Support Bargaining

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The theory of support-bargaining suggests that the systems of government recognized as 'democratic' are better understood as processes in which support is assembled in groups and organizations through support-bargaining. For example, only a minority of Romans were citizens with votes in elections for representatives, yet the same thing applies to Greeks and yet the sentence seems to make this seem like a significant difference between Athenian and Roman democracies. Preventing women from voting already banned half of the population from politics, not to mention the slaves, so pretty much the majority of Greeks couldn't vote.

In political support-bargaining, parties formulate policies and proposals that will attract support. People give their support to parties in accordance with their acceptance or rejection of the policies and proposals on offer. An electoral system, understood as an artificial support-bargaining structure, is used to facilitate the emergence of a party with majority support in a legislature. In contrast with democratic theory, which has difficulty reconciling parties with popular rule, the theory gives a central role to political parties, as the most powerful agents of support-bargaining systems.

Support-bargaining theory also draws attention to the importance of finance for political parties. The assembly of support across a nation for the same policies involves substantial costs. Democratic theory has no understanding of parties and consequently no understanding of the importance of finance in political processes