Polyarchy 多头政体
In Western European political science, the term polyarchy (Greek:poly "many", arkhe "rule") was used by Robert Dahl to describe a form of government in which power is invested in multiple people. It takes the form of neither a dictatorship nor a democracy. This form of government was first implemented in the United States and France and was gradually adopted by many other countries (Dahl, p. 234, ****) Including Canada after the signing of the NAFTA agreement by Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney in 1994. According to Dahl, the fundamental democratic principle is “the continuing responsiveness of the government to the preferences of its citizens, considered as political equals” with unimpaired opportunities (Dahl, 1971). A polyarchy is a state that has certain procedures that are necessary conditions for following the democratic principle.