Democracy fails...

[Smaug]

I've come to a conclusion that there has pratically never been such a thing as true democracy throughout the history. The only exceptions may have been the Republic of Athenes and the medieval City-states or Free Cities. However it must be noted that in these cities there was no such thing as equal voting. There was an economical census. These were small enough societies to actually maintain the legitimacy. In larger societies money take over. And it's a rule. The only difference is how well this fact is disguised. But even so there may be positive aspects since this kind of regime sometimes lowers social tension and may solve some problems on a low level. By the way, you may be surprised but the USSR was a democratic state on certain level. This took place after the death of Joseph Stalin. While all the high-level decisions were made exclusively by the Party on the low level of self-governing there was a mechanism of people's deputies that actually worked through a democratic procedure. Of course you had smaller chances to be elected without being in the Party but by then becoming a member of the Party in most cases was a formality if you weren't a known 'dissedent'. This became even easier in 1970's.
Anyway a useful thing is not to fool yourself and understand that equal-rights Democracy on a large scale is in fact a utopia. Just like Communism. And in real world it's economical considerations that prevail. For your vote to really matter you have to have something to back it up with. Money, public support (which may be bought with money), social status (which displays your input into the society in a non-financial way and can be acheived through non-equal voting) or else. The more backup you have the more your voice matters no matter what ways are used to please the laymen. Laws of Nature in action.