Collective Reason or Individual Liberty

2019 ◽  
pp. 35-67
Author(s):  
Assaf Sharon
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Public Deliberation ◽  
Individual Liberty ◽  
Standard View ◽  
Normative Framework ◽  
The People ◽  
Collective Deliberation ◽  
The Creation ◽  
Public Decision ◽  
Public Decision Making

Can a government of the people and by the people also be a government for the people? In this chapter, Assaf Sharon questions the deliberative democratic attempt to bring democracy and liberalism into a unified normative framework. On the standard view, democracy and liberalism are distinct ideas that give rise to competing normative demands. Democracy is the institutional realization of sovereignty by the people. Liberalism is committed to the protection of individual liberties. Deliberative democrats claim that liberal commitments are entailed by their democratic ideal; to deny an individual’s liberties would be to exclude her from public decision-making. Sharon raises concerns by pointing out that public deliberation requires a widely shared democratic ethos, the creation and maintenance of which might require suppressing intolerant, non-egalitarian, and anti-democratic sensibilities. Given that such suppression stands to violate individual liberties, Sharon concludes that government by collective deliberation might be incompatible with a robust commitment to individual liberties.

scholarly journals “All this Regulatory Uncertainty in the Air”: The Indispensability of Public Hearings in Guarding and Guiding Public Deliberation

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jaclyn Carroll ◽  
Pete Bsumek
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Environmental Communication ◽  
Public Deliberation ◽  
Field Analysis ◽  
Decision Making Process ◽  
Regulatory Uncertainty ◽  
Public Hearings ◽  
Public Decision ◽  
Public Decision Making

The field of Environmental Communication has often critiqued the shortcomings of public hearings, noting their limitations in bringing about effective and equitable public decision making. While this work has been significant, it has tended to limit the deliberative field to public hearings themselves, sometimes going so far as to assume that public hearings are the only spaces in which significant deliberations occur. Using a field analysis of the “No Coal Plant” campaign in Surry County, Virginia (2008–2013), the authors illuminate some limitations of existing literature. Their analysis suggests that while public hearings can be extremely limiting, even “failed” public hearings can play a critical role in constituting, organizing, and pacing formal and informal deliberative spaces, which are necessary for communities as they manage the stresses and strains of the decision-making process.

Ways to increase inclusiveness in public decision-making

2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (2 (118)) ◽  
pp. 28-34
Author(s):  
IRINA P. SIDORCHUK ◽  
◽  
ANTON A. PARFENCHIK ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Public Decision ◽  
Public Decision Making

The Complexity Surrounding Market Rationale in Public Decision Making in the Twenty-First Century

2018 ◽  
pp. 185-195
Author(s):  
Bakry Elmedni
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Choice Theory ◽  
Public Organizations ◽  
First Century ◽  
Alternative Methods ◽  
Role Of Government ◽  
Market Rationality ◽  
Public Decision ◽  
Public Decision Making

Applying market rationale to public decision making has been in the center of the debates in both political and academic circles. Theoretically, these debates center on the role of government in society and how that role should be played. This chapters shows that applying market rationality to public decision making is problematic for three reasons. First, in reality, neither market nor individuals can be rational as envisioned in neoclassic economics. Second, public organizations pursue broad social goals that are often not measurable by market indicators. Third, the context within which public decisions are made is governed by legal and constitutional mandates that do not always suit market rationale, i.e. utility maximizations. Notwithstanding this, public choice theory can provide public organizations with alternative methods for maximizing social benefits. In doing so, public organizations have been adopting market-based standards as a method to promote performance and manage for results.

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