scholarly journals A Deliberative Model of Intra-Party Democracy

2019 ◽  
pp. 35-65
Author(s):  
Fabio Wolkenstein
Keyword(s):  
Deliberative Democracy ◽  
Institutional Design ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Critical Function ◽  
Bottom Up ◽  
Democratic Practices ◽  
The Status ◽  
Democratic Parties

This chapter aims to answer the question of how exactly internally democratic parties should look, developing a ‘deliberative model of intra-party democracy’. The main justification of such a model is first, that deliberation can cater better to the demand for political self-expression many citizens share than merely aggregative democratic practices, and second, that deliberation can perform an important critical function within parties, allowing the status quo to be questioned and transformed. The challenge is to devise mechanisms and institutions that can enhance deliberation within parties, and the chapter looks here to the more practice-oriented literature on deliberative democracy and democratic innovations for inspiration. As an instantiation of bottom-up democracy, it is suggested, a deliberative model of intra-party democracy must empower the active members on the ground and offer numerous fora in which they can make their voices heard and bring them to bear on decisions. Chief amongst the institutional design paths suggested are problem-oriented fora, partisan deliberative networks, and larger deliberative conferences. These proposals are discussed in turn, and empirical illustrations of how they could be realised are provided.

How are the powers of the president decided? Vote trading in the making of Taiwan’s semi-presidential constitution

2016 ◽  
Vol 38 (5) ◽  
pp. 659-672
Author(s):  
Jih-wen Lin
Keyword(s):  
Unusual Case ◽  
Institutional Design ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Provincial Government ◽  
Government Formation ◽  
Constitutional Choice ◽  
Reasonable Explanation ◽  
The Status ◽  
Vote Trading

To establish an unambiguous source of accountability, a semi-presidential constitution can either allow the president to dominate government formation and dissolve the parliament without a prior vote of no confidence being passed or it can reverse the arrangement of these powers. Accordingly, Taiwan is an unusual case of semi-presidentialism because the president can unilaterally appoint the premier but cannot actively dissolve the parliament, so the electorate is seldom called upon to evaluate the responsibility of the constitutional agents in a snap election. Vote-trading theory offers a reasonable explanation for this puzzling situation by showing how seemingly unconnected issues can be voted on as a package. In Taiwan, the choice of presidential powers was complicated by the sovereignty issue, leading the reformers of the constitution to deny the legislature the power to confirm the president’s appointment of the premier in exchange for downsizing the Taiwan Provincial Government. This is exactly what vote-trading theory foresees: votes on different issues may be traded if no “pivot” finds the status quo to be his/her favorite option. By demonstrating how the linking of unconnected issues can obstruct institutional design, vote-trading theory expands our understanding of constitutional choice.

When Dissident Citizens Are Militant Mamas: Intersectional Gender and Agonistic Struggle in Welfare Rights Activism

2016 ◽  
Vol 12 (04) ◽  
pp. 623-647
Author(s):  
Holloway Sparks
Keyword(s):  
Status Quo ◽  
Critical Dimensions ◽  
Welfare Rights ◽  
Welfare Rights Movement ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Democratic Change ◽  
Democratic Practices ◽  
The Status ◽  
Agonistic Democracy

In this article, I argue that contemporary theories of agonistic democracy offer provocative insights into democratic activism and protest but require a more robust account of intersectional gender to adequately theorize the challenges of disruptive dissent. To this end, I propose an agonistic and feminist account of “dissident citizenship,” the democratic practices of disruption used to problematize and disturb the status quo when formal channels of democratic change are inadequate. My account foregrounds how intersectional gender formations pervade dissident practices, including activists’ ongoing struggles with their critics over their democratic standing and performances of disruption. I illustrate these theoretical claims through a case study of dissident citizenship drawn from U.S. politics, the welfare rights movement of 1966–75. Intersectional gender formations assisted welfare activists in claiming democratic standing as loving, hardworking mothers and in becoming bold dissidents. It was nonetheless exceedingly difficult for the poor, usually minority “militant mamas” to remain intelligible as full citizens when critics rejected their claims as the greediness of “breeders” and “cheaters” and dismissed their democratic disruptions as offensive, violence-causing disorders. Attending to intersectional gender dynamics highlights critical dimensions of democratic contestation that agonistic theories must address more carefully.

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.

Stability and Innovation in Athenian Policy

2019 ◽  
pp. 75-107
Author(s):  
Federica Carugati
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
Institutional Design ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
Political Stability ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Decision Making Process ◽  
The Status ◽  
Over Time

This chapter argues that the constitution fostered political stability and economic growth by imposing a set of constraints on the decision-making process based on the consensus on Solonian legality, while at the same time enabling citizens to introduce innovative new measures. To overcome evidentiary concerns, this chapter presents a model that reconstructs the incentives regulating actors' behaviour under the new constitutional rules. The model yields several results: first, institutional design incentivized proposers of new measures to take into account the preferences of the median, or the average Athenian. Moreover, because the median was relatively stable throughout the fourth century, preferences did not dramatically shift, ensuring a modicum of predictability and consistency over time. Another result is institutional design and actors' preferences that interacted to enable proposers of new measures to depart from the status quo, sometimes in significant ways. Finally, innovation was more likely to occur when sub-elite actors were involved in politics.

scholarly journals Veto players, policy change, and institutional design

2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 205316801772270
Author(s):  
Tiberiu Dragu ◽  
Hannah K. Simpson
Keyword(s):  
Incomplete Information ◽  
Policy Change ◽  
Institutional Design ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Veto Players ◽  
Policy Outcome ◽  
Equilibrium Outcome ◽  
Institutional Structures ◽  
Ideal Policy ◽  
The Status

What institutional arrangements allow veto players to secure maximal welfare when all agree on both the need for and the direction of policy change? To answer this question, we conduct a mechanism design analysis. We focus on a system with two veto players, each with incomplete information about the other’s policy preferences. We show that the unique welfare-maximizing mechanism is the mechanism that implements the preferred policy of the player whose ideal policy is closer to the status quo. We provide examples of institutional structures under which the unique equilibrium outcome of this two-player incomplete information game is the policy outcome implemented by this mechanism, and argue that our result can be used as a normative benchmark to assess the optimality of veto player institutions.

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