ABSTRACT
This chapter outlines some of the most significant conceptions of democracy in Western political thought. It does this partly chronologically and partly thematically. We begin with a discussion of the understanding of democracy in Ancient Greece and move on to ideas embedded in republicanism and liberalism that have influenced modern understandings of democracy. We then shine a light on the electoral, procedural conceptions of democracy that understand it as a method to determine who has access to political power and that emphasize a series of procedural criteria. Finally, we introduce four additional modern conceptions, i.e., liberal democracy, egalitarian democracy, participatory democracy, and deliberative democracy that go beyond the electoral understanding in different ways.
