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Nonetheless, some people believe that there is no system that can ideally order society and that democracy is not morally ideal. These advocates say that at the heart of democracy is the belief that if a majority is in agreement, it is legitimate to harm the minority. The opponents to this viewpoint say that in a liberal democracy where particular minority groups are protected from being targeted, majorities and minorities actually take a markedly different shape on every issue; therefore, majorities will usually be careful to take into account the dissent of the minority, lest they ultimately become part of a minority on a future democratic decision. The threat of coercive power is still the main cause for concern. A historical example would be Hitler in pre-Nazi Germany, who was 'elected' in 1933 by the German people with the largest minority vote. For this reason, some countries have created constitutions / laws that protect particular issues from majoritarian decision-making.
Generally, changes in these constitutions require the agreement of a super majority of the elected representatives, or require a judge and jury to agree that evidentiary and procedural standards have been fulfilled by the state, or, very rarely, a referendum. This means a majority can still legitimately coerce a minority, but such a minority would be very small and, as a practical matter, it is harder to get a larger proportion of the people to agree to such actions. On the other hand, proponents of broader democracy wonder what gives a small minority of people the right to impose their will on the majority. "Democracy has failed to eliminate social inequality, and this seems a permanent and structural failure. It is undeniable that all democratic societies have social inequalities - substantial differences in income, in wealth, and in social status.
These differences have persisted: there is no indication that inequality will ever disappear in democracies. In the stable western democracies, inequality is apparently increasing. The pattern established in the United States is, that the lowest incomes do not grow: all the benefits of economic growth go to the higher-income groups (Treanor. ) " In practice, a coalition of two-thirds, or three-quarters, can successfully disadvantage a minority. For instance, the majority might exclude the minority from the main labor market, and then force this excluded underclass into workfare. The emergence of a lower class is usually seen as a structural change within a society, but it might be simply a side-effect of democracy.
Every democracy is a temptation to disadvantage minorities. In practice, every existing liberal democracy is a dual society, with some politically marginalized minority. Proponents of democracy make a number of defenses to this. One is to argue that the presence of a constitution in many democratic countries acts as a safeguard against the tyranny of the majority.
A constitution (whether written or unwritten) can ensure a distinction between policy enacted through the legislature and executive, and the modification of fundamental constitutional rights, which may require a more deliberative procedure (such as an independent judiciary) and less vulnerable to the tyranny of the majority. Another common argument is that, despite these risks, majority rule is preferable to other systems, and the tyranny of the majority is at all events an improvement on a tyranny of a minority. In practice, history offers numerous examples of ruling minorities who oppressed a disenfranchised majority, but cases of a society that operated almost entirely as a 'tyranny of the majority' are few and far between. This proportional versus majoritarian dichotomy is a not just a theoretical problem, as both forms of electoral system are common around the world, and each creates a very different kind of government. One of the main points of contention is having someone who directly represents your little region in your country, versus having everyone's vote count the same, regardless of where in the country you happen to live. Works Cited Rothenberger, Roger.
Beyond Plutocracy. New York. Harper Collins (c) 2001 Shackman, Gene. "Brief Review of world political Trends" Sept 2004. 01 Mar. 2005 web Treanor, Paul. "Why Democracy is Wrong. " 23 Nov. 2004. 01 Mar. 2005. web
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Research essay sample on Liberal Democracy Mar 2005
