University Essay: Response to Questions on Sodaro's Democracy

This essay provides a comprehensive response to questions regarding Sodaro's concept of democracy, exploring his framework built on core values, the rule of law, and economic well-being. It examines the three pillars of democracy: popular sovereignty, essential rights and liberties, and economic well-being. The essay analyzes the interconnectedness of these elements and discusses the ten conditions for a functioning democracy. Furthermore, it uses Nigeria and India as case studies to exemplify the challenges and complexities of implementing democratic principles in different contexts, highlighting issues such as institutional and cultural problems, political instability, and threats to democratic values. The essay concludes by emphasizing the importance of a strong foundation of democratic principles for successful governance.

Running Head: RESPONSE TO QUESTIONS ON SODARO’S IDEA OF DEMOCRACY
Response to questions on Sodaro’s Idea of Democracy
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

1RESPONSE TO QUESTIONS ON SODARO’S IDEA OF DEMOCRACY
Sodaro defined democracy as an idea that lets the people retain the right to determine
the body who shall be their government. In most democracies, the principal governing body
is elected by the people and are held responsible and accountable for their deeds and actions.
By guaranteeing certain rights and freedoms to the citizens, some legal limits are imposed on
the government and its authority.
Sodaro examines democracy as a concept that is built on a set of principles or five
core ideas in his work “Temple of Democracy”. In his text, the façade of the Temple consists
of three pillars which are built upon a foundation of two steps (Campbell, 2019). The bottom
set consists of a set of democratic values namely freedom, inclusion, equality, equity, respect,
tolerance, compromise, and trust. These values form the undergrid for the entire structure that
defines democracy. They also contribute to a moral dimension to democracy. The step next to
is a representation of the principle of rule of law, i.e., the legal foundation on which the
democracy is resting (Campbell, 2019). On further examination, it is evident that the two
steps are extremely interconnected with each other. And without the rule of law, democracy’s
core values with being spelt out to the population in a codified fashion and effectively
codified. In other words, values underlie the law, and the law implements the values. There
are ten conditions of democracy involves the discussion of the following aspects- state
institution, elities committed to democracy, a ociety that is homogenous, development of
national wealth, private enterprise, a middle class society, support of the disadvantages in a
democracy. It also includes participation of citizens, civil society, and a political culture that
is democratic in nature. Education and freedom of information are also included in the
aspects, followed by a favourable international environment (Campbell, 2019).
According to Sodaro, these values and the rule of law are practicable. To these ends,
any democratic government has three basic functions that include- respecting the popular
sovereignity, guaranteeing the specific rights and liberties, and enhancing the economic well

2RESPONSE TO QUESTIONS ON SODARO’S IDEA OF DEMOCRACY
being of the entire population. These core functions of the government are considered to be
the functional components of democracy.
The three pillars of the Temple of democracy are upheld by the following concepts-
 The first pillar upholds the concept of popular sovereignity, and this is how the people
are capable of governing themselves (Sodaro, 2019).
 The second pillar is a representation of the most essential rights and liberties and
hence are extremely important for which these rights and liberties cannot be
suspended by either the state or the people.
 The third pillar represents the importance of economic well-being as it forms a
reflection of the idea that any democracy is responsible to provide the people with
proper opportunities in order to keep poverty at bay and improvement of the quality of
life along with the provision of the basic social welfare benefits (Sodaro, 2019).
Sodaro’s framework of democracy is completely full proof and shall provide the basic
structure for any democracy in order to successfully govern its people. However, in order to
create a system that is fully functional, the basic steps and the three pillars need to be
indispensable. In case any of these components are missing or are weak, stability of the
democracy will be compromised.
In order to understand the various democracies of the world and their effectiveness,
Nigerian democracy can ne taken as an example. Many critics consider Nigeria to be defined
by its failures and the country still grapples with and immense amount of problems that the
democracy has not been able to solve (Iboi, 2017). However, the peoblems are mostly
institutuitional and cultural such as credibility of elections, accountability, political parties,
and problem of legitimacy. Other problems that are rooted in culture include indigeneity,
poverty, religius, ethnic conflict, terrorism, corruption, as well as godfatherism. Another

3RESPONSE TO QUESTIONS ON SODARO’S IDEA OF DEMOCRACY
democracy in the world, known as the largest democracy- India. Democratic, republic,
secular in nature, India is known to be the largest democracy in the world. However, the
present status of the country and its democratic nature is in jeopardy. The right-winged
government elected by the people are essentially transforming the country into a Hindu
Rashtra by the systematic implementation of the citizenship amendment bill that denied
citizenship to people based on religion. Hence, the democracy is adapting into a fascist
government but it has also been receiving enormous voices of dissent from the people in
general.

4RESPONSE TO QUESTIONS ON SODARO’S IDEA OF DEMOCRACY
Reference
Campbell, D. F. (2019). The Empirical Macro-Model: How to Measure Democracy and the
Quality of Democracy in Global Comparison. In Global Quality of Democracy as
Innovation Enabler (pp. 75-113). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham.
Iboi, P. (2017). Democratic Consolidation in Nigeria: Issues and Challenges. SSRN
Electronic Journal. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2958239
Sodaro, A. (2019). SELECTIVE MEMORY. Museums and Sites of Persuasion: Politics,
Memory and Human Rights.