Defining Democracy: A Bid for Coherence and Consensus

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Abstract
For a short, definite, non-sectarian definition of democracy, I nominate Responsive Rule qua necessary correspondence between acts of governance and the desires with respect to those acts of the persons who are affected. This definition seems noteworthy, and perhaps commendable, for essentiality, or concentrating on the nature of democracy as distinct from its concomitants and merits; for generality, or congeniality with the notion that democracy can in principle exist in all sorts of human groups; for nominal quantifiability, or compatibility with the notion that democracy is both an ideal-type state and a matter of degree; and for clarity with respect to conceptual issues which commonly arise in talk about ‘democracy’. It deals definitely with the ‘government by’ and ‘government for’ conceptual traditions, with the primary object of popular control, with the identity of ‘the people,’ with the sort of equality that is a property to democracy, and with the sources of popular control over governors in a democracy.

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