels of both inclusiveness and liberalization, it can be labelled a polyarchy. [Insert photo?]

History
Bernard Manin traces the invention of Representative Government to the 17th and 18th centuries, specifically in England, America and France. Its popularity among the political elites who would go on to establish it in their respective countries largely comes from how it conceptually marries social contract theory with some ancient democratic principles. Social contract theory required that the people consent to a form of government for it to be legitimate, while ancient democratic principles rested on beliefs of equality. Representative Government and elections allowed for both of these ideas to exist, as the people consent to who will govern them by participating in elections, and there is a sense of equality in the principle of "one man, one vote".

It is clear that Manin views the first Representative Governments as post-revolutionary America, post-revolutionary France and eighteenth century England. It is important to note that the inventors and pioneers of representative government (for example, James Madison), settled on it as an alternative to out-and-out democracy, which often incorporated random selection or lot as a method for selection of its rulers. Crucially, part of the attraction of representative government to thinkers at the time was its aristocratic element, that, through election, the best of society would be selected and therefore rule.

Since its invention, representative government has evolved to keep up with changes in the societies it was set up to govern. For example, political parties were originally not a part of its structure or theory, but emerged to deal with larger electorates, fundamentally changing how representative government operates. This led to the coherent policy platforms, ideological nature of elections, and legislative voting groups that we now view as characteristic of representative government. Similarly, the development of mass media like radio, television, and even the internet has changed how representative government operates, as leaders have become far more visible to the public.

The Delegate vs The Trustee
There has long been a debate over how a representative should act in a representative government. One school of thought argues that the representative is essentially a "delegate" for the people. In this capacity, a representative's role is fundamentally to reflect the views of their constituents, regardless of what that representative might believe personally. The opposing view, famously argued by Edmund Burke, is that a representative should act as a "trustee". In this capacity, a representative's role is to exercise their own judgement over matters, guarding the views of their constituents as they see fit, without necessarily doing what their constituents believe is correct. It has been noted by scholars that modern representatives act as both a "delegate" and a "trustee" at different times, depending on how much their constituents care about an issue. Bernard Manin notes that our conception of "good" representation has changed over time. While at the founding of Representative Government (and the time of Edmund Burke), it was generally believed that a good representative was a "trustee" of the people, this has changed as the introduction of party platforms and more ideological politics has brought the "delegate" view more into fashion.

On the Relationship Between Representative Government and Democracy
Manin: They are somewhat in conflict

Urbinati: They are actually very complementary.

On the Necessity of Election
Manin: Key to representative government

Landemore: Not so much. Why can't lot be representative?

Representative Government in the Modern Day
Discuss that modern day Representative governments often have many things that are extra (i.e. supreme court, bureacracy, etc.)

Also mention some examples of governments considered representative.