Talk: Popular sovereignty
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See:
http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h228.html http://www.basiclaw.net/Principles/Popular%20sovereignty.htm http://www.google.ca/search?num=20&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=%22popular+sovereignty%22&btnG=Google+Search
DJ Clayworth 18:25, 15 Mar 2004 (UTC)
I believe that recent edits have been detrimental and not factual. Here is the previous version of the article, reproduced in its entirety:
- Popular sovereignty is the doctrine that sovereignty ultimately resides in the populace as a whole, rather than in a monarch, an aristocracy, or a plutocracy. The concept of popular sovereignty provides one of the theoretical underpinnings of democracy, whether that is direct democracy, representative democracy, or plebiscitory democracy.
- This doctrine stands at an opposite pole from the doctrine of the divine right of kings.
This could be much expanded, and "plebescitory" was misspelled, but pretty much all of this was removed without explanation and replaced by what seems to me to be an opinion-laden and inaccurate article. Rather than have an edit war, I will tag it NPOV and factually disputed and hope to discuss here.
- Certainly Hobbes, for one, did not believe that popular sovereignty necessarily excluded monarchy. And would anyone seriously argue that, say, the Netherlands or the UK or Spain today is not based fundamentally on popular sovereignty, even though they all have monarchs?
- "The British overthrew their incompetent king to replace him with a similar system(for awhile)." This presumably refers to Cromwell's Commonwealth, but seems deliberately obscure.
- "The French had their revolution and killed all the nobility..." This is so exaggerated I don't know how to reply.
I could go on, but I assume my point is clear. As I say, I'd like to talk this through & agree on a substantive article rather than have an edit war.
-- Jmabel 18:42, 15 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Recent complete rewrite removes my objections. -- Jmabel 04:32, 22 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Popular sovereignty and democracy
"Popular sovereignty is thus a basic tenet of most democracies." True enough, but I think a bit misleading and deserves expansion. Popular sovereignty is also often the legal mandate of undemocratic states (e.g. Mussolini's Italy, all of the past and present communist states, Saddam Hussein's Iraq, or present-day Iraq with its puppet government). Also, although most constitutional monarchies today at least informally admit popular sovereignty and consider the monarch to serve at the behest of the people, this was not always the case: as England (and later Great Britain and the U.K.) became more and more democratic over the centuries, the first serious assertion of other-than-royal sovereignty was Cromwell's Commonwealth. Then with the Restoration and the Glorious Revolution it goes back and forth, but even a monarch as late as George III never willingly recognized any sovereignty other than his own "by the grace of God". That formula is used even today, although presumably almost no one takes it seriously. -- Jmabel 17:32, Sep 1, 2004 (UTC)
- The uncertainty I had about the formal underpinnings of some of Europe's constitutional democracies was the reason I wrote "most". Note, for instance, that Louis-Philippe of France called himself "king of the French" and not "king of France" to affirm that he believed his leadership derived from popular sovereignty, and not from some divine right.
- What do you think of my current suggestion? David.Monniaux 18:03, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)
Much more on the mark. I doubt it can get better without some real research.
Until someone does some solid research on the history of the doctrine, this article is just waiting to become a lightning rod for POV wars. (e.g. what examples of usurped sovereignty will be included?) I hope that whoever decides they need to significantly expand this does so by some actual historical research instead of by insertion of material that merely lengthens without strengthening. -- Jmabel 19:13, Sep 1, 2004 (UTC)
