2025/10/22 by Sirianne Dahlum, Carl Henrik Knutsen · 1 voice
Social Sciences · #Electoral Systems and Political Participation #European Union Policy and Governance #European and International Law Studies
paper · doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198888581.013.0010
openalex publication_date 2025/10/22 · openalex created_date 2025/10/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/06/26
Abstract Norway is a high-quality democracy, almost regardless of how democracy is conceptualized or operationalized. Yet, Norwegian democracy is far from perfect; it has room for improvement, and more so in some areas than in others. Our chapter overviews the historical development of democracy in Norway since 1814, before detailing the system’s current characteristics. Regarding the latter, we address the overall high quality of the system along several dimensions—notably the electoral, liberal, and deliberative dimensions of democracy—but also several democratic deficiencies. The latter are highlighted in a recent analysis of the state of Norwegian democracy, which we review in this chapter. Examples of democratic deficiencies are inequalities in both political influence and participation across different groups of citizens, lacking voting rights in parliamentary elections for the large (and growing) share of the population without citizenship, and limited autonomy for elected politicians in some policy areas.