take in the informatio #### Read the following extract carefully. Then answer the questions on the basis of what is stated and implied. The defects of political democracy as a system of government are so obvious and has been so often catalogued, that I do not need to do more than summarize them here. Political democracy has been blamed because it leads to inefficiency and weakness of rule, because it permits the least desirable men to obtain power, because it encourages corruption. The inefficiency and weakness of political democracy are most apparent in moments of crisis, when decisions have to be rapidly made and acted upon. To ascertain and tabulate the wishes of many millions of electors in a few hours is a physical impossibility. It follows, therefore, that in a crisis one of two things happen: either the governors decide and present the accomplished fact of their decision to the electors – in which case the whole principle of political democracy will have been treated with the contempt which in critical circumstances it deserves; or else the people are consulted and time is lost, with often fatal consequences. The most powerful and stable democratic states are those in which the principles of democracy have been least logically and consistently applied. The weakest are the most democratic. Thus a parliament elected under a scheme of proportional representation is a truly democratic parliament. But it is also in most cases, an instrument not of rule but of anarchy. Proportional Representation guarantees that all shades of opinion shall be represented in the assembly. It is the ideal of democracy fulfilled. Unfortunately, the multiplication of the small groups within the parliament makes the formation of a stable powerful government impossible. In proportionally elected assemblies governments must rely on a composite majority. They have to buy the support of small groups with the more or less corrupt distribution of favours, and as they can never give enough, they are liable to be defeated at any moment. Stable democratic governments are found in countries where minorities, however large, are unrepresented, and where no candidate who does not belong to one of the great parties has the slightest chance of being elected. Parliaments in such countries are not in the least representative of the people. Extract from Proper Studies - "Political Democracy" by Aldoous Huxley