Is Democracy Always Preferable to Dictatorship?

Democracy is defined as the government of the people. In time this definition has withered into a term no longer befitting to the voice of the people. No longer does it fit to be called a protection of liberties and equal rights. Today’s democracy vaguely promises freedom and equality, but is yet to deserve the actual title. Instead of already savouring the rights to make lawful decisions, the people of democracies challenge the extent to which the government fulfills its promises and questions the actual intentions of the authorities. Democracy, as many argued, has turned into an overrated sham fit to mask the true face of the government. Through its many flaws and surreal promises, democracy has proved itself not preferable to dictatorship and to some extent is a subtle dictatorship in disguise.

Democracy, coming from the Greek words demos, "people," and kratos, "rule", literally means "rule by the people". The first democratic system was established in Athens as a mean to overthrow tyranny and share law-making decisions with the public by giving then daily access to civic affairs and the duties to make and enforce laws. Citizens in Athens enjoyed the rights to vote weekly on important issues involving the state. The citizens of Athens were directly involved not only in government matters, but also in matters of justice, as there was no separation of powers in ancient Athens. As the famous historian, Thucydides once said, “we judge the men who take no part in public affair useless.” And therefore direct involvement in the state was essential; where the people do not elect representatives to vote on their behalf but vote on legislation and executive bills in their own right. Today’s democracy strays far from the true democracy that once developed in Ancient Athens in more ways than one. Where as in Athens there would be no different side of government representatives, present day elections recalls a line-up of government representatives that are elected based on image and status alone. Where in Athens the people are the government, today, we elect representation through a superficial system of party members campaigning, advertising and promoting themselves. Democracy has deviated from the true democracy in Ancient Athens to such an extent that the voice of the people, the basis of demos, is not always heard.

The concept of Democracy, based on the law-given power of citizens taking part of decision-making and decision-enforcing only applies to Canada to a limited extent. The highest court of Canada, the Supreme Court, is composed of nine judges who grant decisions that are binding upon all lower courts of Canada. These nine judges who make up the final court of appeal in the Canadian justice system is simply not a fair representation of all the people. Views may be very narrow, if not biased, by the limitation of having only a select nine judges to represent the millions of citizens in Canada. In Plato’s The Republic, the famous philosopher expresses his belief in ‘Philosopher Kings’:

Whether it is a matter of art, music or politics, it is only the ‘best men’ who are capable of true judgment. The true judge must not allow himself to be influenced by the gallery nor intimidated by the clamour of the multitude. Nothing must compel him to hand down a verdict that belies his own convictions. It is his duty to teach the multitude and not to learn from them.

His personal description of a dictatorship ruled by an elite class bears an unfortunate resemblance to the democracy we have today. Excluding the multitude by having only the “best men” rule and deeming the average person not capable of true judgment is something that questionably exists in the present day political system.

Limits are put on the Government in how much power they have within a Constitution. However the Constitution that promises to “fulfill people’s rights”, looks impressive on paper but only gives citizens another reason to rely on a judicial branch’s interpretation. The more written it is, the more interpreted it becomes, often translating to more court authority. This allows political leaders to bend the rules while masking their true intentions behind false promises. Although the constitution promises an individual their liberties, the average person does not have a say in important issues affecting the state. We see the rise of defaming scandals where political leaders chase after their selfish interests at the public’s loss. We witness leaders excusing responsibilities for their own actions and often the lack of accountability shows through. As English philosopher John Locke once said, “The people cannot delegate to government the power to do anything which would be unlawful for them to do themselves.” Therefore, it is in each own duty to realize the mockery in democracy,