Political egalitarianism describes an inclusive and fair allocation of political power or influence, fair processes, and fair treatment of all regardless of characteristics like race, gender, religion, age, wealth or intelligence. Political egalitarianism, and its close cousin political equality, are key founding principles and sources of legitimacy for many

democracies Democracy (from , ''dēmos'' 'people' and ''kratos'' 'rule') is a form of government in which political power is vested in the people or the population of a state. Under a minimalist definition of democracy, rulers are elected through competitiv ...

. Related principles include one person, one vote and

equality before the law Equality before the law, also known as equality under the law, equality in the eyes of the law, legal equality, or legal egalitarianism, is the principle that all people must be equally protected by the law. The principle requires a systematic ru ...

Discussion

Egalitarianism

Egalitarianism Egalitarianism (; also equalitarianism) is a school of thought within political philosophy that builds on the concept of social equality, prioritizing it for all people. Egalitarian doctrines are generally characterized by the idea that all hum ...

denotes the belief that all people are of equal fundamental worth and should have equal status. Egalitarians tend to focus more on process and treating people as social equals than on the raw distribution of power.

Political equality

Political equality is only achieved when the norms, rules and procedures that govern the community afford equal consideration to all.Beramendi, P., Besley, T. and Levi, M. (2022)
‘Political equality: what is it and why does it matter?’
IFS Deaton Review of Inequalities The concept is cited in many definitions of democracy and touted as one of its advantages over

oligarchy Oligarchy (; ) is a form of government in which power rests with a small number of people. Members of this group, called oligarchs, generally hold usually hard, but sometimes soft power through nobility, fame, wealth, or education; or t ...

and

autocracy Autocracy is a form of government in which absolute power is held by the head of state and Head of government, government, known as an autocrat. It includes some forms of monarchy and all forms of dictatorship, while it is contrasted with demo ...

. Alexander Guerrero argues that systems using

sortition In governance, sortition is the selection of public officer, officials or jurors at random, i.e. by Lottery (probability), lottery, in order to obtain a representative sample. In ancient Athenian democracy, sortition was the traditional and pr ...

score better on political equality than electoral representative democracies.

Robert Dahl Robert Alan Dahl (; December 17, 1915 – February 5, 2014) was an American Political philosophy, political theorist and Sterling Professor, Sterling Professor of Political Science at Yale University. He established the pluralism (political the ...

believes that the ideal of democracy assumes that political equality is desirable. He goes on to argue that political equality and democracy are supported by the inherent intrinsic equal worth of every person (intrinsic equality) and the tendency of concentrated power to corrupt.

Equality before the law

Equality before law means that the law applies to all peoples equally and without exceptions. For example, the

freedom of speech Freedom of speech is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or a community to articulate their opinions and ideas without fear of retaliation, censorship, or legal sanction. The rights, right to freedom of expression has been r ...

should apply the same to all members of a society. Laws can sometimes be designed to help minimize unequal application. Well-designed constitutions, for example, can help protect political rights in functioning democracies.

References

External links

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