Journal Article•
Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy
About: This article is published in Review of Metaphysics.The article was published on 1997-02-01 and is currently open access. It has received 2568 citations till now. The article focuses on the topics: Democracy.
Citations
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TL;DR: For example, exit-based empowerments should be as central to the design and integrity of democracy as distributions of votes and voice, long considered its key structural features as mentioned in this paper. But because contemporary democratic theory often dismisses exit as appropriate only for economic markets, the democratic potentials of exit have rarely been theorized.
Abstract: Democracy is about including those who are potentially affected by collective decisions in making those decisions. For this reason, contemporary democratic theory primarily assumes membership combined with effective voice. An alternative to voice is exit: Dissatisfied members may choose to leave a group rather than voice their displeasure. Rights and capacities for exit can function as low-cost, effective empowerments, particularly for those without voice. But because contemporary democratic theory often dismisses exit as appropriate only for economic markets, the democratic potentials of exit have rarely been theorized. Exit-based empowerments should be as central to the design and integrity of democracy as distributions of votes and voice, long considered its key structural features. When they are integrated into other democratic devices, exit-based empowerments should generate and widely distribute usable powers for those who need them most, evoke responsiveness from elites, induce voice, discipline monopoly, and underwrite vibrant and pluralistic societies.
98 citations
TL;DR: Partisanship is indispensable to the kind of political justification needed to make the exercise of collective authority responsive to normative concerns as mentioned in this paper, and partisanship can be seen as a necessary and sufficient precondition for a principled deliberative democracy.
Abstract: Political justification figures prominently in contemporary political theory, notably in models of deliberative democracy. This article articulates and defends the essential role of partisanship in this process. Four dimensions of justification are examined in detail: the constituency to which political justifications are offered, the circumstances in which they are developed, the ways in which they are made inclusive, and the ways in which they are made persuasive. In each case, the role of partisanship is probed and affirmed. Partisanship, we conclude, is indispensable to the kind of political justification needed to make the exercise of collective authority responsive to normative concerns.
98 citations
Cites background from "Between Facts and Norms: Contributi..."
...…theorists have recently acknowledged that there may be empirical reasons why acts of justification come to be rejected by some, it is axiomatic that justification involves the provision of reasons accessible to all citizens (Bohman 1998, 401–3; Cohen 1996, 99–100; Habermas 1996, 463–90)....
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TL;DR: In this article, the authors argue that corporate social responsibility is a strategy that enables multinational corporations to profit from social responsibility, and they provide a critical analysis of the politics of Corporate Social Responsibility.
Abstract: In this article, I provide a critical analysis of the politics of corporate social responsibility. I argue that corporate social responsibility is a strategy that enables multinational corporations...
98 citations
Cites background from "Between Facts and Norms: Contributi..."
...The basic normative and theoretical assumptions of PCSR are drawn from Habermas’s work on deliberative democracy (Frynas and Stephens, 2015; Habermas, 1996, 1998; Mäkinen and Kourula, 2012; Scherer, 2017; Whelan, 2012)....
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01 Jan 2007
TL;DR: A critical examination of the emergence and the strengths and weakness of this new and important field in politics and law can be found in this article, where a new hybrid field called "recognition and dialogue" is proposed.
Abstract: Over the past 50 years, both theory and practice regarding the struggle for recognition have developed relatively independently of deliberative and agonistic democracy, a related field. Over the last decade, however, these two fields have merged, because courts, legislatures, ministries and rival armies around the world have often turned the reconciliation of struggles for recognition over to various institutions and practices of negotiation and deliberation. The result is the emergence of a new hybrid field called “recognition and dialogue.” This paper is a critical examination of the emergence and the strengths and weakness of this new and important field in politics and law.
97 citations
01 Jun 2015
TL;DR: This dissertation aims to provide a history of web exceptionalism from 1989 to 2002, a period chosen in order to explore its roots as well as specific cases up to and including the year in which descriptions of “Web 2.0” began to circulate.
Abstract: Please do not quote without authors' permission.
97 citations
References
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TL;DR: In this comprehensive social theory of the Internet and the networked information economy, Benkler describes how patterns of information, knowledge, and cultural production are changing--and shows that the way information and knowledge are made available can either limit or enlarge the ways people can create and express themselves.
Abstract: With the radical changes in information production that the Internet has introduced, we stand at an important moment of transition, says Yochai Benkler in this thought-provoking book. The phenomenon he describes as social production is reshaping markets, while at the same time offering new opportunities to enhance individual freedom, cultural diversity, political discourse, and justice. But these results are by no means inevitable: a systematic campaign to protect the entrenched industrial information economy of the last century threatens the promise of today's emerging networked information environment. In this comprehensive social theory of the Internet and the networked information economy, Benkler describes how patterns of information, knowledge, and cultural production are changing--and shows that the way information and knowledge are made available can either limit or enlarge the ways people can create and express themselves. He describes the range of legal and policy choices that confront us and maintains that there is much to be gained--or lost--by the decisions we make today.
4,002 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors develop a framework for understanding the range of institutional possibilities for public participation, including who participates, how participants communicate with one another and make decisions together, and how discussions are linked with policy or public action.
Abstract: The multifaceted challenges of contemporary governance demand a complex account of the ways in which those who are subject to laws and policies should participate in making them. This article develops a framework for understanding the range of institutional possibilities for public participation. Mechanisms of participation vary along three important dimensions: who participates, how participants communicate with one another and make decisions together, and how discussions are linked with policy or public action. These three dimensions constitute a space in which any particular mechanism of participation can be located. Different regions of this institutional design space are more and less suited to addressing important problems of democratic governance such as legitimacy, justice, and effective administration.
1,526 citations
01 Dec 2000
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examine the current debate about the nature of democracy and discuss the main theses of the approach called "deliberative democracy" in its two main versions, the one put forward by John Rawls, and the other one put forth by Jurgen Habermas.
Abstract: This article examines the current debate about the nature of democracy and discusses the main theses of the approach called 'deliberative democracy' in its two main versions, the one put forward by John Rawls, and the other one put forwardby Jurgen Habermas. While agreeing with them as regards to the need to develop a more of democracy than the one offered by the 'aggregative' model, I submit that they do not provide an adequate understanding of the main task of democracy. No doubt, by stating that democracy cannot be reduced to a question of procedures to mediate among conflicting interests, deliberative democrats defend a conception of democracy that presents a richer conception of politics. But, albeit in a different way thanthe view they criticize, their vision is also a rationalist one which leaves aside the crucial role played by 'passions' and collective forms of identifications in the field of politics. Moreover, in their attempt to reconcile the liberal tradition with the democratic one, deliberative democrats tend to erase the tension that exist between liberalism and democracy and they are therefore unable to come to terms with the conflictual nature of democratic politics. The main thesis that I put forward in this article is that democratic theory needs to acknowledge the ineradicability of antagonism and the impossibility of achieving a fully inclusive rational consensus. I argue that a model of democracy in terms of 'agonistic pluralism' can help us to better envisage the main challenge facing democratic politics today: how to create democratic forms of identifications that will contribute to mobilize passions towards democratic designs.;
1,338 citations
TL;DR: Public diplomacy, as the diplomacy of the public, not of the government, intervenes in this global public sphere, laying the ground for traditional forms of diplomacy to act beyond the strict negotiation of power relationships by building on shared... as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: The public sphere is the space of communication of ideas and projects that emerge from society and are addressed to the decision makers in the institutions of society. The global civil society is the organized expression of the values and interests of society. The relationships between government and civil society and their interaction via the public sphere define the polity of society. The process of globalization has shifted the debate from the national domain to the global debate, prompting the emergence of a global civil society and of ad hoc forms of global governance. Accordingly, the public sphere as the space of debate on public affairs has also shifted from the national to the global and is increasingly constructed around global communication networks. Public diplomacy, as the diplomacy of the public, not of the government, intervenes in this global public sphere, laying the ground for traditional forms of diplomacy to act beyond the strict negotiation of power relationships by building on shared...
936 citations
Book•
05 Oct 2012
TL;DR: Tweets and the Streets as mentioned in this paper examines the relationship between the rise of social media and the emergence of new forms of protest, arguing that activists' use of Twitter and Facebook does not fit with the image of a "cyberspace" detached from physical reality.
Abstract: Tweets and the Streets analyses the culture of the new protest movements of the 21st century. From the Arab Spring to the "indignados" protests in Spain and the Occupy movement, Paolo Gerbaudo examines the relationship between the rise of social media and the emergence of new forms of protest. Gerbaudo argues that activists' use of Twitter and Facebook does not fit with the image of a "cyberspace" detached from physical reality. Instead, social media is used as part of a project of re-appropriation of public space, which involves the assembling of different groups around "occupied" places such as Cairo's Tahrir Square or New York's Zuccotti Park. An exciting and invigorating journey through the new politics of dissent, Tweets and the Streets points both to the creative possibilities and to the risks of political evanescence which new media brings to the contemporary protest experience.
911 citations