Illiberal democracy

An illiberal democracy could be any democracy that is not a liberal democracy. However, the term is almost always used to denote a particularly authoritarian kind of representative democracy, in which the leaders and lawmakers are elected by the people, but tend to be corrupt and often do not respect the law.

Illiberal democracies are found primarily outside of the West, in newly democratizing countries that do not have a history of pluralism. Without such a tradition of different ideas co-existing peacefully, the ruling party or leader—after winning multi-party elections that are mostly free and fair—behaves in a manner that violates the constitutional rights and liberties of the general population. (It was like the condition of Burma when it was in 1948 to 1962 and also until now pluralism still cannot be applied in burma as well as in opposition groups)

There is a spectrum of illiberal democracies: from those who are nearly liberal democracies to those that are almost dictatorships.

An illiberal democracy is marked by the tension between how a government is selected and how that government behaves. Illiberal democratic governments believe they have a mandate to act in any way they see fit, disregarding laws or the constitution if they desire, as long as they hold regular elections. They often centralize powers both between branches of the national government (violating the seperation of powers) and between different levels of government and private associations.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia