Britain : The Greatest Challenge Facing Democracy

To what extent does democracy in the UK suffer from a participation crisis? (25 marks)

Throughout the world there are many diverse political cultures. A political culture is the attitudes, beliefs or practices among a group of likeminded individuals. (Giardino pg. 27) There are different categories that embrace a political culture like an Individualistic, traditionalistic and moralistic. An individualistic culture is one that prefers less government involvement. The traditionalists’ culture maintains government as the social and economic hierarchy and does not like change. The moralistic culture favors public good and it revolves around social issues. In shaping a political culture demographics such as population size, growth, distribution and diversity are essential to determine how a state is in any of the three categories. Society is strongly affected by decisions of who, what and when does an individual receive any types of goods or services. Government is the structure, buildings and institutions that are held within politics.

These four cleavages emerged as the part of the foundation of the argument for a sociological approach to explaining party systems. A social cleavage is a far cry from a political party, and so Lipset and Rokkan had to provide a transition from the former to the latter; which they did in three parts. The first being that these cleavages existed before all adult males were given the privilege of voting. What this meant was that before these men could have joined together and voted one way or another there already existed certain issues on which they held viewpoints, whether consciously or not. The second point they made was that during this time of enfranchisement of the masses, the structure made it so that political organizations had to rely on support of the people to continue to enjoy political success. Typically this support came from certain factions that were strongly supportive of whatever ideal the organization held. The final point they make about transitioning from cleavage to party system is that when there is a movement towards better representation it’s the result of a fracturing of current parties and not new ones. All of these points illustrate the steps taken in order to arrive at the assumption that party systems are a function of a sociological interaction between the people of a nation.

One final argument for direct democracy in the UK is that it increases the people’s political participation and engagement in current issues. When people are given the opportunity to have their say, they are more likely to get involved in the process, thus increasing the accuracy of the judgement. A successful and fully functional democracy relies on the involvement of the general public and the people it will be directly

There is an argument that the government has the power and right to change laws and represent people without necessarily having to be elected. This can also be known as ‘Democratic deficit’. An example of democratic deficit is the House of Lords. The members in the House of Lords aren’t elected but they get to make laws and represent the people. The members in House of Lords are usually given their seats hereditarily so many people found it unfair that they’re not elected into the Parliament but they can make decisions and laws

The first thing to look at is the various types of democracy used in the UK. There are many examples of the various types of democracies with the first being direct democracy. A recent example of what a direct democracy can do is the Scottish Referendum taking place throughout Scotland. This allows the people of Scotland to take the decision of independence in to their own hands. This is a great example

The fact that, in the United Kingdom, we have multiple political parties, with a variety of view points and policies, is exemplary of the fact that political parties enhance democracy. The existence of various political parties gives the public voting options, and provides them with a choice of who governs their country, which is arguably a democratic approach, and encourages public participation. The idea that the public are not only voting for the party and its leaders, but also its policies show that they have an influence in how the country is run. For example the Conservative party (under David Cameron) believes in traditional institutions and values, protecting the rights and interests of property owners, and support the idea that the wealthy do have a responsibility to improve the conditions of the disadvantaged. However modern Labour (under Ed Miliband), emphasises that education is the main driver of social justice and social mobility, agrees that there should generally greater stress on environmental protection, and the party now favors more active state

The idea of political culture is found within the state’s history. The history of the state is impacted by the people settled in the region, religious backgrounds, and geography. The history of the state influences the attitudes and beliefs that people hold regarding their political system. Daniel Elazar theorized a connection between the states’ history and attitude towards government by explaining differences in government between states. Every state is different with some common ground. Elazar’s theory divides states into three types: moralistic, traditionalistic and individualistic. The state’s constitution defines the powers of government with political culture bias. Because of the state constitution, the political culture

In Elaine Taylor May’s article, Security against Democracy: The Legacy of the Cold War at Home, written in 2011, she argued that people were willing to forgo personal freedoms for national security. She provided the example of during the nuclear age of the cold war; Americans were more interested in protection rather than concern for the common good. However, as the cold war continued and domestic issues formed, the tight knit social order that was created in the early years was falling apart. She pointed to the start of the civil rights movement, the counterculture, the women’s movement, and the antiwar movement, started to challenge the social order and led to changes in society. The political campaigns shifted from stopping the

Tony Blair introduced me to politics. Taken by my parents to protest in London against the Iraq war I experienced the inability of national politics and international relations to be mutually exclusive concepts. Key issues such as the growing refugee crisis, the debate regarding Britain’s place in Europe and trade agreements such as TTIP all have national and international implications. Britain’s political sovereignty has been eroded by Unions, Agreements and world events. This opens up the debate as to where power is concentrated. A more controversial debate would address whether national and global decisions are in fact being made by politicians at all, or if global corporations impose greater power. Regardless of this nihilistic view, the

A voter can be defined as an individual who votes, or has the right to vote, in elections. Voting behaviour is explained using the concepts of expressive voting and strategic voting. A rational voter would act more strategically, that is, the voter would vote to produce an election outcome which is as close as possible to his or her own policy preferences, rather than voting on the basis of party attachment, ideology, or social group membership (expressive voting). Strategic voting has become more important than voting on the basis of political cleavages (expressive voting), so voters have become more rational in their approach, however there is always an element of expressiveness in their behaviour. Political parties were initially formed to represent the interests of particular groups in society however, as these parties became more universal in the appeal of their policy programmes, voting behaviour shifted from expressive to strategic. This essay explores the reasons behind the declining importance of political cleavages, and the rise of strategic voting.

Not every member of the public will be interested in politics or in fact have a clear understanding of the political system in Britain and this could affect the voter’s outcome. For example, an individual might not understand the significance of their vote to a political question, and that it can have long term effects that they may not take into consideration whilst voting. Furthering this point, the public may be easily influenced by campaigns of newspapers, notable tabloids, or by wealthy vested interests who can afford to spend large amounts of money on a campaign. This suggests that referendums are not always a true representation of what the public wants an outcome to be.

At one time, our Nation was divided by race and social class. Today, our Nation is divided by the type of political party one identifies by or even by our stance on particular issues. There are some, however, that get caught up in their generational past and use this occurrence to identify by. Even more, some people classify themselves by their moral obligations, setting standards that they may view as higher or different than their adversaries. Then there are those who want to create new ideas and give their idea a fighting chance in this ever so active society. Therefore, historical, modern, and principled issues classify the groups of topics that divide our Nation.

Cleavages are important in our understanding of political behaviors and attitudes. The importance of cleavages branches from the observation that social groups distinguished by social features such as class, religion, ethnicity, language, and region often tend to be similar in their political attitudes and behavior. (Dunphy, 2017) However, not all social cleavages are political cleavages for a social cleavage to have political significance three conditions must be present. Firstly, differences must be socially important and recognized by a society such as race and religion. Secondly, social groups must be aware of their identity and express them in their social life, for example through their political actions. Lastly, there must also be a

Analyses show that by 2015 voter survey, the Leave campaign had a massive impact on the older population who was tired of the government ignoring them and not listening to their stresses. A portion of the votes to leave was done so in frustration in hopes it would get their officials attention, rather than actually wanting to actually break with the European Union. UKIP supporters have been predicted to be the driving force in the name of leave, coupled with the Conservative party and the Labor-Liberal Democrats the “Vote Leave” was pushed through the media by storm to circulated what they deemed as a well-needed independence.