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Englisch_GFS.md

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+## Who decides what is Democratic - Adam Przeworki
+
+- Definition of Democracy: Citizens can collectively decide, by whom and to some extent how they are governed
+- Two conceptions of Democracy:
+  -  Minimalist: Method for processing conflicts in a society
+    - Still needs laws and civic rights that protect it to work
+    - Democracy is based on positive rights, but doesn’t automatically provide the conditions, that are necessary to exercise these rights
+    - Some measures, that seem pro democratic in this sense can be misused to help a certain candidate, for example Erdogans decision to let people with Turkish citizenship living outside of turkey vote in Turkish elections helped him → Difficult to asses using minimalist criteria
+  - Maximalist: Embodiment of democratic values, ideals and interests
+    - Certain ideals are often valued above democracy, like representation, accountability, equality, justice, dignity etc.
+    - Defenders of this notion will argue, that real democracy will guarantee these ideals, and anything that doesn’t is no democracy
+    - These values, that people attach to democracy differ → Different definitions create conflicts
+- Everyone claims to defend democracy, uses democratic rhetoric
+- Democratic values can come in conflict with one another, for example laws that threaten democracy and human rights can have popular support
+- Constitutions and judges are the guardians of democracy in the minimalist sense when they uphold and defend the conditions for free and fair elections
+- Constitutions are maximalist in the sense, that they define certain values, that a government must uphold regardless of popular demand
+- Judges can also be partisan and deliberately interpret the law in a way, that benefits the incumbent
+- People are increasingly dissatisfied with traditional democratic institutions and the populist far right is on the rise
+- The dissatisfaction comes from the fact, that these institutions have failed to provide equality in the economic and social realm, which is widely believed to be the purpose of democracy itself 
+- Two types of populism:
+  - Particapatory: The demand to govern ourselves
+  - Delegative: The demand that governments do what people want, even if it defies the conditions necessary for the continued existance of democracy (Competetuve elections, liberal rights to speech and assosiation and the rule of law) 
+    - Over time this weakens the chances and power of the opposition and distorts the free expression and power of the electorate
+
+
+- Over time, the average number of major parties has risen all over the world 
+
+## Democratic Backsliding in the US
+
+- Trump is trying to dramatically increase the amount of power he has as a president by
+  - Firing government workers
+  - Using an excessive amount of executive orders
+  -  Placing loyalists in important positions, people who disagree with him get fired
+    - Example: Marjorie Taylor Greene criticised Trump because of his handling of the Epstein Files, the war in Gaza and healthcare subsidies very publicly, was publicly denounced by Trump and called a traitor and had to resign
+  - Unitary executive theory: The theory that all executive power should be in the presidents hands
+- 
+-