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Assess the Various Measures, Other Than Electoral Reform, That Have Been Suggested to Improve Democracy in the Uk.

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Assess the various measures, other than electoral reform, that have been suggested to improve democracy in the UK.

Democracy in the UK has declined since the post war dramatically, this is shown in many ways. Participation levels have fallen majorly in the past years and mainly due to the reason that people feel their votes are wasted and so they're not being represented in society and this is the main way that democracy has fallen this has clearly been shown in statistics whereby the norms for general election turn outs was at a high 75% however in the year 2005 it has dropped considerably to 60%.

The first, most effective way of improving democracy is to increase the use of the referendum. through this strategy, it will ensure that the public is educated about the political issues at hand and therefore will be more willing to vote in political matters as they understand the question given. Also, through the use of referenda it will increase the legitimacy of the government as the people have given their consent through their vote, especially as the referendum is the most direct form of democracy. This has been shown to be a positive and effective way of increasing participation levels as in the 2014 Scottish Independence referendum when the participation rate was up to 87% which is the highest turnout since the 1950 general election. This would make the UK more democratic as it would include all parts of society whilst having all views expressed.

Improving democracy in such a way does have problems. Too many referendums may cause ‘voter fatigue’ and cause the voters to get bored and tired with constantly having to vote, especially as it is a long drawn out process in comparison to typical elections. In order to overcome this issue, more referendums should be used to improve democracy however it is important that only major issues that concern

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