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It is difficult to measure how 'democratic' a particular government is. Some have compared the E.U. favorably to the U.K. government while still acknowledging t
by lliamander 10y ago
It is difficult to measure how 'democratic' a particular government is. Some have compared the E.U. favorably to the U.K. government while still acknowledging that it falls short in certain regards [0].
But democracy is about more than just voting. It really comes down to "how much say does the average person have in the rules that govern their lives?". Will the Scottish vote count for as much being a part of the E.U. (where they are only 1% of the population) as it will staying a part of the U.K. (where they are 8% of the population)? Will the Scottish parliament retain as much independence from the E.U. parliament as they do from the U.K. parliament? Will the Scottish government be in a position to protect the interests of its people against political machinations, or will they be too often asked to sacrifice on behalf of "the greater good"?
I don't presume to have answers to those questions, so Scotland joining the E.U. may be the smart move. It just doesn't seem obviously so to me.
[0] http://theconversation.com/how-democratic-is-the-european-union-59419 http://theconversation.com/how-democratic-is-the-european-un...
- tremon 10y ago(where they are 8% of the population)? They may be 8% of the population, but they have 0.15% of the government's power. Scottish law is written mainly in Westminster, in which the conservatives have an absolute majority. 56 of the 59 Scottish seats went to the SNP, only one to the conservatives.
- ZenoArrow 10y ago56 seats out of 650 = 8.6%. Population of Scotland as a percentage of total UK population: 5.3 million people / 64.1 million people = 8.3%. Seems like the Scottish have about the same level of say as the rest of the UK population when it comes to the House of Commons. Plus, they have their own parliament in Holyrood.
- tremon 10y agoI said power, not representation. But you're right, I should have said 0.3% (1/331), not 1/650.
- ZenoArrow 10y agoSorry, where are you getting that 0.3% figure from?
- tremon 10y ago1 seat out of the 331 conservative seats that are currently running the UK.
- ZenoArrow 10y agoMPs in opposition still have power, though admittedly less power than those in a majority government. Also, if Scotland was in the EU government the number of seats would be set roughly proportional to the size of the population vs. the population of all EU countries (though it apparently doesn't follow a set formula, so all the numbers that follow are just to help with guesswork). Population of the EU, minus UK but adding in Scotland... 447 million people (approx.) 5.3 million people / 447 million people = 1.2% (approx.) As far as I can see from Wikipedia, Slovakia has roughly the same size of population as Scotland, and if I've read the table correctly it has 13 MEPs. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apportionment_in_the_European_Parliament https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apportionment_in_the_Europea... 13 / 750 MEP seats (would be 751 with the President of the European Parliament) = 1.7%, not too far off 1.2%. So would you expect Scotland to have much of a say in the EU if it had so few seats?
- themihai 10y agoI think democracy and underrepresentation are different things and it seems most don't see the difference. Would London be more democratic as a separate state? They voted to stay in the EU but it seems their vote doesn't count much as the UK leaves the EU. Does it make the UK undemocratic? Of course not. I think the idea behind EU is that united you can accomplish more(at least on long term). It's democratic but like any democratic system it has multiple players. UK left it because it couldn't control it not because it was not democratic. That's not necessary a bad thing for the rest of EU