‘A Passionate Clarity’: David Beetham on Democracy, Legitimacy and the Democratic Audit

Abstract

All who examine and puzzle over the ideas and practices of democracy, in the UK and well beyond, owe much to the scholarship and leadership of David Beetham (19382022) – a long-serving member of the Editorial Advisory Board of Representation – over several decades. In this short article, we discuss and appreciate key parts of David’s contribution to advancing our understanding of democracy, representation, rights, and more. In a short book published as a ‘Beginner’s Guide’ to democracy, Beetham (2005, p. 161) described his involvement with an ‘organisation or network called Democratic Audit’. The aim, he explained, has been to ‘develop a method and a framework which can be used by citizens of any country to audit their own democracy. The point of such an audit is to identify the most significant strengths and weaknesses as a contribution to reforming and strengthening the democratic process’. With Stuart Weir and others, David published two Democratic Audits of the UK (Beetham et al., 2002; Beetham & Weir, 1999). He was also closely involved with several of the audits in 24 other countries. Perhaps the ‘go to’ publication for anyone seeking to understand the continuing value of the Audit is Assessing the Quality of Democracy: A Practical Guide (Beetham et al., 2008). In 314 pages, the Practical Guide justifies the Audit as a framework and method of democracy assessment and compares it to other methods of assessing democracy. It discusses the strengths and weaknesses of different data sources in evaluating different aspects of democracy, and draws lessons from experiences from audits around the world. Despite the admirable clarity of its standards, some might feel that the Audit starts out from a needlessly complex understanding of democracy. Why not just assess democracy as a simple competition for the people’s vote (Schattsneider, 1960)? Anything much more, the democratic realists tell us, gets democracy into trouble by pursuing unattainable ideals. In contrast, a form of government with periodic opportunities to throw the rascals is not only possible, but is also a remarkable development compared to the dismal ways in which humans have been governed for most of their history. So why does assessing democracy require much more than free and fair elections; rights needed for free and fair elections and rascals who are prepared to accept being thrown out? The answer, in David’s view, was that even indicators based on rights, competition and inclusiveness – a combination that had become ‘standard’ since Dahl (1971) – failed to