Evolution of Democracy

            Many governmental laws and reforms have made democracy evolve into the way it is today in America. These also have an influence in the jurisprudence system which is the study of law and the legal system.

            Specific things such as the 10 Commandments, 12 Tables, Athenian Democracy, direct/ indirect democracy, the Magna Carta, Divine Right of Kings, Enlightened Thinkers have been utilized to shape today’s democracy system. These are important because they set rules for people to follow. Examples of such rules are the 10 Commandments and the Magna Carta. The 10 Commandments is a summary of important rules of behavior that God expects humanity to follow. The Magna Carta, or great charter, is a document that recognizes the rights of people and the church. Another important way democracy has evolved was from direct and indirect democracy. Direct democracy was first used by the Athenians and this is when the people in the government. Indirect democracy, which was used by the Romans, is used by having elected representatives take part in the government. This is also the method we use in America.

            With the help of the jurisprudence system, we are able to learn what these rules and laws are. This has also helped us enforce them. Although the justice system is not perfect, we do our best to try to keep innocent people out of prison and the others in. The simplest concept is a person can either follow these rules or not. The ones that do not are usually punished and sometimes put to death.

           Rome played a good role in shaping democracy because they use it indirectly which is what we use but in my opinion, the Athenians had the biggest role in forming democracy. One reason is that they were the first and another is they tried to improve on it by forming ideas about government and shaping it the way it is today.

Response

            Many people probably do not know when and how democracy was created. They probably think that it was made during the early years of America. This is not true. Democracy started at the time of Athenian and Roman rule. Pericles believed that all male citizens should take part in government,regardless of wealth or social class. This was a step forward in developing democracy. The Athenians used direct democracy in which the people vote. The Romans used indirect democracy in which the citizens vote by elected representatives. Of course the development of democracy was also helped by the Magna Carta, 10 commandments, 12 Tables, etc, but it was mainly due to the Athenians. I agree with Jordan that without the Athenians and there way of governing people, we would not have the same type of democracy we have today. I also agree that during the development of democracy, we had some flaws. Examples that were given by Jordan are women could not vote and blacks also were not able to vote. Over the years we have been able to improve on democracy but we still have some problems even in today’s democratic government. These are insufficient citizen participation, inaccurate voting, and a lack of understanding the jurisprudence system. Later on these problems may improve but over time we have to deal with the democracy we have today.

            What is good about having the Athenians using democracy, is that they were able to develop ideas about government and how it should be improved. Although Plato and Aristotle did not approve of democracy, they were able to analyze all kinds of government, from monarchy to aristocracy to democracy. Aristotle left writings and information from politics to physics and are influenced today by many people. With the help from his information we are able to improve on his ideas of government and try to make the best one.