The Pros And Cons Of Representative Democracy

Although it seems like direct democracy would give an accurate representation of the population, a representative democracy provides more fair and equal decisions. This is because representatives can make decisions while keeping the minority in mind. In a direct democracy, the majority will always come out on top, simply because there are more people. Also, representatives are not emotionally invested in every issue, so they can make more logical and rational decisions. People often prioritize their values and beliefs over the welfare of others when voting on representatives, and they will do the same when they vote on important issues.
Some people may think that a direct democracy would be fast and efficient, but direct democracy is actually
much less efficient than indirect. Because voting is a representative’s job, they obviously vote much more often than an average citizen could. Also, it takes much more time for citizens to learn about an issue, then make suggestions and revisions, and after that the votes still have to be collected and counted. This would be even more of a problem if the issue was about war or national emergency. Another major problem is that some issues require complex decisions, and while representatives can choose the best option to suit the needs of many, direct democracy is limited to yes or no answers. For example, California adopted Switzerland’s direct democracy, and although it has Hollywood, Silicon Valley, and many beautiful beaches, it still has dropped to having one of the lowest credit scores out of the 50 states8. This is a result of budget problems from a direct democracy. It is reasonable to think that direct democracy makes lobbying harder, as it is easier to influence the few and not the many, but the internet makes it simple for anybody to gain a massive amount of followers.
A very recent and appropriate example of this is a crowdfunding website called Kickstarter.com[3]. Kickstarter allows people to post a project and donors pledge money until the funding goal is met, then the money is given to the creator of the project[4]. The entire basis of the website is trying to convince random people to give money to the project creator, without knowing them or having any guarantee that they will follow through. The success of the website has shown that it does not take much to reach hundreds of thousands of dollars in pledges, even if the project is strange and has questionable creators[5]. There are also many other social media websites where it is possible to gain a fanbase of millions of followers, such as YouTube and Twitter[6][7]. Another major problem with a voting system on the internet is that someone can be forced into voting a certain way. A father and son may have different political views, and normally the son could vote any way he chooses and pretend to agree with his father. However, if they can vote on the internet, the father can watch his son vote and make him change
it. In a direct democracy, the citizens are responsible for voting on legislation, however, even if an internet-based voting system was implemented, a direct democracy is simply not feasible.
Even politicians are not able to educate themselves and understand every bill that they vote on, and that is what they are paid to do. How can the average person be expected to do the same? People have their own lives to live, and ordinary citizens just are not interested in politics. Also, there are too many bills for the average person to vote on. In it’s two year span, the 112th Congress enacted 284 laws[1]. That is an average of one law for every 2.5 days, and those are just the ones that were passed. In the 2012 presidential election, only 131 million people participated[2]. If that was the turnout for the most important election in the country that only happens every four years, there is no way that the average person will take the initiative to vote every week, or even every month for that matter. It is much easier to vote for a representative that has views that you agree with: it takes less effort, you do not have to vote on things that you do not care about, and you do not have to learn about complex
issues.