Engaged, Indifferent, Skeptical or Critical? Disentangling Attitudes towards Local Deliberative Mini-Publics in Four Western European Democracies

Sebastien Rojon,Jean-Benoit Pilet

doi:10.3390/su131910518

Abstract

Democratic innovations, such as deliberative mini-publics, are designed to encourage public engagement in policymaking. They are increasingly being used to inform decision-making on the environment, climate change, and other sustainability issues. Research on support for democratic innovations has focused on identifying citizens in favor and understanding whether they are “enraged” or “engaged” with politics. However, this approach ignores potential differences between citizens expressing more (or less) positive attitudes towards democratic innovations. In an online vignette study, respondents from four Western European countries rated varying descriptions of a local mini-public, indicating both their support for the decision-making process and their willingness to get involved. Four distinct groups were identified based on a latent profile analysis: (1) those who are truly engaged, in that their support for mini-publics is reinforced by intentions to participate, correspond to one-third of citizens. Engaged deliberative democrats stand out as being more concerned about the environment than any other issue on the agenda; (2) the majority of citizens are indifferent, expressing neither positive nor negative inclinations towards mini-publics; (3) a group of “elitists” is skeptical of integrating citizens into policymaking despite intending to participate themselves; and finally (4), a small share of citizens was identified as critics, scoring low on both support and willingness to participate in a mini-public. The diversity of profiles points to the challenges of using deliberative mini-publics to address sustainability issues.

Highlights

Democratic innovations, or processes enabling citizens to influence decision-making on important social and political issues, are often championed as providing a solution to the crisis of representation affecting established democracies [1]
Whereas previous research has focused on separating the advocates of participatory decision-making from the critics, we argue that there are several attitude groups, some of whom score differently on support for greater use of deliberative “mini-public” (DMP) and willingness to participate in one
We found that a four-cluster model on data from the UK produced a group of respondents who differ very little from the engaged democrats

Summary

Introduction

Democratic innovations, or processes enabling citizens to influence decision-making on important social and political issues, are often championed as providing a solution to the crisis of representation affecting established democracies [1]. Scholars and policymakers have increasingly turned their attention to deliberative processes emphasizing focused discussions among ordinary citizens as a crucial component of decision-making. An example of such processes is the deliberative “mini-public” (DMP), or a body of citizens selected by lot to reflect the characteristics of the general population, which gathers to deliberate and decide on specific policy issues [1]. The potential of these innovations for addressing sustainability issues

Results

Discussion

Conclusion