Democracy’s Expanding Reach

2019 ◽  
pp. 37-69
Author(s):  
Robert B. Talisse
Keyword(s):  
Democratic Society ◽  
Democratic Politics ◽  
Democratic Ideal ◽  
Democratic Practice ◽  
The Social

This chapter argues that the problem of overdoing democracy is inherent within the democratic ideal; we tend to overdo democracy in our pursuit of responsible democratic practice. Thus the problem is not due to an infiltration of some antidemocratic norm or tendency into democratic society. Rather, the democratic ideal of self-government among equals lends itself to progressively expanding conceptions of the social reach of democratic politics. This chapter defines the site, scope, and reach of politics, and discusses majoritarian, minimalist, particpationalist, and deliberativist views of democracy. The latter view is what we are trying to do, and, more importantly for present purposes, it is most often what we see ourselves as doing when we engage politically.

Mortal Democracy and Plato’s Apology

2020 ◽  
pp. 009059172098295
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Barringer
Keyword(s):  
Democratic Politics ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Partial Transformation ◽  
Critical Space ◽  
Athenian Democracy ◽  
Precarious Work ◽  
Democratic Practice

The Apology is often read as showing a conflict between democracy and philosophy. I argue here that Socrates’s defense critically engages deeply political Athenian conventions of death, showing a mutual entanglement between Socratic philosophy and democratic practice. I suggest that Socrates’s aporetic insistence within the Apology that we “do not know if death is a good or a bad thing” structures a critical space of inquiry that I term “mortal ignorance;” a space from which Socrates reapproaches settled questions of death’s appropriate place in political life, ultimately prompting a partial transformation of Athenian democracy. I argue here that Socratic mortal ignorance supports a self-reflective politics of death, one which produces many potential responses and accepts the impossibility of closing off death’s meaning in any final sense—an aporia suitable for the unending, precarious work of democratic politics.

Trial by Jury as “Mockery of Justice”: Party Contention, Courtroom Corruption, and the Ironic Judicial Legacy of Antimasonry

2016 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 155-198
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Bussiere
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
Early Republic ◽  
Democratic Politics ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Party Organization ◽  
Party Organizations ◽  
Political Landscape ◽  
The Social ◽  
Modern Mass ◽  
True Mass

Sweeping across the social and political landscape of the northeastern United States during the late 1820s and early 1830s, the Antimasonic Party has earned a modest immortality as the first “third” party in American history. In pamphlets, speeches, sermons, protests, and other venues, Antimasons lambasted the fraternal order of Freemasonry as undemocratic, inegalitarian, and un-Christian, reviling it as a threat to the moral order and civic health of the Early Republic. Because they believed that the fraternal organization largely controlled all levels of government, antebellum Antimasons first created a social movement and then an independent political party. Even before the full emergence of modern mass democratic politics, Antimasons demonstrated the benefits of party organization, open national nominating conventions, and party platforms. Scholars with otherwise different perspectives on the “party period” tend to agree that Antimasonry had an important impact on what became the first true mass party organizations—the Jacksonian Democrats and the Whigs—and helped push the political culture in a more egalitarian and populist direction.

scholarly journals Algorithms, Manipulation, and Democracy

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Thomas Christiano
Keyword(s):  
Democratic Society ◽  
Economic Life ◽  
Democratic Politics ◽  
The Political ◽  
Democratic Participation ◽  
Fake News ◽  
Political Sophistication ◽  
Political Equality ◽  
Political Inequality

Abstract Algorithmic communications pose several challenges to democracy. The three phenomena of filtering, hypernudging, and microtargeting can have the effect of polarizing an electorate and thus undermine the deliberative potential of a democratic society. Algorithms can spread fake news throughout the society, undermining the epistemic potential that broad participation in democracy is meant to offer. They can pose a threat to political equality in that some people may have the means to make use of algorithmic communications and the sophistication to be immune from attempts at manipulation, while other people are vulnerable to manipulation by those who use these means. My concern here is with the danger that algorithmic communications can pose to political equality, which arises because most citizens must make decisions about what and who to support in democratic politics with only a sparse budget of time, money, and energy. Algorithmic communications such as hypernudging and microtargeting can be a threat to democratic participation when persons are operating in environments that do not conduce to political sophistication. This constitutes a deepening of political inequality. The political sophistication necessary to counter this vulnerability is rooted for many in economic life and it can and ought to be enhanced by changing the terms of economic life.

Designing for Democracy

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer Forestal
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Built Environment ◽  
Digital Technologies ◽  
The Other ◽  
Democratic Politics ◽  
Built Environments ◽  
Democratic Practice ◽  
Social Media Platforms ◽  
Democratic Spaces ◽  
Personalization Of Politics

Designing for Democracy addresses the question of how to “fix” digital technologies for democracy by examining how the design of the built environment (whether streets, sidewalks, or social media platforms) informs how, and whether, citizens can engage in democratic practices. “Democratic spaces”—built environments that support democratic politics—must have three characteristics: they must be clearly bounded, durable, and flexible. Each corresponds to a necessary democratic practice. Clearly bounded spaces make it easier to recognize what we share and with whom we share; they help us form communities. Durable spaces facilitate our attachments to the communities they house and the other members within them; they help us sustain communities. And flexible spaces facilitate the experimental habits required for democratic politics; they help us improve our communities. These three practices—recognition, attachment, and experimentalism—are the affordances a built environment must provide in order to be a “democratic space”; they are the criteria to which designers and users should be attentive when building and inhabiting the spaces of the built environment, both physical and digital. Using this theoretical framework, Designing for Democracy provides new insights into the democratic potential of digital technologies. Through extended discussions of examples like Facebook, Twitter, and Reddit, it suggests architectural responses to problems often associated with digital technologies—loose networks, the “personalization of politics,” and “echo chambers.” In connecting the built environment, digital technologies, and democratic theory, Designing Democracy provides blueprints for democracy in a digital age.

Literature Analysis of the Theory of Liberative Democracy

2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 108-114
Author(s):  
Hari Zamharir ◽  
Sahruddin Lubis
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Research ◽  
Deliberative Democracy ◽  
Liberal Democracy ◽  
Democratic Politics ◽  
The Political ◽  
Literature Analysis ◽  
Political Liberalization ◽  
Reform Era ◽  
Democratic Practice ◽  
Democracy Theory

During the political liberalization of the reform era (1998 – present), various groups have complained about the evil practices of democratic politics. One of the shooting targets is that we have made the wrong choice, namely adopting a majoritarian or liberal democracy model. In the literature on democracy theory, one of the theories relevant to improving democratic practice is TDD (Theory of Deliberative Democracy). Although still using the principle of representation, TDD, in general, makes corrections or improvements to the procedures and substance of democracy that have been poorly practised in Indonesia today. This research is based on qualitative research using the descriptive-analytical method to provide a clear picture of the object of the problem. The conclusion of this study shows evidence that there is a model of democracy—both in substance and in procedures. They are different from the mechanism of representation initially derived from the theory of representative democracy.

Religious Practices and Democratic Virtues

2018 ◽  
pp. 136-167
Author(s):  
Benjamin R. Hertzberg
Keyword(s):  
Political Activism ◽  
Democratic Politics ◽  
Virtue Theory ◽  
Religious Practices ◽  
Democratic Practice ◽  
Democratic Virtue

Some claim that religion in general—or certain religions—are disciplines that shape their adherents in ways that make them less fit for democratic politics. Religion in general (or some religion) makes people subservient or authoritarian. This chapter argues that democratic virtue theory can provide an approach to these types of concerns. Because democracy protects citizens’ associational freedoms, it should not interrogate all religious practices or all the virtues that religions value. However, it must evaluate those religious practices that citizens use in political activism. This chapter considers Gandhi’s practice of satyagraha—nonviolent direction action—as an example of this kind of assessment. The chapter asks whether satyagraha develops in its practitioners the virtues necessary for reciprocal accountability, a crucial democratic practice. This assessment acts as a model that can be extended to other politicized religious practices: prayer vigils, funerals, and the like.

The Ethics of Social Information Retrieval

2011 ◽  
pp. 179-188
Author(s):  
Brendan Luyt ◽  
Chu Keong Lee
Keyword(s):  
Information Retrieval ◽  
Social Networking ◽  
Ethical Issues ◽  
Social Information ◽  
Democratic Society ◽  
Technological Systems ◽  
Social Diversity ◽  
Technological Design ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social And Ethical Issues

In this chapter we discuss some of the social and ethical issues associated with social information retrieval. Using the work of Habermas we argue that social networking is likely to exacerbate already disturbing trends towards the fragmentation of society and a corresponding decline reduction in social diversity. Such a situation is not conducive to developing a healthy, democratic society. Following the tradition of critical theorists of technology, we conclude with a call for responsible and aware technological design with more attention paid to the values embedded in new technological systems.

Introduction

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Harry Hendrick
Keyword(s):  
Identity Politics ◽  
Parenting Styles ◽  
Adult Child ◽  
Child Rearing ◽  
Democratic Ideal ◽  
Social Democratic ◽  
Central Thesis ◽  
The Social ◽  
Democratic Ideals ◽  
Methodological Considerations

The chapter introduces the reader to the book's argument, themes, broader context, and methodological considerations. It discusses the central thesis, which is in two parts. First, between the 1920s and the late 1960s the culture of parenting progressed away from being characterized mainly by disciplinary attitudes towards one that was increasingly psychoanalytically informed and, particularly from the 1940s through to the early 1970s, also began to emphasize liberal social democratic ideals. Second, from the 1970s to the present, under the influence of neoliberalism, feminism, social liberation (permissiveness and identity politics), and structural economic/political reconfigurations, the social democratic ideal declined and popular child-rearing came to be represented by 'authoritative' ('tough love') parenting styles reflecting neoliberal and narcissistic values expressed through a form of adult-child relations governed by childism - 'a prejudice against children.’

scholarly journals Pathways to global democracy? Escaping the statist imaginary

2013 ◽  
Vol 39 (4) ◽  
pp. 789-813 ◽  
Author(s):  
ADRIAN LITTLE ◽  
KATE MACDONALD
Keyword(s):  
Social Conditions ◽  
Democratic Institutions ◽  
Global Level ◽  
Foreseeable Future ◽  
Global Democracy ◽  
Democratic Practice ◽  
Nation States ◽  
The Social ◽  
Political Conditions ◽  
National Experience

AbstractCritics of global democracy have often claimed that the social and political conditions necessary for democracy to function are not met at the global level, and are unlikely to be in the foreseeable future. Such claims are usually developed with reference to national democratic institutions, and the social conditions within national democratic societies that have proved important in sustaining them. Although advocates of global democracy have contested such sceptical conclusions, they have tended to accept the method of reasoning from national to global contexts on which they are based. This article critiques this method of argument, showing that it is both highly idealised in its characterisation of national democratic practice, and overly state-centric in its assumptions about possible institutional forms that global democracy might take. We suggest that if aspiring global democrats – and their critics – are to derive useful lessons from social struggles to create and sustain democracy within nation states, a less idealised and institutionally prescriptive approach to drawing global lessons from national experience is required. We illustrate one possible such approach with reference to cases from both national and global levels, in which imperfect yet meaningful democratic practices have survived under highly inhospitable – and widely varying – conditions.

Democratic Theory and the Athenian Public Sphere

2016 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-51
Author(s):  
Matthew Landauer
Keyword(s):  
Public Sphere ◽  
Democratic Theory ◽  
Democratic Politics ◽  
Historical Case ◽  
Democratic Practice ◽  
Accountability Practices ◽  
The Relationship

Classical Athens has left to political theorists a dual legacy: a crucial historical case of democratic practice, and a rich tradition of political reflection. A growing number of scholars have placed the relationship between these two legacies at the center of their research. I argue that these scholars collectively offer us a model of a broad, engaged, Athenian public sphere. Yet I also caution that we should avoid overly harmonizing pictures of what that public sphere was like. I focus in particular on two prominent claims in the literature: that Socratic philosophy can be read as an expansion of Athenian accountability practices, and that ancient dramatists, philosophers, and historians were alike engaged in a project to educate citizen judgment. I argue that both claims threaten to obscure arguments over the appropriate role of the judgment of the demos in democratic politics.

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