Does democracy stabilize a society?

Good evening gentlemen, sorry for my late post, I was having trouble connecting to the internet.


A stable society is one which is capable of handling both ends of the spectrum that is human behavior. Many examples of stable societies in today’s world define themselves as democratic or incorporating democratic elements at the very least. Two examples of such countries would be America and China. America is considered by many to be a prime example of democracy where the citizens elect their own leaders and they play an active role in shaping the country’s future.
China on the other hand, though considered by many to be a communist state, incorporates elements of socialism, communism and democracy as well, while staying on the road to become a future global superpower. Thus, democracy is not the only means of creating stability in a society but is capable of producing stability.

However, not all democracies consist of stable societies. India for example, though being a democracy, has a very unstable society, especially in the state of TamilNadu, where even though elections are held, the vast majority of citizens there are uneducated and are mainly villagers and as a result, they end up not understanding the process of the elections properly and are hoodwinked by a certain candidate who may even bribe them to vote for him. This results in a society that’s going nowhere, where the same politician is elected again and again and nothing happens. Therefore, the presence of democracy does not necessarily ensure stability in a society. One criteria that is usually fulfilled for stable democratic societies is widespread education where most of the individuals are educated and are able to make calculated, and mature decisions when voting for a leader.

From my point of view, I agree with the statement to a small extent as my teammate Tak Wei implied, democracies allow the people to influence the laws of the society. Therefore, the people in a sense are governing themselves which provides for stability.

Although, in the case of Singapore and Hong Kong it is not essentially democracy that has stabilized the society but rather “sound economic policies and high quality education” that has propelled them to .their current economic status which is an underlying factor in the stability present in the two societies.