Breaking the Constitutional Deadlock: Lessons from Deliberative Experiments in Constitutional Change

This work provides comparative insights into how deliberation on proposed constitutional amendments might be more effectively pursued. It reports on a new nationwide survey of public attitudes to constitutional reform, examining the potential in Australia of innovative Canadian models of reform led by Citizens' Assemblies. Assembly members are selected at random and are demographically representative of the wider public. They deliberate over reforms for several months while receiving instruction from experts in relevant fields. Members thus become 'public-experts': citizens who stand in for the wider public but are versed in constitutional fundamentals. The author finds striking empirical evidence that, if applied in the Australian context, public trust would be substantially greater for Citizens' Assemblies compared with traditional processes of change. The article sets these results in context, reading the Assemblies against theories of deliberative democracy and public trust. One reason for greater public trust in the Assemblies' may be an ability to accommodate key values that are otherwise in conflict: majoritarian democratic legitimacy, on the one hand, and fair and well-informed (or 'deliberatively rational') decision-making, on the other. Previously, almost no other poll had asked exactly how much Australians trust in constitutional change. However, by resolving trust into a set of discrete public values, the polling and analysis in this work provide evidence that constitutional reform might only succeed when it expresses, at once, the values of both majoritarian and deliberative democracy

Deliberative Democracy in the EU. Countering Populism with Participation and Debate. CEPS Paperback

Elections are the preferred way to freely transfer power from one term to the next and from one political party or coalition to another. They are an essential element of democracy. But if the process of power transfer is corrupted, democracy risks collapse. Reliance on voters, civil society organisations and neutral observers to fully exercise their freedoms as laid down in international human rights conventions is an integral part of holding democratic elections. Without free, fair and regular elections, liberal democracy is inconceivable. Elections are no guarantee that democracy will take root and hold, however. If the history of political participation in Europe over the past 800 years is anything to go by, successful attempts at gaining voice have been patchy, while leaders’ attempts to silence these voices and consolidate their own power have been almost constant (Blockmans, 2020). Recent developments in certain EU member states have again shown us that democratically elected leaders will try and use majoritarian rule to curb freedoms, overstep the constitutional limits of their powers, protect the interests of their cronies and recycle themselves through seemingly free and fair elections. In their recent book How Democracies Die, two Harvard professors of politics write: “Since the end of the Cold War, most democratic breakdowns have been caused not by generals and soldiers but by elected governments themselves” (Levitsky and Ziblatt, 2018)

Who is willing to deliberate, and how? Dissatisfied democrats, stealth democrats and populists in the UK: SEI Working Paper 131

This article draws on a new survey of British citizens to test the hypothesis that there are two quite distinctive types of attitude prevalent among those who are ‘disaffected’ with politics, the ‘dissatisfied democratic’ and ‘stealth democratic’ orientations, the former being more widespread in the UK. While neither manifests a high level of trust for the political elite, the dissatisfied democratic citizen is politically interested, efficacious and desires greater political participation, while the contrary is generally true of the stealth democrat. However, although stealth democrats are unwilling to engage in most forms of participation or deliberation, they are ambiguous about direct democracy, which can be attributed to the populist nature of stealth democratic attitudes

Od edukacji demokratycznej (obywatelskiej) do demokracji partycypacyjnej? Trudna droga do aktywnego obywatelstwa młodzieży

In this article we make an attempt to join a discussions on the political and social activity of young people in contemporary polyarchies. On the basis of the assumption that the condition for the active fulfilment of civic functions are cognitive skills and the ability to communicate which the individual improves in the education process and through participation in social phenomena, we are trying to find the answer to the following questions: how is participation perceived in today’s polyarchies, what can be the determinants of youth’s political and social involvement, why do European international organisations – the Council of Europe and the European Union – take measures to activate European youth. In the first part of the article, we focus on democratic participation and try to recognise its role in selected models of democracy. Then we analyse selected aspects of youth electoral absenteeism. We cite examples of the activities of the Council of Europe and the European Union in the field of the youth democratic (civic) activation with an indication of the reasons for this activity. Finally, we point to the relationship between the political and social participation of young people and the condition of modern European polyarchies.W artykule podejmujemy próbę włączenia się do dyskusji na temat aktywności politycznej i społecznej młodzieży we współczesnych poliarchiach. Wychodząc z założenia, że warunkiem aktywnego spełniania funkcji obywatelskich są umiejętności poznawcze i zdolności komunikowania się, które jednostka doskonali w procesie kształcenia się i poprzez uczestniczenie w zjawiskach społecznych staramy się znaleźć odpowiedź na następujące pytania: w jaki sposób postrzegane jest uczestnictwo w dzisiejszych poliarchiach? jakie mogą być determinanty angażowania się politycznego i społecznego młodzieży? Dlaczego europejskie organizacje międzynarodowe – Rada Europy i Unia Europejska – podejmują działania z zakresu aktywizowania młodzieży europejskiej? W pierwszej części artykułu uwagę koncentrujemy na uczestnictwie demokratycznym i staramy się poznać jego rolę w wybranych modelach demokracji. Następnie analizujemy wybrane aspekty absencji wyborczej młodzieży. Przywołujemy przykłady aktywności Rady Europy i Unii Europejskiej w zakresie aktywizowania demokratycznego (obywatelskiego) młodzieży wraz ze wskazaniem przyczyn tej aktywności. W końcu wskazujemy na związek pomiędzy uczestnictwem politycznym i społecznym młodzieży a kondycją współczesnych poliarchii europejskich

Does one trust judgement fit all? Linking theory and empirics

Copyright @ 2010 The Authors. This is the accepted version of the following article: Fisher, J., Van Heerde, J. and Tucker, A. (2010), Does One Trust Judgement Fit All? Linking Theory and Empirics. The British Journal of Politics & International Relations, 12: 161–188, which has been published in final form at http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-856X.2009.00401.x/abstract.Few questions in political science have received more attention in recent times than the role of trust in democracy, democratic government and political participation. In Britain this has become a particular concern as levels of democratic engagement in traditional politics have declined, exacerbated by media reports of politicians' untrustworthy behaviour. A common feature of previous empirical work on political trust is that trust is treated as a single theoretical concept. Scholars have assumed that trust operates in a similar fashion across different political institutions—that citizens' trust mechanisms are the same for trusting parliament, the prime minister or the European Union. As a consequence, the operationalisation of trust has generally been through a single measure. In this article we draw on recent research from political theory, where different forms of judgements whether to trust—strategic, moral and deliberative—have been conceptualised, to argue that trust judgements may vary in application and significance depending upon the institution under examination. Using specially designed data sets generated from YouGov's weekly omnibus and the British Election Study's Continuous Monitoring Panel, we operationalise these three forms of trust judgements to examine trust in two British institutions—political parties and politicians. We find, as hypothesised, that different forms of trust judgements are of differing significance depending upon the institution under consideration

Discursive representation

Democracy can entail the representation of discourses as well as persons or groups. We explain and advocate discursive representation; explore its justifications, advantages, and problems; and show how it can be accomplished in practice. This practice can involve the selection of discursive representatives to a formal Chamber of Discourses and more informal processes grounded in the broader public sphere. Discursive representation supports many aspects of deliberative democracy and is especially applicable to settings such as the international system lacking a well-defined demos

Democratizing deliberative systems

'Deliberative democracy' is often dismissed as a set of small-scale, academic experiments. This volume seeks to demonstrate how the deliberative ideal can work as a theory of democracy on a larger scale. It provides a new way of thinking about democratic engagement across the spectrum of political action, from towns and villages to nation states, and from local networks to transnational, even global systems. Written by a team of the world's leading deliberative theorists, Deliberative Systems explains the principles of this new approach, which seeks ways of ensuring that a division of deliberative labour in a system nonetheless meets both deliberative and democratic norms. Rather than simply elaborating the theory, the contributors examine the problems of implementation in a real world of competing norms, competing institutions and competing powerful interests. This pioneering book will inspire an exciting new phase of deliberative research, both theoretical and empirical

Radical Leadership in Post-Parojinog Ozamis Politics

The history of Philippine democracy is marked with the persistent existence of oppressive forces that subjugate the people. Oppression and corruption are the two historically rooted characteristics of Philippine politics. One of the many reasons for the proliferation of corruption and oppression is the existence of local warlords who impose their power over the masses. These political warlords immure the people by violence in order for them to remain in power. The oppressive structure of governance designed and imposed by these warlords became the mainstream structure of government. Democracy is no longer intended to secure the development of the people, but for the few who are in power. Ozamis city is not immune from such structural injustice; for decades the city was ruled by a family whose failure in running a democratic state is prevalent in the actual lives of the people in the city. Not until a radical shift of power was realized in the advent of a progressive leadership exhibited by Police Chief Inspector Jovie Espenido. Though his critics may brand his leadership as authoritarian, it will be argued that radical means are necessitated in order to restructure society and to redirect its course towards bettering the lives of the people. Disruption is needed not just to challenge the present state. It is intended to uproot the putrefied structure that has taken roots in the system in order to plant a new. This paper intends to philosophically assess Jovie Espinido’s leadership following Chantal Mouffe’s radical democracy paradigm

The inconveniences of transnational democracy

Despite some limited moves toward openness and accountability, suprastate policy formation in such bodies as the World Trade Organization remains fundamentally exclusive of individuals within states. This article critiques the “don’t kill the goose” arguments commonly offered in defense of such exclusions. It highlights similarities between those arguments and past arguments for elitist forms of democracy, where strict limitations are advocated on the participation of nonelites in the name of allowing leaders to act most effectively in the broad public interest. Advocated here is movement toward a strongly empowered WTO parliamentary body that would be guided in practice by a principle of democratic symmetry, attempting to match input to the increasing impacts of WTO governance. A parliament with codecision powers broadly similar to those of the European Parliament is offered as a long-term institutional ideal