Lecture 3

• Political Science: Session 3 Outline includes discussions on Democracy, its definition, criteria, rationale, waves, levels, models, and measuring.
• Democracy is defined as a political system in which citizens govern, either by themselves or through others that are elected, influenced, and controlled by the people (direct or indirect), in a way that puts each citizen equal with every other (equality in influence) ( Hendriks , 2010, p.22 ).
• The references for the 3 rd session include the book Comparative Government and Politics by McCormick, Hague & Harrop (2022), an article by Maleki & Hendriks (2016), and books by Dahl, Lijphart, and Heywood.
• The readings for the 3 rd session include Chapter 4 from McCormick, Hague & Harrop (12 th ), an article by Amartya Sen, an article by Maleki & Hendriks, and summaries made by the students themselves.
• Culture and Politics is the subject of the 3 rd session.
• Ideal criteria of democracy include effective participation, equality in voting, enlightened understanding, control of the agenda, and inclusion of adults.
• Realistic criteria of democracy include elected officials, free, fair, and frequent elections, alternative sources of information, freedom of expression, freedom of assembly and association, and inclusive citizenship.
• The two dimensions of democracy are cooperation and contestation.
• The Freedom House index measures the level of democracy through Political rights (10 indicators) and Civil liberties (15 indicators) in three categories: Free, Partly Free, and Not Free.
• Integrative democracy is non-majoritarian, consensual, and based on deliberation and consensus building.
• The Economist Index of Democracy 2017 measures the level of democracy through Political rights (10 indicators) and Civil liberties (15 indicators) in three categories: Free, Partly Free, and Not Free.
• Models of Democracy include reasonable consensus, which involves elected representatives, choice options, free, fair and frequent elections, alternative sources of information, and freedom of speech and association.
• Electoral democracy is a level of democracy that has met certain minimum standards for political rights.
• Significant dissensus is a model of democracy where the question of who decides and how to decide is significant.
• Westminster versus Dutch democracy is a comparison of different models of democracy.
• The level of democracy is measured by Political rights (10 indicators) and Civil liberties (15 indicators) in three categories: Free, Partly Free, and Not Free.
• Dahl's two dimensions of democracy are contestation and participation.
• Indirect (spectating) democracy is different from participating democracy.
• Liberal democracies are a level of democracy that includes electoral democracy and the presence of civil liberties.
• Democracy can be measured through conceptualization, what to measure, measurement, index construction, and level of democracy.
• Aggregative democracy is majoritarian, based on voting, and a simple majority of 50% + 1 decides (the winner takes all).
• Democracy is widely supported but there is little backing for rule by a strong leader or military.
• Contestation in democracy refers to the process of deciding how to decide, including the right to compete, the rate of contestation, and the rate of participation.
• Majoritarian (aggregative) democracy is different from consensus (integrative) democracy, and participative (direct) democracy is different from spectative (indirect) democracy.
• Democracy prevents tyranny, protects essential rights, guarantees freedom, provides self-protection, self-determination, moral autonomy, human development, restricts inequality, maintains peace, and creates prosperity.
• The first wave of democracy lasted from 1828 to 1926, the first counter movement from 1922 to 1942, the second wave from 1943 to 1962, the second counter movement from 1958 to 1975, the third wave from 1974 to 1991, and the fourth wave is currently underway.
• Democracy can be categorized by the level of democracy, which is the presence and substantiality of democratic institutions, and the model of democracy, which is the institutional settings.
• Worldwide approval of democracy is at 84%.
• Democratic backsliding is the incremental erosion of democratic institutions, rules, and norms, often leading to reversion to authoritarianism.
• Democracy can also be categorized by the two dimensions of contestation and participation.
• Democratization is the process by which states build the institutions and processes needed to become stable democracies.
• The Arab Spring is an example of democratization.
• Three factors contribute to democratic backsliding: social and political polarization, collapse of the separation of powers, and incremental subversion of democratic institutions by incumbents.
• Assignment 2 requires students to find the requested information and answer the questions in the table for both their course-country and their home-country.
• Forms of Authoritarianism include Absolute monarchy, Ruling party, Personal rule (presidential monarchy), Military rule, Theocracy.
• Participatory democracy is a combination of Integrative and Participative models.
• Consensus democracy is a combination of Integrative and Spectative models.
• Strengths of Consensus democracy include Controlled integration, Collaboration, Proportional representation, Pacification and accommodation, Channeled multiformity, Administrative expertise, Viscosity, Vague accountability, Avoidance behaviour, Cartel and backroom politics, Technocracy, expertocracy, Compromise politics.
• The assignment is worth 4% of the total grade and should be submitted via Socrative (room: PoliticalScience) by Friday 3rd @ 18:00.
• Voter democracy is a combination of Aggregative and Participative models.