Democracy and Capitalism

In recent history the number of democratic countries has seen a dramatic rise, from one in 1860 to sixty five in 1990.  Democracy has risen from a theoretical system that was at one point associated with mob rule, to a point now where it is widely considered to be the only legitimate form of government.  The rise of democracy has been closely mirrored by the rise of a capitalist system of economic management, which in it’s turn, is now almost universally accepted as the most efficient method of running an economy.  However, capitalism and democracy often seem to struggle in an ‘antagonistic symbiosis’.  One demanding political equality and the other economic liberty.  This essay will considerer the nature of democracy, it will examine the possible antagonisms between capitalism and democracy postulating whether democracy can possibly exists in a non-convoluted form in a capitalism society, or in fact not at  all. It will then consider why capitalism has seemed to work with and towards democracy throughout history so effectively.  It will consider if a practical form of democracy is even possible in the non-capitalist system.  The essay will finally consider what changes might take places within a capitalist system to make it more compatable to ideal democracy and whether or not these changes are practically viable.  

Primarily let us consider the nature of democracy.  Democracy has many definitions, but is we start with a quite basic one suggesting the democracy is:  ‘a political system in which the whole people, positively or negatively, make, and are entitled to make, the basic determining decisions on important matters of public policy’.  This offers us a broad guideline.  Dahl elaborates on this simple definition to set out five key points for a democratic process: effective participation, equality in voting, gaining enlightened understanding, exercising final control over the agenda, inclusion of adults.   Effective participation allows every person in the society to have equal opportunity to have get their view across to the government, voting equality can simply be expressed as one person one vote, enlightened understand requires that even person have equal resource (money, time, education) to devote to acquiring the knowledge necessary to decide on policy, control of the agenda requires that members have the final say in the political agenda, and adult inclusion demands that all adults of sound mind to be allowed to vote.  This sets out ideal principles of democracy.  It is easy to see that no practical democracy lives up to these standards; first passed the post systems do not offer equality of votes for example. However it offers us a good benchmark to judge whether capitalism is fundamentally set against the principles of democracy.