Democracy

The decisions about the goals of government and how policy is formulated are made in different ways and are dependent on the type of government making policy.

Democracies dramatically increased after World War II. The fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of Communist Governments in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe led to a second surge of democracy.  Although some form of democracy now predominates in most parts of the world, many countries are struggling to maintain democratic systems.

It may surprise you to know that governments that aren’t democratic have advantages over those that are, and a democratic system has disadvantages too. Policymaking in a democracy can be slow and cumbersome. In a presidential system like our own, with separation of powers, it is even more cumbersome. 

What will it take for a group to get a policy on the policy agenda, passed and implemented in a democracy?  In actuality things proceed more "efficiently" in an authoritarian dictatorship.