The idea of democracy in systemic transformations of self-government

Abstract

The article aims to show the idea of democracy as a basic condition for implementing decentralisation and self-government. At the same time it identifies certain threats that accompany those processes and the need for their protection.

Democracy, understood both as a value and a principle, constitutes, together with the principles of freedom and the state of law, one of the basic axiological and system standards in modern Europe. Attempts at defining democracy made within the scientific domain of particular states manifest themselves in various ways; as a result, there are numerous definitions of the principle of democracy and of a democratic state itself. However, the variety of perspectives does not reduce the influence of the idea of democracy and, especially, its inspirational effect. In the state of law, democracy protects all the rights and freedoms of an individual connected with political liberalism. Since 1789 and the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, the notion of decentralisation has been developing in Europe. This has taken place together with consolidation of the belief that democracy is a condition of decentralisation and self-government is an institutional form of participation by citizens in governance, serving the bottom-up development of democracy. This has been reflected in the concept of local democracy, most often, in connection with the process of systemic change: as a positive effect of these transformations or as an objective (value) which should be pursued in future reforms. The article also indicates immanent weaknesses of democratic procedures that can be used opportunistically and for purposes far removed from the idea of democracy. Local democracy is threatened by the political indifference of voters, the tyranny of the majority, populism and a ruling party’s control over self-government.