How effectively does representative democracy operate in the UK?

by andthewinnerisx (student)

25 marks

Britain is a representative democracy. This is where citizens within a country elect representatives to make decisions for them. Every 5 years in The UK, the people have the chance to vote into power those they wish to represent us in Parliament. This factor alone could suggest that representative democracy is effective in a sense as the public have elected somebody who will represent them, rather than having a delegate who primarily acts as a robot.

In today’s modern society, all mainstream political parties in the UK state that they absolutely represent the whole nation. For example, the conservative party no longer just represents the middle class, and Labour no longer just represents the working class. Representation is now based on party membership rather than social class. This can be clarified through each party manifesto. This could suggest that representative democracy works effectively in the UK.

On the contrary representative democracy is not as effective to an extent, as neither House of Parliament have a large number of women, ethnic minorities and manual workers whom are represented. The "Tyranny of the Minority" is something that pure democracy is meant to prevent, however the UK isn’t doing a very good job of this as in the House of Commons there are only 22% of women represented whereas there are 51% of women in the whole population, similarly there are only 4% of ethnic minorities represented in the House of Commons. These figures reinforce the idea that representative ...

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As faith in political parties has declined, and participation has decreased, people in the UK feel more represented by pressure groups; which are arguably very democratic, as pressure groups represent the nation precisely and accurately. They promote particular causes, and fight for the demands and views of the electorate today. In this sense representative democracy works extremely democratic in the UK.

Representative democracy operates effectively in the UK to an extent as most people do not want to vote all the time on political issues that do not always affect them, or may require a lot of understanding in order to cast a meaningful vote. Switzerland requires about 10 referendums per year. This is the main criticism of direct democracy from people subject to it. It is expensive and extremely time consuming. Whereas voting for a representative who agrees with you takes less effort, doesn't require you to do anything about issues that do not concern you and does not require you to learn about complex issues.

In conclusion, from the points made above representative democracy does operate effectively to an extent as most of the time the people can get their views and ideas heard, by using pressure groups and contacting their local MP. Although there are a few loop holes in the system such as the idea that representatives are not always accountable for their policies and actions as well as the view that representative democracy is not democracy at all, it is leader selection.