James T. Kloppenberg — The three principles of democracy [excerpt]

Whether or not true democracy can ever be achieved remains uncertain. Historian James T. Kloppenberg argues that while democracy can be defined as an ethical ideal, the practical definition of democracy is too contentious to be adopted as a political system. The following shortened excerpt from Toward Democracy analyzes three contested principles of democracy: popular sovereignty, autonomy, and equality.

OUPblog

The three principles of democracy [excerpt]
James T. Kloppenberg | Charles Warren Professor of American History, at Harvard University

Irrepressible Thought — Proudhon on What Democracy Cannot Answer

In principle then, I admit that the People exists, that it is sovereign, that it is predicated in the consciousness of the masses. But nothing yet has proven to me that it can perform an overt act of sovereignty, that an explicit revelation of the People is possible. For, in view of the dominance of prejudices, of the contradiction of ideas and interests, of the variability of opinion, and of the impulsiveness of the multitude, I shall always ask what establishes the authenticity and legitimacy of such a revelation-and this is what democracy cannot answer.

Irrepressible Thought
Proudhon on What Democracy Cannot Answer

Curious Leftist

Thomas Jefferson on popular sovereignty and democracy

"I am not among those who fear the people. They, and not the rich, are our dependence for continued freedom."

Thomas Jefferson

Letter to Samuel Kercheval | June 12, 1816