Democratic Theory Research Articles

Conceptualizing Belonging for Democratic Theory

Previous articleNext article No AccessConceptualizing Belonging for Democratic TheoryYuna Blajer de la GarzaYuna Blajer de la Garza Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by The Journal of Politics Just Accepted Sponsored by the Southern Political Science Association Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/723980 Views: 52Total views on this site HistoryAccepted December 12, 2022 © 2023 Southern Political Science Association. All Rights reserved.PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

On expanding the possibilities of implementing municipal projects of initiative budgeting for the development of physical culture and sports in the regions of Russia

Alm. The purpose of the study is to determine the essence of initiative budgeting as a tool of modern state public management and a mechanism for managing public finances, as well as to assess the institutional conditions for the use of this tool for the socio-economic development of territories, including in the field of physical culture and sports. Materials and methods. The theoretical and methodological basis of the research was made up of scientific works of domestic and foreign scientists in the field of public public management, public values management, public management of sustainable socio-economic development of territories, public finance management, including in the field of physical culture and sports, and methodological approaches formed on the basis of the theory of participatory democracy (participatory democracy) to involve citizens in the budget process, public finance management in general and the mechanism of initiative budgeting in particular. In the course of the study, the institutional conditions for the development of initiative budgeting in Russia in 2014-2021 were analyzed, the foundations of its regulatory support were structured. Special attention is paid to the practices of proactive budgeting in the field of physical culture and sports. Results. Typical models of municipal projects of initiative budgeting in the regions of Russia in the field of financial culture and sports are identified, carried out in the context of organizational and methodological support for the implementation of relevant municipal initiative projects structured in the course of the study. Conclusion. Recommendations are given on expanding thepossibilities ofimplementing municipal projects ofinitiative budgeting, improving theregulatory andmethodological support of projects of local initiatives implemented in the field of physical culture and sports in municipalities of the regions of Russia within the framework of models of initiative budgeting.

Industrial and Environmental Democracies as Models of a Politically Organized Relationship Between Society and Nature

This paper is based on the concept of environmental political philosophy and from its perspective, it highlights the weaknesses and contradictions of contemporary, existing democracies. It aims to formulate an outline of the concept of environmental democracy, following the accounts of M. Bookchin, R. Morrison and H. Skolimowski, as well as international environmental law enshrined in United Nations documents and resolutions. It is based on the hypothesis that the preservation of a democratic political system in a situation of a collapsing planetary system (the Anthropocene) requires improving the foundations of democratic theory with the insights of the Earth system sciences, particularly of political ecology and critical environmentalism. Through philosophical analysis, explanation and interpretation, this paper explores an environmental democracy that would, on the one hand, preserve the basic constitutional principles of current democratic constitutional regimes, and, on the other hand, reconcile them with the current state of understanding in the Earth sciences concerning the vulnerability of the planetary system. In a sense, J. Habermas’s understanding of human rights characterizes the concept of environmental democracy as a realistic utopia. The author concludes by drawing up the imperative of sustainability, which he sees as a guiding organizing principle of institutions and public policies for the climatic, demographic and economic regime of the Anthropocene. -------------------------- Received: 16/12/2022. Reviewed: 09/03/2023. Accepted: 30/03/2023.

Information, doubt, and democracy: how digitization spurs democratic decay

ABSTRACT The amount of information available to citizens due to global digitization and new technologies is unprecedented. However, in established democracies where access to alternative sources of information is guaranteed and educational levels are high, we witness a rise in attitudes and actions that threaten democratic foundations. Some citizens succumb to misinformation that has led them down the path of radicalization and violence; others withdraw completely from political life. How do we explain these developments? Building on democratic theory and the concepts of informational learned helplessness and selective exposure, we introduce a theoretical framework that connects digitization and digital technologies to attitudes and behaviour that threaten democracy even before democratic decay manifests. We argue that AI-assisted digital technologies expose societies to an abundance of contradictory information, limit citizens’ ability to assess their trustworthiness, and reinforce the tailored dissemination of misinformation. We present the US and Germany as empirical plausibility probes that show how these features drive some citizens towards informational agnosticism, which results in de-politicization and political apathy. Others might become misbelievers who display negative attitudes towards democracy and/or engage in anti-democratic actions. Our probe offers an initial empirical illustration that provides a basis for further systematic investigations of digital technology’s effects on democracy.

Democratic Practices in MERCOSUR and the OAS: What Space for Transnational Civil Society?

ABSTRACT Democratic theory asserts that the legitimacy of contemporary international and regional organisations rests on a degree of consensus expressed by various actors. The quest for diffuse support now extends beyond member states and explains the opening up of IOs/ROs to transnational civil society’s participation. Despite both notions being familiar to IR scholars, a more precise understanding is needed concerning the relationship between each concept, particularly with regard to the inclusion/exclusion nexus and in the still neglected study of organisations in the global South. Using a practice perspective, the paper offers a contribution to that understanding by proposing a micro-level analysis of the behavioural practices of both ROs and TCS using MERCOSUR and the OAS as case studies. A nalysis of the opening up of these organisations, and the concurrent engagement of civil society reveals how inclusion is still both incomplete and unequal. Political liberalisation of ROs thus remains an unfulfilled mandate.

Are good leaders truly good?

Abstract This paper offers a new insight on the Condorcet Jury Theorem (CJT) in the theory of epistemic democracy. This theorem states that democratic decision-making leads us to correct outcomes under certain assumptions. One key assumption is the ‘independence condition’, which requires that voters form their beliefs independently when they vote. This paper examines the role of an opinion leader as an informational source, which potentially violates independence. We demonstrate that voters’ beliefs may be correlated in the presence of the leader, and that the CJT can fail if the leader’s opinions are reliable. This leads us to the following paradoxical observation: for epistemic democracy, good leaders may be bad, while bad leaders may be good.

The Boundary Problem in Democratic Theory: A Methodological Approach

How should political power and influence be allocated in democratic systems? That is, roughly, the core of the boundary problem in democratic theory. As of late, some authors have begun paying increased attention to the methodological aspects of this dispute. This paper attempts to make a twofold contribution to this ‘methodological turn’. On the one hand, it identifies and analyzes five desiderata of a successful principle of democratic inclusion. Any such principle, I argue, must be grounded in a clearly identifiable set of values, must provide a clear standard of inclusion, must specify the relevant modalities of inclusion, must provide sound bridging principles, and must be extensionally adequate. In the first half of the paper, these desiderata are developed and critically scrutinized. On the other hand, I also extract three lessons from the previous discussion. First, that a unique answer to the boundary problem (i.e. one grounded in one single principle) is unlikely. Second, that a satisfactory answer to the boundary problem need not necessarily appeal, as some have argued, to distinctively democratic values. And third, that intuitions about political exclusion (i.e. those requiring or permitting the exclusion of some individuals) should be treated with special caution.

The Epistemic Violence of Transitional Justice: A View from Sri Lanka

ABSTRACT In this article I explore the failures of transitional justice in post-war Sri Lanka. For most commentators this is simply explained in terms of a lack of political will. However, I argue that beyond this transitional justice in Sri Lanka is a story of epistemic violence. This is a result of its over-reliance on abstract, universalist liberal democratic theory that fails to properly grasp the historical, cultural and socio-political specificity not just of the locations where transitional justice is proposed but of the conceptual foundation of transitional justice itself. As a result, transitional justice simultaneously discounts colonial legacies while reproducing colonial categories. In the case of Sri Lanka this has resulted in a failure to fully understand and address the root causes of conflict and an inability to see and draw upon resources for reconciliation, reparation and redress.

The Constitutional Concepts of Sustainability and Dignity

The principle of sustainability is generally taken as a good, but what does sustainability really mean? The notion of sustainability has been at the center of global governance debates for more than a decade and many countries across the world include sustainability in their constitutions. This paper argues that in order to understand the concept of sustainability in a constitutional context, we need to turn to the notion of dignity. The paper explores the concepts of sustainability and dignity and their meanings in the framework of climate justice and related questions and by discussing them in the context of Kantian and republican theory. In addition, the paper looks at intriguing court cases on the importance of nation states meeting their climate law duties. The paper concludes by exploring new uses of the sustainability concept. EU constitutional law will serve as a laboratory in testing these questions.

Democratic politics and hope: An Arendtian perspective

Narratives of hope are omnipresent in democratic life, but what can they tell us about the structure and orientation of politics? While common, they are often reduced to an all-compassing understanding that overlooks hope's various forms and implications. Democratic theory, however, lacks the theoretical language to attend to these distinctions. The aim of this essay is thus to define a collective and political account of hope and recover the normative basis of a democratic theory of hope. Drawing on the literature on hope and juxtaposing it with extracts from Harvey Milk's ‘The Hope Speech,’ I first distinguish its collective experience before turning to Hannah Arendt. While Arendt rejects a politics of hope that turns away from the world, exploring how she thinks with and against hope provides a theoretically fruitful approach that elevates the in-betweenness of its worldly expression. From that standpoint, I relate the work and experience of hoping with others to her notions of natality, action and promises. These three conceptual touchstones provide the normative basis of a democratic theory of hope and help situate a collective sense of possibility inherent in democratic politics.

Saving Popular Sovereignty From a Slow Death in the European Union

AbstractThe European Union (EU) faces a pressing challenge with democratic backsliding potentially resulting in an authoritarian member state. EU institutions have sought to safeguard member state democracy. Most normative studies submit that the EU can legitimately intervene based on either current treaties or the theory of militant democracy, but they leave unanswered the fundamental question of the EU's normative political authority. I argue that shared popular sovereignty, which entails Europe's peoples directly authorizing the EU, is the most appropriate principle to theorize the EU's political authority for the foreseeable future. This principle results in a duty for the EU to protect its democratic peoples from backsliding governments and an account of who can legitimately decide on whether backsliding is taking place. A comprehensive normative assessment follows on the democratic legitimacy of various democracy protection measures. My argument bolsters the normative case for EU democracy protection.

Hard Facts, Distorted Views, and Hope: How to Square Democratic Theory with Realism. An Interview with Lisa Herzog and Enzo Rossi

Hard Facts, Distorted Views, and Hope: How to Square Democratic Theory with Realism. An Interview with Lisa Herzog and Enzo Rossi

The in_visibilization of emotions in politics. Ambivalences of an ‘affective democracy’

ABSTRACT The liberal affect dispositif and liberal theories of democracy are historically entangled with gendered processes of in_visibilization—the invisibilization and paradox visibilization of women as well as of affect and emotions. To overcome divisions and exclusions connected to in_visibilization, this article spells out the ambivalent power relations of affect, care and relatedness in processes of visibilizing and invisibilizing, and hence their dis-empowering as well as empowering qualities. Against deliberative and queer-feminist theories of democracy which are aware of the role of affect and emotion, the article suggests a new way of conceptualizing affect and emotions as important elements for re-imagining democracy. It combines democracy theories including affect, emotions, and passions with a critical concept of affect and queer-feminist democracy theories of care and relatedness. The notion of an “affective democracy” suggests to establish institutions for feeling democracy as well as it is a critical entry point to become aware of ambivalences and contradictions of gender, democracy, and acting together without denying affectivity and emotions.

The Theory of Political Democracy for Vietnam in Ho Chi Minh's Thought Compared to Western Political Democracy

The Theory of Political Democracy for Vietnam in Ho Chi Minh's Thought Compared to Western Political Democracy

Whose Coordination? Which Democracy? On Antitrust as a Democratic Demand

The growing movement seeking to revive an aggressive, “neo-Brandeisian” approach to antitrust policy sees it partly as a way of protecting democracy against concentrated economic power. Yet on closer inspection, prevailing theories of democracy as collective decision making offer weak support, at best, for a neo-Brandeisian approach. Rather than abandoning the insight that an aggressive approach to antitrust can help protect democracy, however, this essay argues that we should adjust our theories of democracy to accommodate it. I first show why prevailing accounts are ill suited to explaining the democratic virtues of a neo-Brandeisian approach. I then outline an alternative ideal of democracy—defended in greater detail elsewhere—and draw out its implications for antitrust. While vindicating the intuition that aggressive antitrust policy serves democratic goals, my account also incorporates genuine worries about such an approach, and thus enables neo-Brandeisians to reformulate their democratic ambitions in more precise and promising terms.

The Recruitment Issues of Prospective Regional Head Candidates by Political Parties

The mandate of Article 29 paragraph (2) of Law No.2/2008 requires that the recruitment of candidates for regional head/deputy regional head by political parties must be carried out in a democratic and open manner. However, the arrangement and implementation are left to each political party. This study analyzes the problem of recruitment of regional head candidates by political parties in a democratic and open manner which then provide ideas as alternative solutions. This research is normative legal research with a statute approach. The theory of democracy is used as a qualitative analysis guide and is presented descriptively. The results of this study conclude that the recruitment of prospective regional head/deputy regional head candidates, whose arrangements and implementation are left to political parties, tends to be carried out in an undemocratic and not open manner. Political parties tend to do so exclusively at the party elite level. Even though at the regional level a selection of prospective candidates was carried out by several political parties, the final decision was determined by the leadership at the central level. In addition, the pattern of recruitment is also very vulnerable to money politics. This is because political parties have full authority in recruiting prospective regional head candidates, so that they are not covered by The General Election Supervisory Agency (Bawaslu) and General Election Commissions (KPU) supervision. In the future, improvements need to be made so that arrangements regarding the recruitment of prospective regional head/deputy regional head candidates are strictly regulated in the Regional Head Election Law (Pilkada Law), not in the statutes of each political party.

Discrepancy between theory and practice: Democratic recession or a crisis of state legitimacy?

ABSTRACT The discrepancy between democratic theory and practice is common to all democratic and quasi-democratic governments. Democratic recession manifests where there is an extreme discrepancy between normative democratic values and their practice – for instance where the state has flouted democratic normative rules (theory) and rendered major democratic institutions dysfunctional. This article posits that democratic recession can be seen in the 21st century as a reaction to at least four factors: 1) shifts in global geopolitics, 2) a crisis of representative democracy, 3) democratic silence, and 4) the rise of populism and post-truth framing. Indices of democracy do not, however, reveal the extent of the state’s role in undermining democratic institutions (ie, political parties, election monitoring bodies, parliaments, the media, civil society), due to a bias of liberal individualism. The outcome has been a crisis of state legitimacy, where citizens lose trust in the state rather than in democratic governance.

Curiosity and Democracy: A Neglected Connection

Curiosity’s connection with democracy remains neglected and unexplored. Various disciplines have mostly treated curiosity as an epistemic trait of the individual. Beyond epistemology, curiosity is studied as a moral virtue or vice of the self. Beyond epistemic and moral frameworks, curiosity is examined politically and decolonially. However, all frameworks remain focused on the individual and rarely imply a relevance of curiosity to democracy. The present article departs from such explorative frameworks philosophically to expand the research scope on curiosity in the direction of democratic theory. It highlights the complex politics of curiosity as a collective, rather than merely individual, desire for knowledge. I argue that curiosity should become a key analytical category for studying democracy as a political attitude and as a way of life. Investigations of the multifaceted curiosity of the demos may enhance the visibility of ethico-political issues that often escape the curious eye of citizens and researchers.

Social Capital, Institutional Rules, and Constitutional Amendment Rates

Why are some constitutions amended more frequently than others? The literature provides few clear answers, as some scholars focus on institutional factors, whereas others emphasize amendment culture. We bridge this divide with new theoretical and empirical insights. Using data from democratic constitutions worldwide and U.S. state constitutions, we examine how social capital reduces the transaction costs imposed by amendment rules. The results indicate that constitutional rigidity decreases amendment frequency, but group membership, civic activism, and political trust can offset the effect of amendment rules. Our findings have important implications for scholars in public law, constitutional and democratic theory, and social movements.

Multiaccentual coalitions, dialogic grief and carnivalesque assemblies: Judith Butler and Mikhail Bakhtin meet in the world of ethics

This article for the first time seeks to bring together theoretical insights from Judith Butler and Mikhail Bakhtin in order to strengthen their respective understanding of ethics. First, the article suggests that Bakhtin’s theory of dialogic events and the ‘multiaccentuality’ and thematic nature of everyday utterances can help Butler address criticisms that suggest her work concentrates too heavily on invariant meanings in utterances. Second, Butler’s theory of coalitions can usefully politicise Bakhtin’s ideas on utterances, while her ethics of grief is a crucial way to think about how we forge bonds with the ‘Other’. Correspondingly, Bakhtin’s theory of the ethical ‘I’ adds an important moment of ‘empathy’ to Butler’s account of grief and the ‘Other’. Third, Butler’s theory of state hegemony and counter-hegemonic assemblies can provide an important addition to Bakhtin’s theory, while Bakhtin’s theory of carnivalesque democracy strengthens Butler’s insights on equality in assemblies and occupying a liveable life.