{
  "id": "worlds-largest-democracy.superlative",
  "term": "worlds largest democracy",
  "sense": "superlative",
  "pos": "noun",
  "status": "published",
  "level": 21,
  "domain": "agency",
  "style": "folk",
  "definition": "A collective self naming itself the extreme of a kind others also have, offering being first in that kind as its status among them.",
  "folk_gloss": "a country's description of itself as the biggest or oldest democracy",
  "emergence": {
    "components": [
      "collective-self.shared",
      "name.identifier",
      "extreme.position",
      "pattern.regularity",
      "others.distinct-entities",
      "first.order",
      "offers.proposal",
      "self-model.reflexive",
      "status.social",
      "identity.self"
    ],
    "interaction": "The self model picks a kind the group shares with others and a measure on which it is first; the superlative then works as identity and status at once, and holds as long as the measure does.",
    "novel_properties": [
      "size or age turned into identity",
      "a rank on one measure offered as standing",
      "a claim open to checking by a number"
    ]
  },
  "examples": [
    {
      "text": "India is commonly called the world's largest democracy, having the largest electorate of any country.",
      "domain": "politics"
    }
  ],
  "relations": [
    {
      "id": "punching-above-our-weight.outsized",
      "type": "contrasts-with",
      "note": "that reads reach against size; this reads rank within a kind"
    },
    {
      "id": "pride.state",
      "type": "is-a",
      "note": "pride at group scale, stated as a rank"
    }
  ],
  "used_by": [],
  "forms": [
    "the worlds largest democracy",
    "the worlds oldest democracy",
    "worlds largest democracy",
    "worlds oldest democracy"
  ],
  "closed": true,
  "provenance": {
    "author": "claude-opus-5-5:hand-curated",
    "date": "2026-09-29",
    "confidence": 0.85,
    "sources": [
      "schema/power-agency-phase.md"
    ]
  },
  "canonical": "https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-worlds-largest-democracy.superlative"
}