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.
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01 Jan 2006
2,797 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
References
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TL;DR: The authors argue that the ideal speech situation fails to supply anything like a strategy for political action under conditions hostile to deliberation, and they argue for a limited consequentialism, according to which nondeliberative means are legitimate if and only if they further deliberative goals and do not unnecessarily violate the intrinsic values of public deliberation.
Abstract: Many discussions of deliberative democracy ignore or misunderstand the purposes of the ideal speech situation in Habermas’ theory. These purposes are to show the possibility of dissent in actual communication and of supplying a normative standard of social criticism. I elaborate the significance of these purposes and show some of the shortcomings of deliberative theory that ignores them. However, the ideal speech situation fails to supply anything like a strategy for political action under conditions hostile to deliberation. I seek to fill this void by arguing for a limited consequentialism, according to which nondeliberative means are legitimate if and only if they further deliberative goals and do not unnecessarily violate the intrinsic values of public deliberation.
23 citations
01 Jan 2020
23 citations
TL;DR: The authors argue that it is the force of law that demands human problems be cast in the language of rights and rights language is legal language, and that there has been relatively little attention paid by sociologists to the institutions, especially courts, for example, that will recognise and enforce those rights designated as human rights.
Abstract: This paper examines sociologists' current interest in the topics of human rights and globalisation. Some descnbe a world where everyone has rights (or at least a modicum of rights), because we are all human, and we all interact and communicate with one another in a global environment which will (it is argued), result in greater toleration and recognition of differences. In contrast, this paper emphasises the political instability of rights in a world characterised by vast economic inequalities which does not fit neatly into some of the visions of international or global community being proposed. Rather than the inevitability of rights discourse, I argue that it is the force of law that demands human problems be cast in the language of rights and rights language is legal language. Nonetheless, there has been relatively little attention paid by sociologists to the institutions, especially courts, for example, that will recognise and enforce those rights designated as human rights. The paper closes with some...
23 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a concept of structural transformation is worked out and applied on the history of modernity, which involves a distinction between abstract modernity and epochs of realized modernities.
Abstract: In this article a concept of structural transformation is worked out and applied on the history of modernity. It involves a distinction between abstract modernity and epochs of realized modernities. The general theory of a structural transformation of modernity is applied on a special case; the transformation of the modern conduct of life in the West, The Weberian concept ‘conduct of life’ is today almost forgotten, but the author argues that it is a very useful conceptual tool for grasping crucial aspects of everyday life. These theoretical points of departure are then related to some classical American sociological investigations, but also to recent investigations. The result is a division of the history of conduct of life in Western modernity in three different epochs: the age of asceticism, the age of organization and the age of authenticity.
22 citations
31 Jul 2017
TL;DR: In this paper, a relational interpretation of egalitarianism is proposed and evaluated, based on normative arguments, to be called social egalitarianism, which is an ideal of mutual respect responsible for governing the interpersonal relations between free and equal persons.
Abstract: PETRONI, L. C. The Morality of Equality. Ph.D. Dissertation. Faculty of Philosophy, Languages and Literature and Human Sciences. University of São Paulo, 2017. The work holds that the value of equality is best understood in a determined way. Against nonegalitarian theories – such as libertarian, instrumentalist and sufficentarian theories on one side, and distributive-based theories – such as the luck egalitarianism on the other, the thesis offers and evaluate, based on normative arguments, a relational interpretation of egalitarianism to be called social egalitarianism. What makes social egalitarianism a distinctive type of theory is its normative foundation: an ideal of mutual respect responsible for governing the interpersonal relations between free and equal persons. The work intends to show that a relational interpretation of equality is able to provide the basis for a (i) coherent, (ii) morally relevant, and (iii) distributive determined ground for egalitarian theories of justice. In order to stablish all that, it shows, first, how the legitimate exercise of political coercion among equals in authority brings about a particular kind of interpersonal attitude, called deliberative respect. Next, it is argued that the notion of deliberative respect allows us to conceptualize a particular instance of disrespect among equals, namely, the performative disrespect against a right-holder, and showing why respectful relations among equals in authority should be framed in a secondperson standpoint morality – a morality according to each people are mutually accountable to each other as the idea has been developed by Stephen Darwall. Finally, the work argues for the conceptual compatibility between social egalitarianism, on one hand, and distributive principles of justice, on the other. Two principles of justice are considered: (i) the principle of the civic minimum and (ii) the principle of participation in social wealth. From an egalitarian standpoint, both principles are required in order to bring about a just democratic citizenship. Key-words: Theories of Justice, Equality, Political Authority, Second-Person Standpoint Morality, Deliberative Respect.
22 citations