Consent of The Governed - Types of Consent

Types of Consent

A key question is whether the unanimous consent of the governed is required; if so, this would imply the right of secession for those who do not want to be governed by a particular collective. All democratic governments today allow decisions to be made even over the overt dissent of a minority of voters, which in some theorists' view, calls into question whether said governments can rightfully claim, in all circumstances, to act with the consent of the governed.

The theory of hypothetical consent of the governed holds that one's oblige obey government depends on whether the government is such that one ought to consent to it, or whether the people, if placed in a state of nature without government, would agree to said government. This theory has been rejected by some scholars, who argue that, since government itself can commit aggression, creating a government to safeguard the people from aggression would be similar to the people, if given the choice of what animals to be attacked by, trading "polecats and foxes for a lion," a trade that they would not make.

Another division that is sometimes made is between overt consent and tacit consent. Overt consent, to be valid, would require voluntariness, a specific act on the part of the consenters, a particular act consented to, and specific agents who perform this action. Immigrating into a particular jurisdiction is sometimes regarded as an overt act indicating consent to be ruled by that jurisdiction's government. Not all who are ruled by a particular government have immigrated to that jurisdiction, however; some were born there.

It has been pointed out that in jurisdictions where proportional representation is not used, but candidates are instead elected by plurality vote, a candidate can be elected despite the overt dissent of a majority of the people. Not every voter has necessarily had an opportunity to vote on the constitutional provisions specifying that plurality voting should be used; according to some theorists, this calls into question whether said voters have consented to be governed by the candidates who obtain plurality support. A counter-argument is that, by failing to act through the process of constitutional amendment to change such provisions, the people have consented to them. A rebuttal to this is that in some jurisdictions, the means of amending the constitution are not completely in the hands of the electorate; the same issues arise, in claiming that the constitution left in place by the decisions of the people's elected representatives is consented to by the people, as arise in claiming that any other actions taken by said representatives are consented to by the people. Some proponents of the "overt consent" theory hold that the act of voting implies consent, while others question the connection between voting and consenting to a particular scheme of representative, since some voters may oppose the system as a whole but desire to influence decisions on particular issues or candidates.

The theory of tacit consent of the governed holds that if the people live in a country that is not undergoing a rebellion, they have consented to the rule of that country's government.