DEMOCRATIC

INTERVENTIONS
TRENDS, NETWORKS, & CRITICAL THINKING IN THE 21ST CENTURY CULTURE
MR. JOHN LEWIS SUGUITAN, LPT
LEARNING COMPETENCIES
At the end of the lesson, you should have learned to:

 Identify preferred democratic practices;

 Explain and analyze the reason for their preferences;
 Illustrate the benefits of democratic participation;
 Explain the importance of participation in democracy;
 Differentiate participatory democracy from representative
democracy;
 Generate the criteria to access prevailing political and social
institutions; and
 Conceptualize what can be a viable alternative to undemocratic
practices.
STAKES IN DEMOCRACY

Democracy is often dismissed as mere lip service to build support for

strategic policies. Yet there are tangible stakes for the world in the
spread of democracy – namely, GREATER PEACE, PROSPERITY, AND
PLURALISM.

Democracy affords all groups equal access to justice – and equal

opportunity to shine as assets in a country’s economy. Democracy’s
support for pluralism prevents human assets – including religious and
ethnic minorities, women, and migrants – from being squandered.
Pluralism is also precisely what is needed to stop violent extremism from
wreaking havoc on the world.
MEANING OF DEMOCRACY

Democracy, or democratic government, is ”a system of government in

which all the people of a state or polity . . . are involved in making
decisions about its affairs, typically by voting to elect representatives to
a parliament or similar assembly,” (Oxford English Dictionary)

Democracy is further defined as:

a) “government by the people; especially: rule of the majority"
b) “a government in which the supreme power is vested in the
people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system
of representation usually involving periodically held free elections.
FOUR KEY ELEMENTS
by Larry Diamond
A) A political system for choosing and replacing the government
through free and fair elections;
B) The active participation of the people, as citizens, in politics and
civic life;
C) Protection of the human rights of all citizens; and
D) A rule of law, in which the laws and procedures apply equally to all
citizen.
CHARACTERISTICS OF DEMOCRACY

1) Upward control, i.e. sovereignty residing at the lowest levels of

authority,
2) Political equality
3) Social norms by which individuals and institutions only consider
acceptable acts that reflect the first two principles of upward
control and political equality.
DIMENSIONS OF DEMOCRACY

A) THE RULE OF PEOPLE - THE BODY POLITIC. Democracy is form of

government based on the rule of the people. The body politic is
the public, the community, that sees itself as such.

Cicero, for example, begins his discussion of the forms of government

by pointing out that a Republic is the property of a public, not just any
congregation of people, but a group naturally brought together and
forming a community by legal consent and community interest.
THREE CATEGORIES OF PEOPLE IN
DEMOCRACY
1) People. All individual people subject to the legal authority of the
state, the ruled.
2) Citizen. All individuals making up the body politic.
3) Participants. All individual who participate in the governance of
the state, the rulers.
DIMENSIONS OF DEMOCRACY

B) INCLUSIVENESS OF A POLITICAL SOCIETY. This is a dimension. People

are people, and a society is more democratic when it includes more of
the ruled in the body politic.

c) SOVEREIGNTY OF THE PEOPLE. Democracy relates to a republican

freedom, not liberal freedom. Liberal freedom pertains to rights of
individuals inviolable by the sovereign.
DIMENSIONS OF SOVERIENGTY

A) THEORETICAL. It means the grounding of sovereignty resides in the

people.
B) AS STRUCTURE
C) AS A PRACTICE
BENEFITS OF DEMOCRATIC
PARTICIPATION
1. INCREASED TAX REVENUE/ REDUCTION OF TAX DELIQUENCY
2. INCREASED EFFICIENCY/ BETTER ALLOCATION OF RESOURCES
3. INCREASED TRUST AND IMPROVED IMPLEMENTATION PROCESSES
REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY VS
PARTICIPATORY DEMOCRACY
REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY. Certain people are established as
eligible voters based on their age or other qualifications.

PARTICIPATORY DEMOCRACY. Also called a direct democracy, every

citizen plays an active role in the government .
VIABLE ALTERNATIVE TO
UNDEMOCRATIC PRACTICES
 For citizens in democratic societies to play a participatory societies
to play a participatory and active role and transfer and share
power from elites to and with local bodies;
 For those who develop powerful tools to be responsible for their
consequences;
 To consider voices of diverse and different groups in multicultural
societies; and
 To protect the rights of citizen from powerful institutions.
ILL- EFFECTS OF UNDEMOCRATIC
PRACTICES ON GENDER BIASES
1) UNEQUAL PAY 10) SEXUAL HARASSMENT
2) INTERVIEW QUESTIONS 11) LOSS OF PRODUCTIVITY
3) DIMINISHED RESPONSIBILITIES 12) UNFAIR PROMOTIONS
4) RESTROOMS
5) CONVERSATIONS
6) GLASS CEILINGS
7) POSITIONAL BIAS
8) TERMINATIONS
9) OUTDATED VIEWS
RESULTS OF UNDEMOCRATIC
PRACTICES
 POVERTY
 POLITICAL MARGINALIZATION
 RACIAL INEQUALITY
 CULTURAL DOMINATION