Canada has always been stylized as one of the many examples of parliamentary democracy, in other words, Westminster democracy. It has been 148 years since Canada first elected our own leader, The Right Honorable Sir John. A. MacDonald. The Canadian democracy smoothly transferred from an oligarchy to a modern, parliamentary and fair government system.
Democracy, the term that originated from the ancient Greece, breaks into two compartments, demo and cracy. A demos is the meeting place of the Athens assembly, and cracy stands form rule. The two terms combined together forms the term "democracy". The Athenian democracy is a "direct-democracy", meaning the people can have a direct voice in the legislative procedure. However, as time passes by,
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The representative system was working fairly smoothly during the early years of U.S. Nevertheless, as an representative is high-earning and has powerful legislative function, only the affluent could afford running and becoming one. Unfortunately, Canada adopted this "new" democracy option, thus our chambers are filled with self-hypercritical oligarchs who invests a plethora of capitals to serve the sole purpose of getting into the House of Commons.
In reality, these representatives are defender of democratic realms in name only! Many Canadians whom are well-educated of the democracy concepts gives their votes to the MP just because they support the person of the partisan leader to become the head of government, in other words, the prime minister.
Is our society democratic? Unequivocally yes. We use a first-past-the-post voting system(obsolete compared to proportional representation) that breaks our country in to 338 federal single-member constituency districts that elects 338 representatives. Nonetheless, are all representatives created equally? Indisputably, no. Despite de jure, all MPs are created equally. De facto, MPs elected from the governing party has much more power compared to that of opposition parties. Almost all cabinet ministers came from the governing party. Hence, opposition party members hardly has a word if a majority government is
Canadian Senate Reform The Senate, which consists of one hundred and five appointed members, was created to represent the rights and interests of Canadians in all regions. It is known as the superior house within Canada’s bipartisan parliamentary democracy (Joyal, 2003). There is no question that Canada is in fact, a democratic country and The Senate exists, in theory, to ensure the continuation of this. As democracy is frequently defined as “power vested in the people” (Stilborn, 1992), it is not uncommon for individuals to see the country’s democratic methods as a largely efficacious.
My name is Stephen Gaetano and I’m a student in the Civics course this summer. This speech is about my hero of democracy - Pierre Elliot Trudeau, and his involvement in creating democracy in Canada. The 15th Prime Minister of Canada, Pierre Elliot Trudeau, held this position for 15 years. Prime Minister Trudeau started his career as a lawyer in Montreal, and was an activist in Quebec’s political system. In the 1960s, he joined the Liberal Party of Canada, and took charge of the Liberal Party in 1968.
However, abolishing the Senate may not be the best for Canada in the end, so another argument is to reform the Senate. The best plan at the moment to reform the Senate is the Triple E plan, as it would make it so that the Senators are elected, each province is represented equally, making the Senate more effective. If we were to abolish the Senate the only way to do so would be by a constitutional amendment backed by at least seven provinces representing 50 per cent of the population, or one with unanimous provincial
The Senate: “The upper chamber of Parliament where there are 105 members who are appointed until age 75 by the Crown on the advice if the prime minister.” (Rules of the Game pg 106)The original Senate that was created in 1867 had only originally 72 seats. It was created to counter balance representation population in the House of Commons, although in recent years the Senate has become to reinforce representation of groups that have often been underrepresented in parliament, examples; Aboriginals, visible minorities and women. There has been a huge debate’s on whether Canada should keep the Senate. The people all over Canada have mixed opinions on if we should keep the Senate or not.
The Queensland upper house, known as the Queensland Legislative Council, was eradicated in 1922. Arguably, the abolishment of this upper house, and the introduction of a unicameral system in Queensland placed a severe limitation on democratic credentials of the Queensland government (Aroney 2008, 39). With this, the reinstatement of an upper house in Queensland may hold the key to enhancing accountability and stability of the Queensland government whilst preventing dictatorship. Queensland remains the only state in Australia without an upper house and as a result the only state that is operated with a unicameral system, the disadvantages of such a system is copious.
I think we should be concerned about the low voter turnout, if we weren’t a democratic nation, it wouldn’t be as much of a concern, but speaking from the perspective of Canada - a democratic nation, the big concern is having a majority government being giving unquestionable power only because the won about 60% of Canada’s approval and support. That 40% could have put a different party into power, one that has more of the country’s approval. Currently voting seems to follow the “lesser evil principle”, in a democratic nation, when voting, the voter should walk away with the thought that they voted for someone who they thought deserved to lead, not dropping their own values and voting in hope that a party that isn’t as bad as the conservatives
Representative democracy is defined by Wilson, Dilulio, Bose, and Levendusky as a government in which leaders make decisions by winning a competitive struggle for the popular vote. This form of government has less control of the people, allowing them to have the freedom to join clubs, organizations, political parties, and other groups of their choice. An example of representative democracy is the United States of America. Our government is elected by citizens voting for government officials. Voting is an important part of being a United States citizen because it allows for the people to input their ideas into the government.
The monarchy in Canada is a continuous debate among the politicians and individuals. This paper aims to present the advantages and disadvantages of the monarchy in Canada. This way will enable us to take a clear position. First, Canadian politics are known for their divisive attitudes, and it is very hard to get consensus on decisions. The Queen plays the role of reference for the Canadian politicians and their decisions.
Australia is a Democracy Never before have there been so many democracies in the world or so many competitive elections conducted at national, subnational and region levels. Democracy is now prescribed as inseparable from good governance and an antidote to corruption. The key aspects of what makes Australia a democracy being the electoral role, Australian Electoral Commission (AEC), referendumsm, the rule of law The separate colonies of Australia gained self-government during the nineteenth century and less than half a century later Australia became the first nation to vote itself into existence through popular referendum. How does Australia’s democracy in today’s modern age stack up on those early days of a fledgling democracy.
In ancient Athens or Athenian democracy, the word “Demos” had three different definitions or meanings. The first definition is that it was a word they used for a local village. They also translated it as “deme” which means “a smallest administrative unit of the Athenian state like a voting precinct or school district” (Stoa, 2017). This is where men who were 18 years of age and were Athenians with Athenian parents “presented themselves to officials of their deme”, to prove that they were free men, 18 years of age, and with Athenian parents after which they were enrolled into the Assembly List to enable them to participate in politics or voting (Stoa, 2017).
Direct and representative democracies are two very different types of government. Since direct democracies involve everyone voting, it is only appropriate in civilizations or groups with small populations, such as Greece. Representative democracies use elected officials, so it works well with larger populations, such as Rome or the United States. Even though there are so many differences
The Senate in Canada should be abolished Introduction: Canada senate is a part of legislation institution in Canada, which represents the interests of upper class people. Different from America, it is not produced by election but directly-nominated by the premier and appointed by governor. Senate, governor, and the House of Commons are like three legs of a tripod which constitute the congress and legislation system in Canada. Senate undertakes the responsibility of proposing expostulation to governor and cabinet, which acts the role of supervision and restriction. Senate played critical role when Canada established federal government in 1867, the diversity of senators warrants the smooth convey of popular will to governors and legislators coming from different ethnic group and social status.
Before the Charter, many people may argue that Canada was a free and democratic country. Canadians had the freedom of expression, equality and the principles of fundamental justice. What changed with the creation of the Charter was that rights and freedoms were given constitutional status, and judges were given the power to strike down laws that infringed on them. In 1982, most Canadians agreed that the introduction of the Charter was going to monumental. But on the contrary, over 30 years later, numerous laws have been struck down by interpretation of the charter and remedial techniques that have been developed by courts.
A democratic government allows for all people to be a part of the decision-making process, which means that both the majority and minority are fairly represented in government (What is Democracy). Britain allows for a majority to take full control of the government, giving less power to the opposition and other parties in the minority. Although it is easier to hold this type of government responsible in the next election, giving full power to a political party based on plurality isn’t as democratic as a proportional
Albert Venn Dicey stated that “The principle of parliamentary sovereignty means neither more nor less than this: namely that parliament […] has under the English constitution the right to make or unmake any law whatever; and further, that no person or body is recognised by the law of England as having the right to override or set aside the legislation of Parliament. […] The principle of parliamentary sovereignty may, looked at from its positive side, be thus described: Any Act of Parliament, or any part of an Act of Parliament, which makes new law, or repeals or modifies an existing law, will be obeyed by the courts. The same principle, looked at from its negative side, may be thus stated: There is no person or body of persons who can, under the English constitution, make rules which override or derogate from an Act of Parliament, or