Representative assembly

A representative assembly is a political institution in which a number of persons representing the population or privileged orders within the population of a state come together to debate, negotiate with the executive (originally the king or other ruler) and legislate. Examples in English-speaking countries are the United States Congress and the Parliament of the United Kingdom.

The classical republics of Greece, Rome and Carthage included citizen assemblies (e.g. the Roman comitia). Popular assemblies (things) also emerged in pre-civilised Germanic and Scandinavian lands (and the modern assemblies in those countries are often named after the originals). However, all of these were direct rather than indirect expressions of democracy, since their members were the people themselves rather than representatives of the people. The idea of an assembly of representatives, a representative assembly, as a political institution of a literate society first appeared in Europe in the Middle Ages, more specifically in the twelfth to fifteenth centuries. Perhaps it was brought into being by rulers determined to avoid being overawed by their powerful warrior barons by appealing to lower ranks of society: lesser landowners, townsmen and clergy. Whatever the explanation for its emergence, it is considered by many to be the most important political innovation of the European Middle Ages.

The idea appeared first in Spain, then in England, France and Italy, then spread to Germany and Scandinavia, even Poland and Hungary. Various names were used for these institutions: in England, Ireland, Scotland, Sicily, the Papal States and the Kingdom of Naples they were called parliaments or parlamenti; in the Iberian peninsula they were called cortes or corts; in France they were called estates-general and in the Low Countries the estates- or states-general; in Germany the term used was landtag; in Denmark and Norway it was rigsdag, in Sweden riksdag, and in Poland sejm.

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