Depoliticization, Repoliticization, and Deliberative Systems

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claudia Landwehr
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Deliberative Democracy ◽  
Institutional Design ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
System Perspective ◽  
Deliberative System ◽  
Decision Making Processes

Deliberative democracy is increasingly criticized as inherently elitist and technocratic, and it is blamed not only for the rise of depoliticized institutions, but also for the rise of anti-political and even populist attitudes in citizens. The chapter analyses the discussion about the depoliticizing implications and effects of deliberation and argues that, contrary to these critics, deliberation must be viewed as a genuinely political mode of interaction. A systemic perspective on deliberation allows us to critically assess the deliberative and democratic qualities of political systems and to see when and where they fail to deliver on their promises. Applied with critical intentions, the deliberative system perspective can be used to identify depoliticized policy areas and undemocratic decision-making processes. Moreover, it can feed into processes of meta-deliberation that allow for a democratization of institutional design.

Citizens' Juries and Deliberative Democracy

2000 ◽  
Vol 48 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-65 ◽  
Author(s):  
Graham Smith ◽  
Corinne Wales
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Deliberative Democracy ◽  
Institutional Design ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
Democratic Deliberation ◽  
Democratic Practice ◽  
The Face ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Political Decision Making

In the face of widespread dissatisfaction with contemporary democratic practice, there has been a growing interest in theories of deliberative democracy. However theorists have often failed to sufficiently address the question of institutional design. This paper argues that recent experiments with citizens' juries should be of interest to deliberative democrats. The practice of citizens' juries is considered in light of three deliberative democratic criteria: inclusivity, deliberation and citizenship. It is argued that citizens' juries offer important insights into how democratic deliberation could be institutionalized in contemporary political decision-making processes.

Can Democracy be Deliberative & Participatory? The Democratic Case for Political Uses of Mini-Publics

Daedalus ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 146 (3) ◽  
pp. 85-105 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cristina Lafont
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Deliberative Democracy ◽  
Political System ◽  
Democratic Legitimacy ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Negative Conclusion ◽  
Political Decision Making

This essay focuses on recent proposals to confer decisional status upon deliberative mini-publics such as citizens' juries, Deliberative Polls, and citizens' assemblies. Against such proposals, I argue that inserting deliberative mini-publics into political decision-making processes would diminish the democratic legitimacy of the political system as a whole. This negative conclusion invites a question: which political uses of mini-publics would yield genuinely democratic improvements? Drawing from a participatory conception of deliberative democracy, I propose several uses of mini-publics that could enhance the democratic legitimacy of political decision-making in current societies.

Democratic Meta-Deliberation: Towards Reflective Institutional Design

2014 ◽  
Vol 63 (1_suppl) ◽  
pp. 38-54 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claudia Landwehr
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Deliberative Democracy ◽  
Institutional Design ◽  
Democratic Governance ◽  
Democratic Practices ◽  
Participatory Politics ◽  
Democratic System

Theories of deliberative democracy are popular for their promise that in a deliberative polity, democracy can realise both participatory politics and rational policies. However, they are also confronted with the allegation that by qualifying essentially non-democratic practices as deliberative, they inadvertently (or not) become accomplices in the trend towards post-democratic governance. A central example of such a development is the rise of non-majoritarian bodies to which governments delegate decision making, thereby de-politicising conflicts and turning democratic discourses into technocratic ones. This article adopts a systemic perspective on deliberative democracy, asking whether non-majoritarian forums can be legitimated in a democratic system and whether they can contribute to their deliberative quality. It is argued that the legitimation of delegated decision-making is not possible without a culture and practice of democratic meta-deliberation which enables reflective institutional design.

scholarly journals Rekontruksi Teori Partisipasi Politik Dalam Diskursus Pemikiran Politik Negara

2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Nur Rohim Yunus ◽  
Muhammad Sholeh ◽  
Ida Susilowati
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Political Participation ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Government Policies ◽  
Decision Making Process ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Active Involvement ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
The Relationship

Abstract:Community involvement in a democratic party is important and must exist, because it is a manifestation of true democracy. Citizens are directly involved in the decision-making process, implementing decisions, influencing decision-making processes, influencing government policies, including relating to active involvement and passive involvement of each individual in the hierarchy of government political systems. All this involvement is known as a form of political participation. This study wants to rebuild political participation as a basic theory in the country's political thinking. So that the relationship can be drawn between the role of community political participation and the success of democracy itself.Keywords: Participation, Politics, Democracy Abstrak:Keterlibatan masyarakat dalam pesta demokrasi merupakan hal penting dan harus ada, karena ia merupakan perwujudan demokrasi yang sebenarnya. Warga negara terlibat langsung dalam proses pembuatan keputusan, melaksanakan keputusan, mempengaruhi proses pengambilan keputusan, mempengaruhi kebijakan pemerintah, termasuk berkaitan dengan keterlibatan aktif maupun keterlibatan pasif setiap individu dalam hierarki sistem politik pemerintahan. Semua keterlibatan ini dikenal sebagai bentuk partisipasi politik. Penelitian ini ingin membangun kembali partisipasi politik sebagai teori dasar dalam pemikiran politik negara. Sehingga dengannya dapat ditarik benang merah antara peran partisipasi politik masyarakat dengan kesuksesan demokrasi itu sendiri.Kata Kunci: Partisipasi, Politik, Demokrasi  

scholarly journals Majority Rule vs. Consensus: The Practice of Democratic Deliberation in the Greek Poleis

2018 ◽  
pp. 101-156 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mirko Canevaro
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Deliberative Democracy ◽  
Majority Rule ◽  
Current Work ◽  
Wide Spread ◽  
Athenian Democracy ◽  
Democratic Deliberation ◽  
Deliberative System ◽  
Near Unanimity

Scholars have often identified the Greek polis, and Athenian democracy in particular, as the first example of majority rule. This chapter reviews the evidence for Greek deliberative procedures and reassesses how much they conformed to majority rule, and how much they made use of consensus‐deliberation, understood through engagement with current work on deliberative democracy. It discusses the evidence of Hellenistic decrees from the Greek poleis for which we have voting figures, to show that what we find is for the most part unanimity or near‐unanimity. It then discusses the Athenian evidence to reassess whether the deliberative system in Athens practiced strict majority rule, or left space for considerable consensus seeking and even unanimity. It argues that consensus‐ based forms of deliberation were a key element of Greek decision making, which secured the cohesion of Greek communities as well as the synthesis of wide‐spread knowledge.

scholarly journals Looking at the World Bank’s safeguard reform through the lens of deliberative democracy

2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 465-482 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruth Houghton
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
International Law ◽  
Deliberative Democracy ◽  
World Bank ◽  
Democratic Legitimacy ◽  
Consultation Process ◽  
The World Bank ◽  
The World ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Law Making

AbstractThe sheer amount of non-state participation in the creation of the World Bank Environmental and Social Framework (ESF) is surely noteworthy. The aim of the Bank’s consultation was to get ‘global’ input and feedback, and with over 8,000 stakeholders from over 63 countries taking part, it is laudable. The extent of the participation challenges the positivist approach to international law-making, which views only states as having the power to make law and raises questions about how to legitimize such international soft-law making. Legitimacy is entangled with democracy, as scholars debate whether democracy is the required benchmark for decision-making processes at international organizations. This article uses deliberative democracy to analyse the ESF consultation process. Whilst, democratic legitimacy has been interpreted to mean inclusivity and participation, deliberative democracy raises a series of hard questions about equality and power that scholarship on global governance needs to grapple with. Although this participatory process at the World Bank challenges traditional narratives in international law, analysing it through a lens of deliberative democracy exposes the work that still needs to be done to discuss democracy in international decision-making.

Understanding digital natives in contentious politics: Explaining the effect of social media on protest participation through psychological incentives

2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (9) ◽  
pp. 3457-3478 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yuan Hsiao
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Social Media ◽  
Deliberative Democracy ◽  
Contentious Politics ◽  
Digital Natives ◽  
Social Incentives ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Connective Action ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Individual Efficacy

Many have observed that a new political generation of digital natives has heavily used social media as means of facilitating street protests. Nevertheless, the mechanisms by which social media affects protest participation are not completely understood due to the shortage of psychological explanations. This study employs a uniquely designed survey on a massive demonstration to address such concerns. Social media activity triggers the psychological incentives of anger, social incentives, identification, and individual efficacy. In particular, individual efficacy directly mediates the relationship between social media activity and protest participation. The findings substantiate new theories of connective action and suggest that social media may be a new mobilization structure via changing the decision-making processes of individuals. Theoretical implications on understanding digital natives and deliberative democracy are discussed.

Regional (dis)integration beyond governments: A comparison in social and civil society participation between Mercosur and SADC

2021 ◽  
pp. 223386592110055
Author(s):  
Haroldo Ramanzini Junior ◽  
Bruno Theodoro Luciano
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
Regional Integration ◽  
Institutional Design ◽  
Regional Organizations ◽  
Civil Society Participation ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Societal Participation ◽  
Comparative Regionalism

The aim of this article is to analyse the involvement of civil society in regional integration organizations through a comparative analysis of social/civil society channels in the Southern Common Market (Mercosur) and the Southern African Development Community (SADC). We seek to analyse the level of openness and the trajectory of both blocs in relation to civil society participation. The instruments and strategies employed by civil society actors in both regions are contrasted, aiming to understand how prominent and successful they have been in terms of influencing the decision-making processes of Mercosur and the SADC, which have been traditionally marked by their intergovernmental and interpresidential characters. We argue that civil society involvement in regionalism is shaped by regional institutional design, member states’ support for societal participation and civil society resources. Thus, this article seeks to contribute to the comparative regionalism literature, setting out an analytical comparative framework for assessing the role of civil society in regional organizations from the Global South.

Interest Groups and Political Integration: the 1972 EEC Decisions in Norway and Denmark

1975 ◽  
Vol 69 (1) ◽  
pp. 68-75 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter M. Leslie
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Interest Groups ◽  
Interest Group ◽  
Political Integration ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Conflicting Evidence ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Geographical Expansion ◽  
New Evidence ◽  
Interest Organizations

The article examines four themes of Robert J. Lieber's article in the APSR of March 1972: “Interest Groups and Political Integration: British Entry into Europe,” bringing in new evidence from the Norwegian and Danish EEC decisions of 1972. The conclusions are that:—(a) there is conflicting evidence regarding the applicability of functionalist theories of political integration to the geographical expansion of an existing union;(b) the attempt to link theories of interest group activity and theories of political integration is based on a premature if not unwise generalization about decision-making processes within interest organizations;(c) politicization (as Lieber defines it) is inherently neither favorable nor unfavorable to integration; and(d) in discussing political integration, the distinction between “high” politics (Hoffman) and welfare considerations is best abandoned, provided the observer remembers that there are more dimensions to critical decisions than the economic.The article concludes with the suggestion that there are slim prospects for developing a theory of political integration applicable to the creation or extension of a union, and that the appropriate “vocation” for such a theory is to elucidate the workings of political systems which have two or more “levels” of political authorities.

Building a Regime-Type Framework

2021 ◽  
pp. 5-24
Author(s):  
Christopher M. Davidson
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Saudi Arabia ◽  
Social Contract ◽  
The Other ◽  
Regime Type ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Arbitrary Decision

As a first step in trying to understand the nature and impact of the changes taking place in Saudi Arabia and the UAE, this chapter considers what ‘type’ of regimes their rulers (or rather de facto rulers) now represent. Firstly, it establishes the scholarly consensus on the political systems underpinning the Gulf monarchies, namely their ‘sheikhly authority’ (based on some form of elite consultation and Islamic legitimacy), and their hydrocarbon-financed and social contract-based ‘rentier’ structures (in which citizens generally accept wealth distributions in exchange for their political acquiescence). Secondly, it makes the argument that MBS and MBZ’s regimes have taken a more autocratic-authoritarian turn--moving away from their predecessors’ sheikhly-rentierism--and hypothesizes that their highly personalistic and seemingly more arbitrary decision-making processes might represent some form of contemporary sultanism. In this context, it also makes clear that the other four Gulf monarchies do not appear to have taken the same path, and have mostly retained their historic consultative elements.

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