representative government

representative government

The Evolution and Impact of Representative Government

1. Introduction to Representative Government

The character of community and community units affects the feasibility, legitimacy or usefulness of direct democracy as a governmental method. Direct democracy has thus been appropriate to some times and places, but not to others. In other words, community is akin to trust, as a necessary but slippery social bond. In the case of Greek communities, equality for citizens signified direct democracy, the participation of all citizens directly in the governmental process. In the case of Roman city-states, indirect participation as, for example, in the election of city officers, was viewed as adequate representation for citizens. The city, political unit, and citizenship, the relevant relation between persons in that unit which also defines the character of that unit, were essential concepts in these early discussions of representative government.

The practical or theoretical difficulties of direct rule have prompted the evolution of representative structures. Over time, the voting franchise has expanded and the basis of representation has been questioned and redefined. Prerogative rule has thus been replaced and in many societies has evolved beyond being the mere procedural implementation of a political philosophy to the status of a social or national compact. However, the empirical evidence as to the contemporary religious, economic, political or social impact of representative government is unconvincing and is often contradictory, as much as it is in the case of direct democracy.

2. Historical Development of Representative Government

From an amorphous assembly all of whose members spoke with equal authority on any subject, and this of necessity because problems had not yet appeared on which any organic structural distinctions had to be based, the continuing need to concentrate on greater and greater ranges of interest led to a reorganization of the assembly into three general groups. This organization, which was of necessity electronic in procedure because that was the technology of the day, was based upon the jurisdictional areas of the participants. These were the electrical, ecclesiastical, and assembly of merchant-like links of the nation. From this limitationes evolved the many council houses of the assemblies of the German states and finally the Bundestag of the German Empire. Indeed, we still live under limitations in many aspects of our social and governmental life in that so large a number of our political subdivisions are in origin limitations inherited through our various concepts of law.

When we think of representative government and the rule of law as applying to the world at large, the first thing we must recognize is that it did not happen overnight. The Greeks and the Romans had some forms of representative government, but the records for them are very limited; most of our knowledge is either speculative or based upon extremely brief periods of classical history. More to the point, each of these classical worlds was relatively small and limited in territory, no larger than a European nation, perhaps smaller, or a considerable-sized American state. It was the Germans in their Teutonic Nation, a confederation of tribal forms of government that held sway before and after the fall of the Roman Empire, that evolved the processes of limitationes. For our purposes, limitationes were a kind of assembly of delegates from the different states, operating within a broader-based system of politico-cultural autonomy. The Teutonic Nation had in this fashion entities representing all levels of human endeavor, churches and temporal forms of government as we have them today.

3. Key Principles and Functions of Representative Government

A final element of representative government is the concept of accountability. If elected representatives are bound to reflect and act on the will of the majority, it is essential that they can eventually be held to account by the voters. Otherwise, there is little incentive for elected representatives to consider and reflect the wishes of the public. This is not just a moral argument. This is an essential underpinning of how representative government is supposed to work. When new ideas appear in the political arena, it often seems that they conflict with one or all of these principles. Yet the design and function of representative government has adapted to technical and social change, and new roles and functions for representative government have extended its reach.

There are three core, overlapping principles which embody representative government. The first is that citizens should have a right to vote in elections for the parliament or the institutions of government which make decisions on their behalf. While democracy is supposed to ensure a government of the people, by the people, and for the people, citizens of most countries have no direct rights to vote on significant issues outside the process of five-year or four-year election cycles. Using referenda, where particular issues are decided by a vote, has not been common in representative government. A second core principle is that parliaments and other public institutions are the forum for the public’s concerns.

4. Challenges and Criticisms of Representative Government

History, Thucydides argued, simply had no real place for what Pericles had outlined as a unique virtue of democracy, the ability to view with favor rather than with envy the advances of all fellow citizens, the fact that human talents were thought to be worth having when they were shown to be worth acquiring, and that advancement in the public service is determined by a man’s character and abilities, not relations or social status. These features locked into any state tendencies to behave as if it had no moral code. For Thucydides the very notion of morality seemed to be individualistic, separating actions dependent on private interest from those taken in pursuit of the public good, without seeming to recognize that both are necessarily interwoven within the lives of citizens. Nonetheless, Thucydides and Aristotle, while recognizing both the general truth that states may prefer their survival to their dignity, and the slightly more sophisticated notion that political survival for any polity depends on its external relations.

The challenges and criticisms that arise against democracy in its representative form, to be sure, have profoundly shaped its evolution. The first major criticism of representative democracy rests on the size of the nation-state. Many argue that it is simply impossible, on anything more than a single-issue basis, for modern nation-states to be governed democratically. Stemming from his determination to write a vindication of Athenian democracy, among Thucydides’ deepest thoughts were his comments on the need for states to act as though states have no moral code as such. Rather, responsible statesmen, he argued, have only a sense of expediency or pragmatism to guide them in the making of policy. For Thucydides, they had either to act as Cleon had in the Mytilenean Debate or they ran the risk of disaster.

5. The Future of Representative Government

The changes needed are essentially pragmatic. One fundamental change is the realization that in a period of rapid social and economic upheaval, representative government cannot function adequately by substituting decision on general programs made by various interest groups for decisions that require appraisal of the public interest. Indeed, an essential element of any legislative reform providing for public hearings is that it gives the interested groups an opportunity to suggest governmental policies rather than determine them. Thus, the separation between the role of the legislator and the role of the administrator is preserved, wherever it seems advantageous to distinguish between a public interested and an interested party. Apart from improving the operations of legislatures and executive function on programs, representative government has another dimension, which involves the selection of competent men to fill the posts created by law and the assurance that those posts are generally filled by men who are capable as well as dedicated.

The future of representative government will be shaped by the effectiveness of reform measures aimed at blunting the drift toward a public administration so pervasive as to raise a question whether there remains in most Western nations any distinctive activity properly called government. Representative government will not be nurtured merely by more understanding and responsive political leaders, by the replacement of outmoded or slum conditions with modern and socially superior facilities, or by wholesale changes in old methods and institutions. Ultimately, the strength of representative government rests upon the responsible confidence of the electorate in the ability and resourcefulness of ordinary man to govern himself. Its truth or falsity is tested by the faith that government has in a free society. The future of representative government refers to the development of new techniques, concepts, and practices that are deliberately designed to enhance the representative quality of law making and administration.