What is a parliamentary democracy?

And I ask in practical terms, not labels.

The UK’s prime minister says that the nation has a parliamentary democracy.

This seems an oxymoron. In broad lines, if the people are able to vote for the decisions that affect them then it’s a democracy. If the people are only able to vote for a representative then it’s a republic.

And I am aware of the expression ‘direct democracy’. It is the same as saying ‘direct referendum’.

It seems to me an attempt for republics to sugar coat them as democracies.

Or is there a perspective I’m missing?

All these terms can be used either with a general meaning or a very specific meaning. Broadly, politics systems that rely on voters selecting key members of a government can fairly be called a democracy. The word “democracy” need not mean only a pure democracy in which there are no representatives or foundational laws that cannot be overridden by a majority.

In contemporary use, republics are governments in which the head of state is not a heriditary title. It doesn’t always have to do with being a representative democracy. The U.K. is not a republic, because there is a royal family.

A parliamentary democracy is generally understood to be a system in which what we in the US understand as the top levels of executive power (head of government, cabinet officials) are members of the legislature. The US separates these two functions into two branches of government, so the US isn’t a parliamentary democracy.

The idea that the term “democracy” applies only in those situations where individuals vote directly on issues is a restriction of the term far beyond what is commonly meant by it. By such a limited definition none of the countries of the world are democracies.

In the context of the UK, a call to “turn the nation into a republic” means a call to ditch the monarchy. Very few use the term “republic” in any other context.

And, to return to the question, I think one key feature of a parliamentary democracy as opposed to other types is the feature that the leadership of the government (specifically the executive branch) swings on the election and voting of the legislature or one house of it.

The US doesn’t have this; the President is elected separately from Congress, which means that he can be faced with a hostile Congress unwilling to pass his budget without aggressive negotiation, for instance.

On the other hand, in Canada or the UK, if a Prime Minister gets his budget voted down, that usually means he steps down, and either some other party/coalition gets a chance to form a government, or a new election is called.

Not exactly. With the exception of the UK (maybe others as well), most parlementary democracies do have a separation between the legislative and executive branches of government. The prime ministers and cabinet members might have been elected as representatives, but if they choose to except a cabinet position, they have to give up their seat in parliament.

In practice this means that after elections, you try to find a (combination of) political party(s) that has a majority in parliament and then you form the cabinet. Most democratic countries use proportional representation, so all this can take a while.

I’m struggling to think of a parliamentary democracy in which this is the case. Do you have an example?

You may be confused about the historic origin of “republic,” perhaps. It comes from the Latin res publica and more or less means “people’s state.” It means that ultimate sovereignty lies with the people. The state belongs to the people, is created by them, is ultimately answerable to them.

This was kind of an obvious thing to the Romans, but in the period that followed them it fell very much out of favor. To the Medieval mind, sovereignty rested with the prince, who was ultimately answerable only to God. He might certainly ask the people their wishes, and he was charged with their welfare, so that, in theory, if he did not do what was best for the people – which is not necessarily that for which they asked – then God would smite his sorry ass. That threat may bring a smile to your face but in 1100 AD the threat of eternal damnation of your soul for doing wrong was deeply frightening to people.

The philosophical Christian king of the Middle Ages felt that a republic was readily prone to political gamesmanship, corruption and decadence, and the oppression of minorities, because the only constraint on the behaviour of its government was “what the majority wanted.” It had been readily observed that rabble rousing hucksters were capable of leading the people into grave error, and that tying morality to “what most people say is right right now” inevitably led to a shallow and evanescent public morality, and of course that if the majority is always right and gets whatever it wants then minorities are completely at its mercy and can, and would, be savagely oppressed or exploited. Hence, the foundation of a just government was considered to be the appropriate fear and love of God and His justice, and the earthly prince had better do his best to approach that platonic ideal. For example, the prince could not allow minorities to be persecuted by a majority, no matter how overwhelming the vote for it, because that was contradictory to the commandments of God – and The Big Guy was sovereign, ultimately, not any temporary majority of fallible mortals.

Of course, how well that worked in practice is a matter of debate. A debate which formed a major part of the Reformation and Renaissance. Approaching the foundation of the United States and the general liberalization of the West, you still had a division in thought, between those who felt ultimate sovereignty rested with God, and the prince was his regent, and those who felt it was all a crock and ultimate sovereignty rested with the people.

The Founders of the US were well aware of the practical difficulties of founding a country based on the principle that God was its ultimate ruler, namely, how do we know what the Big Guy has to say on day-to-day matters? But conversely, they were also well aware of the tendencies of democracies to tear themselves to pieces and to oppress minorities. So what they did is invent this pseudo-God, “The People”, who are something like a platonic ideal of real people (us), and who are ultimately sovereign. They are the authority from which the government draws its power. But They are not quite us, if you know what I mean. When we – real ordinary people – express our opinion, government is not expected to instantly do what we say. Because The People are not exactly represented by any momentary majority of the people now alive. The People are something like a time- and space-average over real people. That is, our behaviour as real people, taken over a long enough span (possibly more than one generation) and over enough individual circumstances, approaches the behaviour of The People, and is ultimately sovereign.

The Founders put in a bunch of restraints on what the people can do (indirect election of the President and Senate, federalism, checks and balances, the Bill of Rights, three branches of government deliberately left co-equal) – so that foolishness would be restrained until the time-averaged wisdom of The People emerged instead. This is what you’re calling “a republic” – all those checks on the will of the majority. But that is a modern Western (typically American) back-construction, it is not the original meaning of the word, nor how it’s generally used elsewhere. Those features are more often called being a constitutional representative democracy (or republic, doesn’t matter which), which just describes some of the typical constraints put in to prevent the people from deviating too wildly from what The People want to do. But those constraints can also exist in systems in which the ultimate sovereignty rests, at least in principle, with a prince answerable only to God, such as England, which is (in the original meaning) therefore not a republic.

I believe Belgium, for one.

But I’m trying not to overburden the OP with details of how some countries have twists on their particular types of government. Sometimes sticking to a simple story - like George Washington being the first President of the United States - is the easiest way to explain things, even though someone can say that honor should belong to John Hanson.

I can only think of Slovakia and (perhaps) Czech Republic.

What a pleasurable answer to read. Thank you.

Huh? Never heard of that. In Canada that is certainly not the case - the prime minister and his cabinet ministers remain MPs and retain their seats in parliament. I’ve seen them innumerable times on TV when important matters are brought up. While cabinet ministers don’t have to be MPs (cite) that is **highly **unusual and temporary.

France is another system where the premier and cabinet ministers don’t sit in the parliament. This is one of the dividing points between continental parliamentary systems and Westminster style parliamentary systems.

These are not definitions that reflect actual usage or proper understanding of history or etymology.

Etymologically, “democracy” means “rule by the people” and “republic” means “thing of (belonging to) the people.”

They don’t contradict each other in any sense.

In modem terms, “republic” essentially means “not a monarchy.”

A republic can be a democracy if power ultimately derives from the will of the people. Whether through representatives or directly.

The United States is both a Republican democracy and a democratic republic. It is also a federal republic with division of powers.

The United Kingdom is not a republic because it has a monarch. It is a constitutional monarchy. It is also a parliamentary democracy because it doesn’t have separation of powers.

The idea that republics and democracies are mutually exclusive is just propaganda on the part of people who want to say it is okay to arbitrarily deny individuals dual voting rights.

On the other hand, even though the UK still officially has a monarchy, the monarch has (practically speaking) almost no power. And the ones who do have actual power are, in fact, elected. So one could fairly say that the UK is a republic after all, even with Lizzie.

In Norway the members of government aren’t allowed to vote in parliament, so for the duration of their appointments they are, if they’re members of parliament, replaced in parliament by a substitute.

And the Netherlands and Germany as well (probably all of continental Europe, but I’m too lazy to check). As Northern Piper says this is the difference between Westminster and Continental style parliamentary democracies.

For this continental, that makes the Westminster style the exception;).

I guess my understanding of the words derive from when they were purer, if there is such a thing, because from then on, different peoples skew their meaning to suit their purposes, a bit like all language, I guess.

My recollection is, and please correct me if I’m wrong, that in the heydays of Athens democracy all citizens could vote on the issues, all citizens could propose issues to be voted on, all citizens could discuss them at the Agora.

In the heydays of Rome’s republic, only senators acted as the citizens above, effectively representing their constituency. How they got to the Senate though, I am not aware.

Switzerland comes very, very close, which can be a pain in the ass. Does anybody know if the Basileans have finally decided how to fix the painting on the Casino? Back in '07, they’d been repeating the referendum for several years… (yes, it is an actual example).

The whole point of using representative democracy is to not have to put every single decision and regulation to the vote.

Spain follows the Westminster system, in our case what’s unusual is when a minister doesn’t also have a seat. And they get paid for both jobs, wheeeee!

In the heyday of Athens democracy, the citizens were a tiny amount. Most people could not vote and had no representation. Roman senators had no constituency; they were neither elected nor selected: they were the heads of their families, with only a few families having senators.

I’m not sure if anyone considers France to be a parliamentary democracy, Westminster or continental.

Fair point. However, although the President of France has much more power than in classic parliamentary systems, the premier and Cabinet have to be drawn from the party that has a majority in the parliament, not from the President’s party. If the President’s party doesn’t have the majority, the President has to appoint the premier and cabinet from the majority party, leading to a period called “cohabitation”. The first time that happened was when President Mitterand (Socialist) had to appoint Jacques Chirac, a conservative, as Premier.

That’s closer to a parliamentary model than a presidential one, since the president’s choice was constrained by the party standings in the Assembly.