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Does fair political representation for historically disadvantaged groups require their presence in legislative bodies? The intuition that women are best represented by women, and African-Americans by other African-Americans, has deep historical roots. Yet the conception of fair representation that prevails in American political culture and jurisprudence--what Melissa Williams calls "liberal representation"--concludes that the social identity of legislative representatives does not bear on their quality as representatives. Liberal representation's slogan, "one person, one vote," concludes that the outcome of the electoral and legislative process is fair, whatever it happens to be, so long as no voter is systematically excluded. Challenging this notion, Williams maintains that fair representation is powerfully affected by the identity of legislators and whether some of them are actually members of the historically marginalized groups that are most in need of protection in our society.Williams argues first that the distinctive voice of these groups should be audible within the legislative process. Second, she holds that the self-representation of these groups is necessary to sustain their trust in democratic institutions. The memory of state-sponsored discrimination against these groups, together with ongoing patterns of inequality along group lines, provides both a reason to recognize group claims and a way of distinguishing stronger from weaker claims. The book closes by proposing institutions that can secure fair representation for marginalized groups without compromising principles of democratic freedom and equality

In a world no longer centered on the West, what should political theory become? Although Western intellectual traditions continue to dominate academic journals and course syllabi in political theory, up-and-coming contributions of 'comparative political theory' are rapidly transforming the field. Deparochializing Political Theory creates a space for conversation amongst leading scholars who differ widely in their approaches to political theory. These scholars converge on the belief that we bear a collective responsibility to engage and support the transformation of political theory. In these exchanges, 'deparochializing' political theory emerges as an intellectual, educational and political practice that cuts across methodological approaches. Because it is also an intergenerational project, this book presses us to re-imagine our teaching and curriculum design. Bearing the marks of its beginnings in East Asia, Deparochializing Political Theory seeks to de-center Western thought and explore the evolving tasks of political theory in an age of global modernity.

Criminal tribunals, truth commissions, reparations, apologies and memorializations are the characteristic instruments in the transitional justice toolkit that can help societies transition from authoritarianism to democracy, from civil war to peace, and from state-sponsored extralegal violence to a rights-respecting rule of law. Over the last several decades, their growing use has established transitional justice as a body of both theory and practice whose guiding norms and structures encompasses the range of institutional mechanisms by which societies address the wrongs committed by past regimes in order to lay the foundation for more legitimate political and legal order. In Transitional Justice a group of leading scholars in philosophy, law, and political science settles some of the key theoretical debates over the meaning of transitional justice while opening up new ones. By engaging both theorists and empirical social scientists in debates over central categories of analysis in the study of transitional justice, it also illuminates the challenges of making strong empirical claims about the impact of transitional institutions.

Jane Mansbridge's intellectual career is marked by field-shifting contributions to
democratic theory, feminist scholarship, political science methodology, and the
empirical study of social movements and direct democracy. Her work has fundamentally
challenged existing paradigms in both normative political theory and empirical
political science and launched new lines of scholarly inquiry on the most basic
questions of democratic equality, deliberation, collective action, and political
representation. Her three best-known books—Beyond Adversary
Democracy (1980), Why We Lost the ERA (1986) and
Beyond Self-Interest (1990a)—have become part of the political
science canon and remain staples on graduate course syllabi decades after their
publication. The importance of Mansbridge's work has been recognized by her
colleagues through a trifecta of major APSA awards: the Gladys M. Kammerer Award
(1987), the Victoria Schuck Award (1988), and, most recently, the James Madison
Award and Lecture (2011).

Argues that, in spite of many close affinities, there are significant tensions between arguments for group representation & defenses of deliberative democracy. It is contended that defenders of deliberate democracy have not sufficiently considered the challenges social differences present to a deliberative conception of legitimacy. Contestations related to gender, race, ethnicity, class, or sexuality have the potential of undermining "notions of reasonableness upon which deliberative theory depends for its conception of legitimacy." The place of impartiality in various theories of deliberative democracy is explored, along with the contributions of marginalized group perspectives to democratic deliberation. Recent feminist critiques of deliberative democracy are extended to consider challenges to deliberative theory posed by a standard of reasonableness & social/political circumstances under which marginalized group perspectives are likely to influence the opinions of others. The implications are discussed in relation to general notions of the virtues/responsibilities of citizenship. A debate in the US Senate about the Confederate flag is highlighted to illustrate the uncertainty of reason-giving in public discourse. 1 Appendix. J. Lindroth