Types of democracy

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Types Anticipatory Athenian Cellular Consensus Conservative Cosmopolitan Defensive Deliberative Direct Economic Electronic Empowered Ethnic Grassroots Guided Hybrid regime Inclusive Industrial Jacksonian Jeffersonian Liberal / Illiberal Liquid Majoritarian Media Monitory Multiparty Non-partisan Oral Participatory Pluralist Popular Procedural Radical Representative Religious Buddhist Christian Islamic Jewish Mormon Sectarian Semi Semi-direct Social Socialist Sociocracy Sovereign Substantive Supermajority Totalitarian Workplace
Related topics Anarchism Citizens' assembly Criticism of democracy Deliberative referendum Democratic backsliding Democratic capitalism Democratic centralism Democratic confederalism Democratic peace theory Democratic republic Democratic socialism Democratic transition Democratization Democracy and economic growth Democracy promotion Electoral competition Initiative Kleroterion Liberalism Libertarianism Majoritarianism Motion Ochlocracy Nomination rules Peaceful transition of power Political demonstration Political equality Polyarchy Popular referendum Populism Proportional representation Referendum Right to petition Right to protest Right to candidacy Right to vote Sortition Territorial peace theory Tyranny of the majority Voting War referendum Wars between democracies Waves of democracy
Location Africa Asia Europe Historical Latin America and the Caribbean Middle East and North Africa
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Related Administrative division Democracy indices Democratic transition Autocratization Democratisation Hybrid regimes
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Types of democracy refers to the various governance structures that embody the principles of democracy ("rule by the people") in some way. Democracy is frequently applied to governments (ranging from local to global), but may also be applied to other constructs like workplaces, families, community associations, and so forth.

Types of democracy can cluster around values. Some such types, defined as direct democracy (or participatory democracy, or deliberative democracy), promote equal and direct participation in political decisions by all members of the public. Others, including the many variants of representative democracy, favor more indirect or procedural approaches to collective self-governance, where decisions are made by elected representatives rather than by the people directly.^[1]

Types of democracy can be found across time, space, and language.^[2] The foregoing examples are just a few of the thousands of refinements of, and variations on, the central notion of "democracy."^[3]