Essays on Democracy

A legitimate government is crucial to the prosperity of a country and its people. A government that is acceptable to everybody is a product of a democratic process. Democracy is a system of governance where electing and replacing of an incumbent government is done through free and fair elections, (Adams Henry, 2008:2-5.)In a democratic system the government and the citizenry enters a social contract. The government is given the mandate by the electorate, to implement the social contract for the fixed period of time, failure to which it is kicked out through an election. Besides elections a democratic system displays the following features: Recurrent free and fair elections,   Human rights are respected, political party pluralism exists, and above all civil society is tolerated (Ibid: 15-17). It is impossible for the state to remain religious at the same time democratic. In every jurisdiction there are always people of different religious orientation. They may be affiliated to dominant or minority religions, therefore it is prudent for every state to remain secular in order to uphold the rights of every religion. Depending on the location of the state there’s always a dominant religion and minority religion. A dichotomy between governance and religion  should be there, to avoid the Un- necessary conflicts that arise due to different ideologies of different religions, (Anderson, John ,2006:78-85).In a secular state religion play a very instrumental role in nurturing democracy, by giving direction to the government where it has faulted.