This paper inspects recent theoretical work in deliberative democracy. It identifies three distinct ways in which such theories attempt to justify their claims for an increase in deliberation. Each has its strengths; each has its implications for practice. If the new deliberative theories are to move beyond a critique of liberal democracy in order to articulate a legitimate and practical politics, the respective gains of these three types must be brought together.
The classic accounts of deliberative democracy are also accounts of legitimacy: 'that outcomes are legitimate to the extent they receive reflective assent through participation in authentic deliberation by all those subject to the decision in question' ( Dryzek, 2001, p. 651 ). And yet, in complex societies deliberative participation by all those affected by collective decision-making is extremely implausible. There are also legitimacy problems with the demanding procedural requirements which deliberation imposes on participants. Given these problems, deliberative democracy seems unable to deliver legitimate outcomes as it defines them.Focusing on the problem of scale, this paper offers a tentative solution using representation, a concept which is itself problematic. Along the way, the paper highlights issues with the legitimate role of experts, the different legitimate uses of statistical and electoral representation, and differences between the research and democratic imperatives driving current attempts to put deliberative principles into practice, illustrated with a case from a Leicester health policy debate. While much work remains to be done on exactly how the principles arrived at might be transformed into working institutions, they do offer a means of criticising existing deliberative practice.
AbstractThis paper examines the potential role of deliberative democracy in constitutional processes of higher law-making, either for the founding of constitutions or for constitutional change. It defines deliberative democracy as the combination of political equality and deliberation and situates this form of democracy in contrast to a range of alternatives. It then considers two contrasting processes—elite deliberation and plebiscitary mass democracy (embodied in referenda) as approaches to higher law-making that employ deliberation without political equality or political equality without deliberation. It finally turns to some institutional designs that might achieve both fundamental values at the same time, or in the process of realizing a sequence of choices.
In democratic countries, deliberative democracy is proposed to rectify problems of liberal democracy. This paper explores deliberative democracy in China, conventionally regarded as an authoritarian country. After examining some deliberative practices and institutions in China and its more democratic public sphere, a conclusion is drawn that despite problems such as flawed institutional design and state domination, an immature deliberative democracy exists in China. The prospect of deliberative democracy in China is optimistically predicted, based on the public's strong democratic consciousness, the government's interest in democratic reform and the relatively moderate practices of deliberative democracy.
Research Methods in Deliberative Democracy is the first book that brings together a wide range of methods used in the study of deliberative democracy. It offers thirty-one different methods that scholars use for theorizing, measuring, exploring, or applying deliberative democracy. Each chapter presents one method by explaining its utility in deliberative democracy research and providing guidance on its application by drawing on examples from previous studies. The book hopes to inspire scholars to undertake methodologically robust, intellectually creative, and politically relevant research. It fills a significant gap in a rapidly growing field of research by assembling diverse methods and thereby expanding the range of methodological choices available to students, scholars, and practitioners of deliberative democracy.
The model of deliberative democracy poses a number of dificult questions about individual rationality, public reason and justification, public spiritedness, and an active and supportive public sphere. It also raises the question about what kind of civic involvement is required for the practices of democratic deliberation to be effective. The aim of this article is to examine the last question by looking at the role and value of citizenship understood in terms of participation. It argues that deliberative democracy implies a category of democratic citizens; its institutional framework calls for the activity and competence of citizenry, and consequently, the participatory forms of deliberative democracy come closest to the democratic ideal as such. Also, the model of participatory-deliberative democracy is more attractive as a truly democratic ideal than the model of formal deliberative democracy, but it certainly faces more dificulties when it comes to the practicalities, and especially the institutional design. This problem is raised in the last section of the article where the possible applicability of such a model to post-communist democracies is addressed. The major dificulty that the participatory-deliberative model poses for the post-communist democratization can be explained by a reference to the cultural approach towards democratization and to the revised modernization theory presented by Inglehart and Welzel. The problem of the applicability of such a model in the post-communist context seems to support the thesis presented here which suggests that active citizenship, civic skills and civic culture are indispensable for the development of deliberative politics.
The topic of authority only rarely figures into theories of deliberative democracy, no doubt owing to the widely held view that authority is inherently undemocratic. But deliberative democrats need a concept of authoritative decision making, not least because the scale and complexity of contemporary societies radically limit the numbers of decisions that can be made by deliberatively democratic means. I argue for an inherently democratic conception of authority, in large part by examining and rejecting the view—held by radical democrats, conservatives, and most liberals—that authority involves a surrender of judgment by those subject to authority. In contrast, I develop the view that authority, particularly in posttraditional contexts, involves a limited suspension of judgment enabled by a context of democratic challenge and public accountability. An important point is that democratic authority supports robust deliberative decision making by enabling individuals to allocate their time, energy, and knowledge to the issues most significant to them.
Intro -- Deliberative Freedom -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- Why "Dimensions" of Freedom? -- Overview of the Book -- 1. Deliberation, Aggregation,and Negative Freedom -- Beyond the Aggregation and Transformation Dichotomy -- The Negative Freedom Tradition and Democracy -- Conclusion -- 2. Republican Freedom and Discursive Status -- Domination without Interference -- Republican Freedom and Demoracy -- Deliberative Democracy beyond Republicanism -- Conclusion -- 3. Preferences and Paternalism -- Nonautonomously Formed Preferences -- Paternalism -- Collective Self-Legislation and Freedom as Status -- Conclusion -- 4. Freedom as Accommodation: The Limits of Rawlsian Deliberative Democracy -- The Accommodation of Reasonable Doctrinesand Negative Freedom -- Public Reason and Reasonableness -- Political and Moral Autonomy -- Conclusion -- 5. Freedom as Emancipation: Deliberative Democracy as Critical Theory -- The Critique of Ideology and Internal Autonomy -- Deliberation and Politicization -- Social Critics, Triggering Self-Re ection, and Public Autonomy -- Conclusion -- 6. Democratic Ethos and Procedural Independence -- The Interdependence of the Ethical and the Moral -- Deliberation and Privacy -- Democratic Ethos -- Thinking for Oneself -- Conclusion -- 7. Freedom, Reason, and Participation -- The Epistemic Dimension of Deliberative Democracy -- Reason, Freedom, and Radical Democracy -- Participation, Freedom, and Neutrality -- Conclusion -- 8. Conclusion: Toward a Theory of Deliberative Freedom -- Four Conceptions of Freedom Reinterpreted -- A Multidimensional Theory of Deliberation and Freedom -- On the Need for Institutional Reformand Economic Redistribution -- Notes -- Introduction -- Chapter 1 -- Chapter 2 -- Chapter 3 -- Chapter 4 -- Chapter 5 -- Chapter 6 -- Chapter 7 -- Chapter 8 -- Bibliography -- Index -- A -- B -- C.
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Deliberative Democracy is the darling of democratic theory and political theory more generally, and generates international interest. In this book a number of leading democratic theorists address the key issues that surround the theory and practice of deliberative democracy. The problems faced by deliberative democracy are outlined in the context of the available empirical evidence, solutions are surveyed, and new and innovative ideas are proposed to resolve these issues. Each chapter takes a key issue as its focus: Conflict ́⁰Ø Inequality ́⁰Ø Expertise ́⁰Ø Interests ́⁰Ø Pluralism ́⁰Ø Citizens' Psychological Attributes ́⁰Ø Scale ́⁰Ø Public Openness ́⁰Ø The Public Sphere ́⁰Ø Minipublics Key Features. Makes a profound contribution to the development of deliberative democracy in theory and practice Weighs in on the ongoing, and increasingly urgent, debates about the meaning, desirability and practicality of deliberative democracy The contributors have all written widely about deliberative democracy
"Civil disobedience is a public, nonviolent, conscientious yet political act, contrary to law, carried out to communicate opposition to law and policy of government. This book presents a theory of civil disobedience that draws on ideas associated with deliberative democracy"--
Epistemic democracy is standardly characterized in terms of "aiming at truth". This presupposes a veritistic conception of epistemic value, according to which truth is the fundamental epistemic goal. I will raise an objection to the standard (veritistic) account of epistemic democracy, focusing specifically on deliberative democracy. I then propose a version of deliberative democracy that is grounded in non‐veritistic epistemic goals. In particular, I argue that deliberation is valuable because it facilitates empathetic understanding. I claim that empathetic understanding is an epistemic good that doesn't have truth as its primary goal.
Deliberative democracy is usually presented as a polity in which legitimacy is achieved by deliberative participation on the part of those subject to a collective decision. But cast in these terms, the theory runs headlong into the long-recognized impossibility of directly involving more than a few members of any large-scale democracy in decision making. After canvassing the available solutions to this problem, an argument is made for conceptualizing deliberative democracy in terms of the contestation of discourses in the public sphere, and public opinion as the provisional outcome of this contestation as transmitted to the state. Legitimacy is then achieved to the degree collective outcomes respond to the balance of discourses in the polity, to the extent this balance is itself subject to dispersed and competent political control.
Deliberative democracy is usually presented as a polity in which legitimacy is achieved by deliberative participation on the part of those subject to a collective decision. But cast in these terms, the theory runs headlong into the long-recognized impossibility of directly involving more than a few members of any large-scale democracy in decision making. After canvassing the available solutions to this problem, an argument is made for conceptualizing deliberative democracy in terms of the contestation of discourses in the public sphere, and public opinion as the provisional outcome of this contestation as transmitted to the state. Legitimacy is then achieved to the degree collective outcomes respond to the balance of discourses in the polity, to the extent this balance is itself subject to dispersed and competent political control.
