Advantages and Disadvantages

• Directly democracy is the purest form of democracy as the people’s voice is clearly heard
• Direct democracy can avoid delay and deadlock within the political system
• Direct democracy can lead to ‘tyranny of the majority’ whereby the winning majority simply ignores the interests of the minority
• A disadvantage of direct democracy is that the people may be too easily swayed by short term, emotional appeals by charismatic individuals
• Representatives can be held to account for their actions at election time
• Representatives can develop expertise to deal with matters the public does not have the time or knowledge to deal with
• In a large modern country, representative democracy is the only practical way to translate public opinion into political action
• Representatives may not act in the best interests of their constituents
• It can be difficult to hold a representative to account between elections
• Allowing voters to delegate responsibility to representatives can lead to the public disengaging from social issues and other responsibilities
• Representative bodies can be unrepresentative and may ignore the concerns and needs of minorities