Representative Democracy

Representative Democracy

What is a representative democracy?

•   A political system where decisions are made by elected representatives rather than the people themselves (opposing direct democracy).
•  Examples include the US and the UK.
•  It is a form of indirect democracy 
• The Government is accountable for the people and has it's power limited in some way, in part by a free press and the individual rights of the people.
•  Regular elections are allowed under the Fixed Term Parliament Act 2011.
•  Representative Democracy was expressed by Abraham Lincoln - " Democracy is rule by the people, of the people, for the people".
• Must have an independant judiciary, this is known as the separation of powers.

Features of a representative democracy

1)  Party representation

All modern democracies have the characterisic of political parties. This gives electorate a choice of parties to choose to represent them, each political party should release a public manifesto, outlining thier policies. This means that people are more likley to understand what a party stands for, therefore will vote members to represent them on this basis. Parliament should reflect the choices we made during…