Governance

Class 06 Social Science

Human beings have been living in communities for a long time. When a large number of people live together, there can be disagreements and disorder, and rules become necessary to maintain order and harmony in the society.

The process of taking decisions, organising the society’s life with different sets of rules, and ensuring that they are followed, is called governance. The group of individuals or the system that makes the rules and ensures that they are followed is called a government. Some of the more important rules are called laws.

Three Organs of Government

1. The legislature is the organ that makes new laws (or legislates). Sometimes it also updates or removes existing laws. This is done by an assembly of representatives of the people.

2. The executive is the organ that implements (or executes) the laws. This includes the head of state (who may be a president, a prime minister or a chief minister), the ministers and any agency responsible for enforcing ‘law and order’.

3. The judiciary is the system of courts which decides whether someone has broken the law and, if so, what course of action should be taken, including punishment if necessary. Sometimes it also examines whether a decision taken by the executive is right, or whether a law passed by the legislature is well conceived and fair to all.

In a good system of governance, these three organs must be kept separate, although they interact with each other and work together. This separation is called the ‘separation of powers’. It is intended to provide a system of checks and balances. This means that each organ of the government can check what the other is doing and restore balance if one organ acts beyond its expected role.

Three Levels of Government

Any government operates at two levels at the least - local and national. In many countries, including India, it functions at three levels or tiers - local, state or regional, and national. Each level deals with different matters.

In India, we have:

  1. Local governments
  2. State governments
  3. Central or Union government

Democracy

The word ‘democracy’ comes from two Greek words - dēmos meaning ‘people’, and kratos meaning ‘rule’ or ‘power’; so ‘democracy’ literally means the ‘rule of the people’.

At the State or national levels through elections, people vote for representatives, who will be the elected members of their respective assemblies. They are generally called ‘Members of Legislative Assembly’ (or MLAs) at the State level, and ‘Member of Parliament’ (or MPs) at the national level. All these members discuss laws, problems and solutions in the assemblies, and, through dialogue and debate, try to convince each other whenever there are different opinions.

Like any modern democracy, therefore, India is a representative democracy. It is also the world’s largest democracy. In principle, all Indian citizens above the age of 18 have the right to participate in these elections.

The term grassroots democracy refers to a system that enables and encourages the participation of ordinary citizens. In such a system, the citizens can have a say in decisions which affect them.