Models of Democracy


The features of republicanism distinctively contributing to modern democratic politics
By Michele Boselli

According to David Held, author of Models of Democracy, there are nine such models developing from classical times to the present, the first three of them relevant to this discussion: classical democracy, protective republicanism, and developed republicanism. The author introduces each of these models by analysing the respective (a) principles of justification of democracy; (b) key institutional features; and (c) general socio-economic conditions of the time. Therefore, it comes spontaneously to compare how the conceptual framework of the republican variants related to the first, classical model, and in what they differ from it and between them.

In doing so, it will greatly help an insight in the political thought of four philosophers from the late middle age to the late XVIII century: Marsilius of Padua (1275-1343), Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) and Mary Wollstonecraft (1759-1797) in respect of developmental republicanism; and Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527) for protective republicanism. If such a disproportionate  representation would be unjust in a football match or, indeed, a democratic poll, it is not the case with philosophy, for Rousseau was influenced by Machiavelli who in turn was himself influenced by Marsilius.

First of all, what is democracy? A commonly accepted definition, based on the word’s meaning, is “the rule of the people by the people”. Its origin is in the first century BC in the city-state of Athens and its justification is that “Citizens should enjoy political equality in order that they be free to rule and be ruled in turn” (Held), although it must be noted that citizenship was restricted to a small number of males – women and slaves were excluded from this direct participation in public life. It was, however, “an intense experience presupposing a high level of education by the citizens” (Skinner) which would end with the decline of Athens and the rise of Rome.

In providing his account of (protectively) republican Rome, Held uses the works of Latin historian Titus Livius. His Ab Urbe Condita Libri is the glorification of republican Rome, with a certain pessimism on its fate. The books were grouped in decades and the first decade will be examined by Machiavelli in his Discourses fifteen centuries later as the foundation of protective republicanism.

In the renaissance, in fact, Rome was to be a model of protective republicanism in the same way Athens was to be for developmental republicanism. The difference between the two is summed up by Held in extreme synthesis: “In the broadest sense, developmental theorists stress the intrinsic value of political participation for the development of citizens as human beings, while protective theorists stress its instrumental importance for the protection of citizens’ aims and objectives”.

Native of Padua like Titus Livius, Marsilius had great importance as a political writer of his age. In the Defensor Pacis Marsilius draws his inspiration from Aristotle, but in certain points he distances himself or even overcomes him or as perhaps the first writer who clearly distinguishes the executive power from the legislative one. Given the originality of the writer it is worth to know the intellectual atmosphere in which he lived. After the death of Romano d’Ezzelino the Commune of Padua had adopted policies that we would now call anticlerical, and had vegun with the Holy See an open fight, which echoes were not yet extinguished during Marsilius adolescence. The ecclesiastical prerogatives, including exemption from taxes, had been abolished and, according to Marsilius, it was also up to the people to designate the magistrates who had the duty to execute the laws. 

In respect with the classical model, the main feature that Marsilius innovates is the above-mentioned differentiation between legislative and executive powers, while the main feature of continuity remains the eligibility to democratic public life, or citizenship, still restricted to few people and no women at all. Size of the republic is also another important feature of economy. In both antiquity and late middle age democracy applies to small communities, but that will change. The establishment of the nation-state in the second half of the past century represents a second stage for democracy, and according to Held the making of the European Union could be seen as an attempt to a third, supranational one. Obviously these changes do not happen like turning a switch, but gradually: a first step from stage one to two was made by Machiavelli and his form of protective republicanism.

In his Discourses on the first ten books of Titus Livius, the Florentine author teaches the republics the ways in which they can durably expand, nearly always arguing with examples drawn from the Roman history, holding in little or no account the differences between the age of republican Rome and his own times. His vision of republicanism is protective because his main concern is the protection of citizens' objectives and interests: "[Machiavelli] anticipated certain dilemmas of liberalism, but resolved them ultimately in a profoundly anti-liberal way, by granting priority to the preservation of society by whatever means necessary" (Held).

We can see now, as enlightenly exemplified in Models of Democracy, how Machiavelli's protective republicanism descends from ancient Rome and its historians in the same way in which Marsilius' (and later Rousseau's) developmental republicanism is inspired by the ancient Greek polis and its philosophers. The main feature that differentiates protective republicanism from the developmental one and the classical model of democracy is that, while these latter require a direct participation of citizens in public meetings, in the former it can be "achieved via different possible mechanisms in a balance of power [...] linked to a mixed constitution or mixed government" (Held).

According to professor Quentin Skinner of the Cambridge University, this is a conceptual shift from the fundamental civic duty to overcome self-interest, where the citizen is not distinguishable from the government, to a system where different groups compete to protect their own interests, up to our days with citizens considered as consumers. In his conversation with Held, Skinner highlights how this model of democracy is linked to the Hobbesian concept of negative liberty: "I am free simply whenever I am not interfered with in my pursuit of my various chosen goals". By contrast he quotes the political writer James Harrington (1611-77, author of the Commonwealth of Oceana), in arguing that freedom is not just a matter of action but status as well: "I am unfree not only if I am coherced but if am placed in a position of dependence". There is a lack of independence if the only thing I have to offer is labour, the reasoning goes, thus the difference between the negative liberty of being free from the law and being freed by the law, in helping myself part of the government.

This relation between economic equality and civil rights such as liberty and justice brings us to Rousseau's contribution to modern political thought, which goes beyond reviving ancient traditions of democracy, up to the point that Held maintains that his originality and distinctiveness make him the exemption to the rule of representing a model with a school of thought rather than a single thinker. Instead, the whole conceptual framework of developmental republicanism is summarised in the Genevan philosopher (perhaps only perfectioned in Mary Wollstoncraft's later contribution on women's participation) because "his account of the core republican ideas is among the most radical, if not the most radical, ever developed, and it is linked to a new view of the rights and duties of the citizens" (Held).

Rousseau fought with the general convinctions of his century with the myth of the natural goodness of men and the moral superiority of wild men on the civilised ones, of the ancient on the modern ones. Since the state exists and it cannot be destroyed because it is impossible that men return to life in the forests - he asks himself in the Social Contract - under which conditions can the State comply with the laws of reason and justice? The answer is: since in the state of nature individuals exercise sovereign rights over themselves, they would give up these rights to the collectivity and in return participate to the formation of the general will, that of the State, which in this way would be organised in a way to guard the interests of the majority of the citizens. According to this reasoning, the only legitimate government would be direct democracy, where legislative power belongs to the entire body of the citizens, who are also entitled to the designation of the persons in charge to execute the laws (notice the analogy with Marsilius). In short, Rousseau does not accept that the collectivity can delegate its powers to an elective assembly.

Bram Gieben helps us to better understand Rousseau by posing three questions which I have taken the... liberty to attach what would be the relevant answer by David Held:

1. Where did sovereignty reside, and how was it exercised? "Sovereignty originates in the people, and it ought to stay there [...] The considered exercise of power by citizens is the only legitimate way in which liberty can be sustained".

2. What were the features of Rousseau's account of "assembly politics"? "People can easily meet together and can easily know the rest" (but this means to be content with the city-state and indeed Rousseau is, enthusiast of his Geneva).

3. Where do the problems arise in the account of the difference between liberty and independence? "Liberty consists less in acting accordingly to one's own pleasure, than in not being subject to the will and pleasure of other people" (this is not Held's answer but Rousseau's himself).

Only one element is missing in Rousseau's developmental republicanism, but is fundamental: women, or "the gendered conception of citizenship", as Held writes in introducing Anglo-Irish writer Mary Wollstonecrft. In her most important book, Vindication of the Rights of Women, she attacked the educational restrictions that kept women in a state of ignorance and slavish dependence. She was especially critical of a society which encouraged women to be docile and attentive to their looks to the exclusion of all else: "It would be an endless task to trace to variety if meannesses, cares, and sorrows, into which women are plunged by the prevailing opinion, that they were created rather to feel that reason, and that all the power they obtain, must be obtained by their charm and weakness".

Wollestonecraft describes marriage as "legal prostitution", adding that women "may be convenient slaves, but slavery will have its constant effect, degrading the master and the abject dependent". Her ideas were truly revolutionary and cauused tremendous controversy. She argued that to obtain social equality society must rid itself of the monarchy as well as of the church and the military hierarchies. Her views even shocked fellow radicals in maintaining that the rights of man and the rights of women are the same thing.

In conclusion, with Mary Wollstoncraft women see the light at the end of a tunnel of male-dominated politics, adding this fundamental element to Rousseau's arguing for equality after a slow extension of citizenship, and the consequent right to participate to public life, to a broader realm of categories of people.

I am aware that Gieben puts citizenship (its restriction) firmly among the features of contnuity, but in a perhaps optimistic view I see that even in Marsilius' times "Citizenship extends to the ranks of men with taxable property, born or resident for a long period in their city" (Held).

Thanks to Rousseau and Wollstoncracft modern political science begins "to take more seriously - as Skinner says about citizenship in conclusion of his conversation with Held - the claim of democracy being the government of the people by the people".