How Democratic is the American Constitution? (2001,, among others) is a book by political scientist Robert A. Dahl that discusses seven "undemocratic" elements of the United States Constitution.
The book defines "democratic" as alignment with the principle of one person, one vote, also known as majority rule. It praises the Framers of the Constitution as "men of exceptional talent and virtue" (p. 7) who made admirable progress in the creation of their republican government. However, it also points out that innovation and change in democratic techniques and ideals continued even after the Constitution had been codified, and the American system has not adopted all of those new ideas. He notes that the Founding Founders were partially constrained by public opinion, which included maintenance of the sovereignty of the thirteen states.
The primary undemocratic aspects of the Constitution that the book sets out are:
Dahl considers the question of whether the details of the US Constitution, as amended and practiced in modern times, are superior or inferior to the constitutional systems of other stable democracies. His criteria for evaluation are:
Dahl supposes that there are certain conditions that make it easier to maintain a democracy in a given country. He writes that they seem to include "the effective control by elected leaders over the military and police, a political culture supportive of democratic beliefs, and a relatively well-functioning economic order, among others."
Dahl proposes that highly-unfavorable circumstances cause instability, no matter the constitutional systems. Under highly-favorable circumstances, a country may remain democratic in a range of possible constitutional arrangements, whether or not the system is the best kind for promoting stability. In mixed conditions, he postulates, the details of a country's constitution may tip the balance between stability and undesirable changes, such as the conversion to dictatorship.
Dahl points out that the superiority of presidential vs. parliamentary systems in this regard is disputed and that correlation between breakdown and presidential systems in the "Third World" may not be indicative of a causal relationship. He seems to take the position that different systems may be better suited to the peculiar circumstances of different countries. (p. 96)
* In favor of parliamentary systems, he cites: Juan Linz and Arturo Valenzuela, eds., The Failure of Presidential Democracy: Comparative Perspectives, vol. 1. Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994. In favor of presidential systems, he cites: Matthew Soberg Shugart and John M. Carey, Presidents and Assemblies: Constitutional Design and Electoral Dynamics. Cambridge University Press, 1992. p. 41-42.
Dahl notes that instability is more common in new democracies:
Dahl finds meaningful comparisons to the US Constitution only in other countries with similar conditions. He says that only 22 countries, including the United States, have been "steadily democratic" since 1950. His book identifies the following constitutional attributes as important for comparison:
The book compares the 23 stable, wealthy democracies on these criteria, summarized as follows:
| List of countries steadily democratic since at least 1950 | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| align=center style="background-color: #ffdead;" | Country | align=center style="background-color: #ffdead;" | Strongly federal? | align=center style="background-color: #ffdead;" | Strongly bicameral? | align=center style="background-color: #ffdead;" | Upper house with unequal repress.? | align=center style="background-color: #ffdead;" | Strong judicial review? | align=center style="background-color: #ffdead;" | Electoral system | align=center style="background-color: #ffdead;" | Party system | align=center style="background-color: #ffdead;" | Structure |
| Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Lower House AV; Upper House PR (STV) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| Yes | No | No | No | PR (list) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| Yes (since 1993) | No | No | No | PR (list) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| Yes | No | Yes | Yes | FPTP | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| No | No | No | No | PR (list) | Multi | Presidential | |||||||||
| No | No | No | No | PR (list) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| No | No | No | No | PR (list) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| No | No | No | No | 2 round | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | PR (MMP) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| Yes | Yes | No | Yes | FPTP | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| No | No | No | No | PR (list) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| No | No | No | No | PR (STV) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| No | No | No | No | PR (list) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| No | Yes | No | No | PR (MMP) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| No | No | No | No | Semi-PR | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| No | No | No | No | PR (list) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| No | Yes | No | No | PR (list) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| No | No | No | No | PR (MMP) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| No | No | No | No | PR (list) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| No | No | No | No | PR (list) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| Yes | Yes | Yes | No | PR (list) | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| No | No | No | No | FPTP | Multi | Parliamentary | |||||||||
| Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | FPTP | Two | Presidential | |||||||||
| Totals | Yes:8, No:15 | Yes:7, No:16 | Yes:5, No:18 | Yes:5 No:20 | FPTP:3, PR-list:13, PR-AV:1, 2-round:1 PR-MMP:3, PR:STV:1 Semi-PR:1 | Two:1, Multi:22 | Presidential:2, Parliamentary:21 | ||||||||
| Source: R. Dahl (2000), How Democratic Is the American Constitution? - Table 1 | |||||||||||||||
Looking at Freedom House rankings, Dahl concludes that there is no discernible correlation between the seven constitutional features and ratings on political rights or civil rights among the 23 comparison countries.
Dahl contrasts majoritarian governments, whose electoral system (such as first-past-the-post) can grant a dominant group (or even a minority group) decisive control over the government, with proportional systems, which make governmental control is more distributed. He concludes that proportional systems are more fair.
Proportional systems also do more to promote consensus-building, he claims, because of the need to build coalitions to form a majority.
Dahl considers the American system to be a hybrid because of its bicameral legislature and strong separation of powers, and the strong executive, which he says does not fit the mold of either category.
Data from Patterns of Democracy (Yale University Press, 1999) by Arend Lijphart is presented in an appendix, which ranks the U.S. on a best-to-worst scale among a varying number of countries. Ranked criteria include economic growth, unemployment, inflation, economic inequality, women's representation, energy efficiency, incarceration rates, social spending, voter turnout, and foreign aid. Not all analysts would agree; with Dahl that all of the criteria are appropriate measures of government effectiveness, and in some cases, there are political disagreements on whether a given indicator should be higher or lower. In the rankings that are given, the United States is in the best third of one, the middle third of six, and the bottom third of eight.
Dahl states that difference in size, diversity, and economic affluence make attributing good performance on those measures to government effectiveness too difficult. He describes American performance as "mediocre" and concludes that changing the US Constitution to a system resembling one of the other stable democracies would not necessarily negatively impact government performance.