democracy是什么意思

英文词源

democracy

democracy: [16] Democracy means literally ‘government by the populace at large’. It comes via Old French democratie and medieval Latin dēmocratia from Greek dēmokratíā, a compound formed from demos ‘people’ and -kratíā ‘rule’, a derivative of the noun krátos ‘power, authority’, which has contributed a number of terms for types of government to English.

The original meaning of Greek demos was ‘district, land’, but eventually it came to denote the people living in such a district, particularly the ordinary people considered as a social class participating in government – hence democracy. The derivative democrat [18] was coined in French at the time of the Revolution.
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democracy (n.)

1570s, from Middle French démocratie (14c.), from Medieval Latin democratia (13c.), from Greek demokratia "popular government," from demos "common people," originally "district" (see demotic), + kratos "rule, strength" (see -cracy).

Democracy implies that the man must take the responsibility for choosing his rulers and representatives, and for the maintenance of his own 'rights' against the possible and probable encroachments of the government which he has sanctioned to act for him in public matters. [Ezra Pound, "ABC of Economics," 1933]