Understanding Deliberative Democracy

By Hercules Bantas

This compilation is a comprehensive guide to contemporary deliberative democracy thought. It contains four guides, beginning with the basic tenets of deliberative democracy theory in Deliberative Democracy Basics, before moving on to explore the deliberative theories of John Rawls, Jurgen Habermas, and John Dryzek. The four guides are:

Deliberative Democracy Basics

This concise, essay length guide covers the basics of deliberative democracy by canvassing a spectrum of theories on the subject. It explains what is unique about deliberative theories of democracy, what they all have in common, as well as how they differ.
Jurgen Habermas and Deliberative Democracy

Jurgen Habermas is one of the most influential thinkers of our time. This detailed, article length guide examines his theory of deliberative democracy and covers many of the central concepts such as communicative reason, communicative power, and the ideal speech community.

John Rawls and Deliberative Democracy

This detailed, article length guide is a clearly written, in-depth analysis of John Rawls's deliberative democracy theory. It covers important concepts in Rawls's theory including the idea of public reason and the politicised public sphere.

John Dryzek and Deliberative Democracy

John Dryzek argues for a transnational deliberative democracy that moves beyond the nation state. This detailed, article length guide outlines Dryzek's radical concept of citizenship, his arguments about de-traditionalisation of societies through globalisation, and a transnational public sphere.
sphere.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Hercules Bantas
• Release date: Aug 17, 2010
• ISBN: 9781452389394

Hercules Bantas

Dr Hercules Bantas has been teaching and reading the human sciences for the better part of a decade. It is his opinion that he is too often immersed in some weighty tome or other, the authors of which always use one thousand words where one hundred words would suffice. It was while juggling no less than three weighty tomes by the same author and trying to understand what the fellow was trying to say that the idea of The Reluctant Geek Guides was born. He is well aware that publishing clearly written and unambiguous guides to important ideas in the human sciences is frowned upon in some circles, but he's going to do it anyway. Despite his well documented grumpiness, Hercules claims to like people and can be contacted by email at reluctantgeek[at]tpg.com.au.

Book preview

Understanding Deliberative Democracy

Hercules Bantas

Published by The Reluctant Geek

Melbourne, Australia

Copyright Hercules Bantas 2010

Table of Contents

Deliberative Democracy Basics

John Rawls and Deliberative Democracy

Júrgen Habermas and Deliberative Democracy

John Dryzek and Deliberative Democracy

Author's Notes

This compilation is a complete guide to contemporary deliberative democracy thought. It begins with the basic tenets of deliberative democracy theory, before moving on to explore the work of three leading theorists, namely John Rawls, Jurgen Habermas, and John Dryzek. The collection is made up four guides: Deliberative Democracy Basics, John Rawls and Deliberative Democracy, Jürgen Habermas and Deliberative Democracy, and John Dryzek and Deliberative Democracy.

Deliberative Democracy Basics

To label a democratic theory as 'deliberative' is to say that it has, at its core, the exercise of public reason through the political deliberations of citizens. This is because deliberative theories of democracy focus on communication rather than preference aggregation, which is not to say that these theories abandon voting and elections all together. Rather, a deliberative democracy is a democracy in which citizens make decisions and solve political problems through some sort of deliberative process, which may or may not involve elections and voting.

Most theories of deliberative democracy would have deliberative elements introduced to an existing political system, utilising existing social and political institutions such as churches, corporations, unions, parties, lobby groups, courts, and parliaments. This would mean that rather than simply counting votes, citizens would be encouraged to participate in public deliberation in order to solve political problems (Stokes, 2002, p. 40), and most theories of deliberative democracy associate legitimacy of the law with the exercise of public reason. The following review considers the various starting points and problems addressed by diverse theories of deliberative democracy, concludes on the similarities and differences between them, and constructs a spectrum of issues addressed by theories of deliberative democracy.

John Rawls is a well-known proponent of liberal thought, who has set out a deliberative theory in his book The Law of Peoples (Rawls, 1999). He articulates his theory of deliberation in order to try to solve problems of legitimacy in law by equating the legislative process with public deliberation on matters of political import. He uses the idea of public reason as the focus of his theory, arguing that ‘...in public reason comprehensive doctrines of truth or right [are] replaced by an idea of the politically reasonable addressed to citizens as citizens’ (Rawls, 1999, p. 132). He argues that there are three elements of deliberative democracy: the idea of public reason; a framework of constitutional institutions; and a general willingness by citizens to realise the ideal of public reason (1999, p. 139). His theory restricts political deliberation to political elites, such as elected officials and judges on constitutional courts, as well as confining public deliberation to a subsection of the public sphere.

Amy Gutmann and Dennis Thompson present an alternate liberal conception of deliberative democracy. Their iteration of deliberative democracy sets out to solve the problem of ruling elites making political decisions that have serious ramifications for the state but that have not been through a process of legitimisation by the polity. They start from an observation that in many liberal-democratic countries there is an increasing cynicism about politics and politicians among citizens who feel less represented by elites who are less accountable for their decisions. They base their theory of deliberative democracy on the assumption that citizens are not passive individuals or subjects of government. Rather, they are autonomous agents capable of taking part in the governance of their society (Gutmann & Thompson, 2004, p. 3). They outline four characteristics of a deliberative democracy:

1. Reasons for acting need to be justifiable, and should be acceptable by free and reasonable people seeking fair terms of co-operation

2. Public debate

3. Binding decisions that can be changed with the passage of time

4. A dynamic process that aims at justifiable decisions, but does not guarantee them

Using these four characteristics, they propose the following definition of deliberative democracy,

...a form of government in which free and equal citizens (and their representatives), justify decisions in a process in which they give one another reasons that are mutually acceptable and generally accessible, with the aim of reaching conclusions that are binding in the present on all citizens but open to challenge in the future (2004, p. 7)

Like Rawls, they maintain the institutions of liberal democracy and use deliberation as the tool to solve political problems.

Habermas bases his deliberative democracy theory on critical theory, although he has been criticised by some commentators for straying too far into liberal territory (Dryzek, 2000, p. 27). Habermas uses communicative reason to establish a constitutional framework for his theory and to combine a procedural system of democracy with his theory of discourse ethics. Habermas (1996) articulates most of his deliberative theory in his book Between Facts and Norms, and the title of the text hints at his motivation. He attempts to overcome fissures between his normative political theory of discourse ethics and real-world political practices. The discourse principle is integral to discourse ethics and it requires that all affected by a decision be entitled to participate in the deliberation about what to do. This means that for some nation-wide political problems, all citizens in the state are entitled to participate in the deliberation. He argues that political power has its origin in deliberations in the public sphere. The democratic practice of voting transforms public opinion in the public sphere into communicative power. Legislation is the mechanism that then transforms communicative power into administrative power. A critically enabled public sphere, free from institutional interference is central to his theory of deliberative democracy.

Warren argues that the proceduralism of Habermas’s theory of deliberative democracy differs from the liberal account by imposing constraints on ‘the medium’ rather than ‘the substance’ of political decision-making (Warren, 2002, p. 196). Where liberal theorists argue that the topics for deliberation should be ‘reasonable’ or ‘morally neutral’, deliberative proceduralism uses law to block the forces of coercive power and money (2002, p. 196).

Joshua Cohen proposes a more radical theory of deliberative democracy. He begins with a critique of Rawls’s deliberative theories, and attempts to solve many of the inconsistencies he finds. He argues that in order for a deliberative democracy to exist and function effectively, the institutions of that democracy must support deliberative activity. He formulates the ‘ideal deliberative procedure’ that will highlight the properties that these democratic institutions should embody (Cohen, 1997, p. 73). He argues that there are three general aspects to any deliberation: an agenda, proposed alternative solutions to the problems on the agenda, and settling on a solution. Democratic legitimacy requires outcomes that are the result of free and reasoned agreement amongst equals.

The discursive theories of Dryzek are not limited to the nation state, and he describes a democratic polity that is transnational in nature. His theory centres on communicative action in a transnational public sphere that ‘...is an informal, communicative realm that can be contrasted with the constitutional exercise of authority (though of course it can influence the latter)’ (Dryzek, 2006, p. 154). Dryzek’s theory attempts to solve problems presented by divergent conceptions of democracy and the bias towards liberal ideology that he argues exists within deliberative thought. He bases his arguments in critical theory and develops a conception of deliberative democracy that is not dependant on liberal institutions. Deliberations in this transnational public sphere do not lead directly to legislation, but rather they influence and construct international outcomes through mechanisms such as citizen mobilisation, protest actions, and similar political activities. These activities usually spring from a politicised civil society that ‘...consists of self-limiting political associations oriented by a relationship with the state, but not seeking any share in state power’ (Dryzek, 2000, p. 100).

Deliberative democracy is a label used to describe a range of democratic theories that utilise citizen deliberation and communication in order to solve political problems. The theories of Rawls, Habermas, and Dryzek are a good example of this disparity. In the spectrum of theories discussed above, starting at the liberal Rawls and moving in order to the radical Dryzek, they represent