Democracy Project

Content Focus

We are studying how democratic forms of government emerged through time. In this project you are focusing on the degree to which democracy has succeeded in the country we assign to your group. One of the trends in this past century has been the trend towards greater freedoms and democracy in many countries. After the end of the Cold War in the late 1980s, many countries that had communist forms of government began experimenting (to varying degrees of success) with democracy. Earlier in this century, as European powers such as France, Spain, England, and Portugal relinquished control over their colonies in Asia and Africa, countries in these regions also experimented with various forms of government—most often with dictatorships, but more recently with democracies.

Your Task

Examine one of these five aspects of democratic governments as it relates to your country. The Roman numeral in parentheses refers to the section in the state.gov website that you must read and use:

  1. popular sovereignty (III, IV) – someone must do this topic
  2. individual liberty (II) – someone must do this topic
  3. equal opportunity (for women/children/minorities) (VI)
  4. workers’ rights (VII)
  5. fair justice system (I)

Report to the class the degree to which your country practices this aspect (or element) of democracy. (This is your thesis.) You will need to do research on this country's history in the past 30 years or so, and focus especially on the one element you've chosen and its practice today. Your group will present this information to the class in the form of a lecture accompanied by a PowerPoint presentation. Your talking is the basis of the presentation; the PowerPoint will support what you say.

Requirements

Each of you must contribute the following:

To the group you must help:

 

Speech Outline

Thesis – State the degree to which your country is a democracy, based upon the element you are assigned. Break down your thesis into three subtopics that will demonstrate your thesis.

Subtopic 1: Discuss specific examples that show how democratic your country is

Subtopic 2: Discuss different examples that show how democratic your country is

Subtopic 3: Discuss more examples that show how democratic your country is

Conclusion: Restate your thesis and lead into the next speaker (if appropriate)

 

Slide Division

Slide 1 – thesis and subtopic 1

Slide 2 – subtopic 2

Slide 3 – subtopic 3 and conclusion

 

Research

http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2009/index.htm (U.S. Dept. of State)

https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/index.html (CIA Factbook)

http://www.freedomhouse.org                                 

http://www.ifex.org/ (International Freedom of Expression Exchange)       

http://www.hrw.org/ (Human Rights Watch)                          

http://www.amnesty.org/ (Amnesty International)

 http://dir.yahoo.com/regional/countries/ (Yahoo! listing of countries)

   

Scoring Guide

 

5

4

 3

2

1