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Constitutional Democracy: The Popul



Constitutional Democracy: The Popular Alternative

	To an Asian whose native country's regime severely suppresses any mentioning
of the word "democracy," the only way to know its narrowly-defined meaning is
from the decades-old English-to-English Oxford dictionaries that existed in
the nation prior to the military rule.  Oxford defines democracy as "the
government by the people, of the people and for the people" in its old fashion
and yet, this meaning attracts many of my fellow youths, who started
questioning the nature of the current military junta.  However, Magstadt
broadly explains the meaning and characteristics of an ideal democracy.
Democracy is viewed as a constitutionally-elected government by the majority
people of a country and entrusted with limited powers to be responsive to the
national needs and effective in administering national affairs.  Though
democracy a rule of majority, it also respects and protects the minority
rights. An ideal democracy government is created through free and fair
elections, in which ordinary people play important roles, and allowed to
conduct the administrations in accordance with the constitution.
	According to Robert Pastor, the former NSC under the Carter administration, "
 . . . a more accurate definition of democracy would be the people's right to
replace their leaders at regular intervals."  He believes that "it is the
replacement factor that acts glue that keeps leaders accountable' the fear
that if they do something wrong or don't measure up to their constituents'
expectation, they will lose the next elections." Therefore, free and fair
election is the main ingredient of a democracy.   In addition to the
elections, the constitution plays the most important role in ensuring peace
and progress in a democratic country.  For instance, US Bill of Rights must be
viewed as the most important foundation for US democracy.  Its contents
reflect the fear of its founding fathers for losing all their individual
rights and the powers of each state to a central (federal) government.  Signed
by President Washing, the Bill clearly states "DOs and don'ts" for the
Congress and government.  In fact, more "don'ts" constitute the Bill.  Each
amendment restricts US government's power.  Amendment I prohibits Congress
from making laws on US citizens' natural rights.  Moreover, US founders too
carefully defined who should be the head of the state with a wisdom of
protecting their national sovereignty. However, as Pastor said, "democracy is
a work in progress: it is nowhere perfect." Even though it appears to be the
world's most mature democracy, US is still looking for "formulas on campaign
finance and voter registration" in order to have fairer elections in its
country.
	Can we assume every government which holds periodical elections and also has
a written constitution as a democracy?  Most authoritarian regimes also have
elections and constitutions.  The differences between authoritarianism and
democracy are enormous.  Most elections held under authoritarianism are
designed to ratify or consolidate their illegitimate stay in power.  Their
constitutions impose more restrictions on people's rights rather than on their
government.  Their power is unlimited.   A real democratic election allows "a
political environment that permits people to make free choices."  A democratic
constitution 'recognizes' the citizens' birth rights as their inalienable
rights and does not allow any government to make laws on these rights whereas
the authoritarian constitutions "grant" these rights to their people and allow
governments to take away from them at any time they want, with reasons or
without reasons. As the saying, "All that glitters is not gold. ," goes, only
those governments who recognize the people's rights are constitutional
democracies.
	However, most authoritarian juntas, like Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore, defend
their rules with mouthful words, explaining that democracy is a Western
culture and thus it cannot be applied to the Asians who place greater value in
"family, order and society."  United Nations ended such verbal defense by
authoritarians proclaiming that "Human rights and democracy are universal, not
culturally relative."  In economic front too, according to Pastor, the studies
over 100 nations showed that "democratic regimes grew seven-tenths of a
percent faster than their nondemocratic counterparts."  This study clearly
disapproves the myth that "authoritarian governments are better at making the
hard decisions need to generate economic growth."  Therefore, it is hard to
disagree with Pastor's statement, "Whether democracy is better or worse at
solving social and economic problems, there is no better system for defending
human rights."