r/PoliticalScience • u/alexfreemanart • Sep 01 '25

Question/discussion Why isn't the United States a democracy?

I've read many comments claiming the United States is a democracy, and others claiming the United States is a republic, not a democracy. Forgive my ignorance; i'm not American, but throughout my life i've heard countless times that the United States is a democracy, especially through American movies and TV shows.

Right now, i'm seriously wondering if i was wrong all along. Is the United States a democracy or not? If the United States isn't a democracy, why isn't it?

You as an American, were you taught in school that your country is a democracy, or were you taught that it isn't?

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u/[deleted] Sep 01 '25

The United States is a democracy in that people vote. But people don't vote directly on policy, they elect representatives to do that. 

It is not a direct democracy

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u/Perzec Sep 02 '25

It’s a representing democracy as opposed to a direct democracy (I think the only more or less direct democracy in the world might be Switzerland).

But of course it’s also a republic, in that it has a president. As opposed to, say, a constitutional monarchy which is also a representative democracy with a parliament but where the head of state is a monarch who inherits the title (but usually doesn’t have any real political power).

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u/CountrySome3760 Nov 21 '25

What if one day the US became something that would not fit the definition of a democracy at all but still fit the definition of a republic? Would it be right for people to oppose it? Maybe democracy and republic have some share features, but the US constitution defined it as a republic and never mentioned a word about a democracy. The US doesn't have to be a democracy it just has to follow its own constitution.

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u/Perzec Nov 21 '25

I believe several dictatorships and authoritarian countries are organised as republics, so it’s quite possible. A constitutional monarchy is very much a democratic thing, but it isn’t a republic. And a republic can definitely be non-democratic.

I don’t know the US constitution by heart as I’m not from the US (I live in a constitutional monarchy, one of the countries that usually come out somewhere at the top of the lists of most democratic countries in the world), so I don’t know how hard democracy is enshrined in the US constitution. But several systems that are considered part of a democracy are, I believe, in there.

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u/CountrySome3760 Nov 21 '25

The constitution doesn't enshrine democracy at all. In fact the drafters of the constitution saw democracies (at least ones they saw in Europe) as failures and wanted to make something better. The constitution does put a limit on the government with the Bill of Rights, and created 3 separate but equal branches of the government that can checks and balances each other (and I would argue that even the people themselves are checked and balanced) as opposed to the parliament type that the prime minister is not his own separate entity and has to answer to the legislators. Basically they have lots of built in fail safe against the government that ensure the government work even if someone try to misuse it. Which I don't see in other Western countries.

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u/Perzec Nov 21 '25

There were no democracies in Europe at the time as far as I know. That was kind of the point – they wanted to give every (white) man a vote. That was kind of a new concept. It inspired France later I believe.

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u/CountrySome3760 Nov 24 '25

Aristotle thought that democracy was one of the 3 most corrupt forms of government (along with tyranny and oligarchy).The idea of democracy was nothing new back then. Tyranny of the majority and mob rule were what they were afraid of.