ABSTRACT
The legitimacy of democracy presupposes a common understanding of the meaning of “democracy”. According to DAS, democracy should meet three requirements: rule by the citizens, the rule of law, and system capacity. A normative theory of democracy should, as has been emphasised, be distinguished from a definition of “democracy”. The former states an evaluation of, or an argument for democracy; the latter states a rule of language. Utilitarianism is the most typical example of a result-oriented theory of democracy. The value of democracy lies in its ability to maximise utility. Democracy offers protection against the worst political misfortunes, but it is no guarantee for a good society according to liberal standards. According to F. Sejersted “the rule of law and democracy correspond to two different concepts of liberty, the negative which makes liberty dependent on curbing authority, and positive which makes it dependent on existing authority”.
