Comment by grg0
1 year ago
That would exclude every parliamentary democracy in Europe, so no.
Also, the word 'democracy' does not appear in either the US Constitution or the Declaration of Independence, so it's weird to make the argument you are making. The Founding Fathers never envisioned a party system to begin with. Women and obviously slaves could not vote. The US has only been getting more democratic over time. Your argument looks a bit like historical revisionism to me.
The earliest "democracy" (demokratia) dates back to the Greeks (and for free men, anyway), and Aristotle's Politica will tell you a bit about it.
> That would exclude every parliamentary democracy in Europe, so no.
There are variants (especially executive and legislative work more closely) but please list those where there is no constitutional or customary such a balance between executive, legislative and judiciary?
Thanks for suggesting I don’t know my classics, you seem not so certain about modern European democracies.
You don't need separation of powers to "qualify for democracy", per your statement above. That just simply isn't true. Democracy is, simply put, a form of government where power emanates from the people. That the separation of powers is for the best we obviously agree on, but to say that it is suddenly a necessary requirement for "democracy" is simply just redefining what the word "democracy" means.