2 DEC FS Q.47

Read the passage carefully and answer the question that follows:
Political ‘representation’ nonetheless is the vehicle that enabled the re-introduction of “democracy” into the modem, practical political vernacular. The resulting liberal democracy does not directly descend from the ancient Athenian democracy. Between the eras virtually nothing existed that approached “democracy” as an actual or named political form and when it again became a focus of politics and theory, it was wedded to representation – so that what we call a democracy is, in fact, a distinctive kind of democracy, “a representative democracy”. While elections and popular pressure surely have political impact, the actions of representatives are the primary, official mechanism for translating democratic citizenship into political power. We rely on the representative process to promote political goodness in a democratic society, but when one imagines the idea of ‘representation’ these days, its association with ethics or goodness does not spring to mind. It is an impersonal process, after all-a mechanical method by which one entity stands for or re-presents another, politically required by the need to channel the judgments of millions of citizens into the legally authoritative hands of a small number of public representatives, or even the sentiments of thousands into the leadership of a single person.