▶ Your Answer :
One of the most controversial issues
encountered by many democratic societies is whether government authorities
should carry the will of the citizens or regard their individual opinions more
heavily in making decisions. While controversial this subject is, in a free and
democratic society, government officials should always represent the will of
its citizens.
Firstly, the very definition and
the election process of government officials dictate that they are in a
position where they should represent the will of the people. The social
contract underlying every society is that people surrender their rights to make
laws or administrate them to a body now known as the government. Simply put,
the citizen’s inherent rights were merely ‘endowed’ to the government under
certain conditions and not surrendered. This is precisely why the elections are
held to designate people to assume critical positions in the government. The
elections itself represents the will of the people, and it is the elected
candidate’s duty to carry out the opinions of the people. If the government
authorities make decisions only according to their own individual interests,
then there would be no meaning in elections, or even largely, in democracy.
Secondly, the government officials
comprise a very limited group of people among citizens of a nation, in terms of
their numbers and perspectives. Therefore, their judgments are more likely to
fail than that of the general population. One can see that, in often cases the
political conflict arising in making decisions involves only two or three
parties. This is equivalent to saying that, if the people’s opinions are not
reflected among their opinions, the decision of a government may always be one
of the two or three choices offered by the parties, regardless of whether the
choices suit the people’s direct needs.
One may assert that, if the
situation is dire or, if the opinions of the people are not uniform to a
significant degree, then it is better for the officials alone to make
decisions. While this may seem true, and actually has occurred throughout
history, it should be the very last resort. History has shown us how the
ignorance of the people’s opinions turned out to be disastrous. For instance,
dictators like Hitler or Mussolini first started out as just one of the party
leaders, but once they eradicated their competitors and fixed the law to
effectively ignore the people’s opinions, the government turned into a monster
that killed thousands of innocent people and even waged war against the
international community. The rest is history as we all know.
As responsible members of the
international community, we should always aim for a free society where justice
is rightly served and the people’s opinions are properly reflected. The
democratic system in which most of us reside in ensures this through elections,
but only under the condition that the elected politician acts and makes decisions
according to the general opinion of the citizens. Without such a premise, efforts
to achieve a better world would be meaningless. |