Is the USA a Democracy? – No!
Is the USA a Republic? – Yes, no, maybe… Urrr… read on?
The status of Republic has nothing to do with if a country is a democracy or not, the status of Republic is based on the following, and I quote Oxford Dictionaries:
“A state in which supreme power is held by the people and their elected representatives, and which has an elected or nominated president rather than a monarch.”
Now the first part makes it kind of problematic, especially when it comes to the USA, as since Trump has been chosen, the people are not part of the supreme power officially anymore, as when we look at facts, less than 50% supports Trump, and I don’t care what the exact percentage is, as that it is below 50% we all know is true…
The problem, however, is that apart of Monarchy and Republic, there are not more statuses at this discussion, at least, as far as I know, hence most people classifying the USA as Republic, even though it ain’t anymore, strictly speaking.
Now, to understand why the USA is no Democracy is really simple actually.
A pure democracy would be the power fully in the hands of the people, but what we mostly know as democracy is the form of representative democracy, which is:
“A system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, through elected representatives.”
Now, fully at the other side of that would be an autocracy:
“A system of government by one person with absolute power.”
Now, the whole explaining of the electoral college system of the USA would take me a massive amount of time, but the main importance is to know that there are 538 electoral votes at this moment possible at the USA, which is a really small group compared to the estimated 321.4 million residents the USA has…
These 538 electoral votes are the ones who choose the American president, the supreme leader of the USA, and by that, we are not talking about an autocracy, as it’s not the power of 1, but actually neither a democracy, as the choice is not of the whole population, nor if you would sum it down to only eligible members of the state, as that would still be several millions of people, and not those 538…
Problems would, however, arise when we look at how the American Senate and House of Representatives are chosen, as that is, as far as I am aware of, a full democratic elective system, unlike the choice of president.
Which would actually place the USA between a Representative Democracy and Autocracy.
At which point the term Oligarchy comes in play, as actually it would not fit between democracy and autocracy, but beyond that.
So, what’s an Oligarchy actually?
Well: “A small group of people having control of a country or organization.”
And yes, probably people are thinking about it already, most, if not all, representative democracies are actually oligarchies, and I doubt I would need to explain why the USA is one as well.
The simple fact about the term “Representative Democracy” is that it ain’t a form of democracy in the first place, and is rather used to make people forget what the word democracy actually means, which is only pure democracy, as the word actually even means, “rule of the people”, hence the “power to the people” speeches at the past…
Now, let’s sum it all up.
The USA is not a democracy, caused by the usage of the electoral college system, regardless of the fact that the word democracy is misused.
The USA is not a republic, caused by the lack of the people having actual power over the choices of the USA, however, there is no term, as far as I know, that would fit as replacement.
The USA is an oligarchy, this has to do with the fact that a form of government always is a form of oligarchy, and never of a democracy.
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