Question

“Political parties are a necessary condition for a democracy” Analyse the statement with examples.

Answer 1

Hint: Democracy is the form of government in which people have the authority to choose their governing representatives. Freedom of assembly and speech, inclusiveness and equality, right to life and minority rights, voting etc. are some of the cornerstones of democracy.

Complete answer:
It is the only form of government in which people can show their dissent and different individual groups can express their feelings. Political parties represent groups of people with different ideologies who compete with each other for becoming the governing representative of the people.
Without political parties, democracies cannot exist because then every candidate will be independent. Hence no one will be able to make any promises to people about major policy changes.
The utility of the government formed will remain uncertain. All the elected representatives might be accountable to their own constituencies for what they do in their locality but no one will actually be responsible for how the country as a whole will run.
There’s a lot of opposition in a democracy and hence it necessitates the existence of political parties. Elections developed much later than the formal structures of the government and political parties grew even later than the first onset of elections. Political elites like George Washington, MK Gandhi etc. expressed strong anti-party sentiments as divisive instruments of social and national unity.
Political parties were earlier regarded as infrastructures rather than structures of government and governance.

Note:
In liberal political theory, political parties came to acquire primary and crucial importance. In the Indian politics, parties and party systems have still not developed adequately.