The instrumental value of deliberative democracy – or, do we have good reasons to be deliberative democrats?

Though commanding a prominent role in political theory, deliberative democracy has also become a mainstay of myriad other research traditions in recent years. This diffusion has been propelled along by the notion that deliberation, properly conceived and enacted, generates many beneficial outcomes. This article has three goals geared toward understanding whether these instrumental benefits provide us with good reasons – beyond intrinsic ones – to be deliberative democrats. First, the proclaimed instrumental benefits are systematized in terms of micro, meso, and macro outcomes. Second, relevant literatures are canvassed to critically assess what we know – and what we do not know – about deliberation’s effects. Finally, the instrumental benefits of deliberation are recast in light of the ongoing systemic turn in deliberative theory. This article adds to our theoretical understanding of deliberation’s promises and pitfalls, and helps practitioners identify gaps in our knowledge concerning how deliberation works and what its wider societal implications might be

Institutional accountability of nonstate actors in the UNFCCC: Exit, voice, and loyalty

How are nonstate actors within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) held to account? In this article, we introduce the concept of “institutional accountability” to complement the wider literature(s) on accountability in climate governance. Within institutional frameworks, actors employ rules, norms, and procedures to demand justifications from one another. In light of those justifications, actors then use “exit, voice, or loyalty” to positively or negatively sanction each other. To depict the dynamics of institutional accountability, we analyze the role of nonstate actors in the nine constituency groups of the UNFCCC. We outline the constituency structure and the population of observer organizations. We then identify examples where nonstate actors employed institutional rules in tandem with exit, voice, or loyalty to foster accountability. In making this analysis we draw upon three years of on-site participation at UNFCCC meetings, document analysis, and more than 40 semi-structured interviews with state and nonstate actors. We conclude by discussing the scope and conditions under which institutional accountability may occur in other issue areas of global governance

The Instrumental Value of Deliberative Democracy – Or, do we have Good Reasons to be Deliberative Democrats?

Though commanding a prominent role in political theory, deliberative democracy has also become a mainstay of myriad other research traditions in recent years. This diffusion has been propelled along by the notion that deliberation, properly conceived and enacted, generates many beneficial outcomes. This article has three goals geared toward understanding whether these instrumental benefits provide us with good reasons – beyond intrinsic ones – to be deliberative democrats. First, the proclaimed instrumental benefits are systematized in terms of micro, meso, and macro outcomes. Second, relevant literatures are canvassed to critically assess what we know – and what we do not know – about deliberation’s effects. Finally, the instrumental benefits of deliberation are recast in light of the ongoing systemic turn in deliberative theory. This article adds to our theoretical understanding of deliberation’s promises and pitfalls, and helps practitioners identify gaps in our knowledge concerning how deliberation works and what its wider societal implications might be

The Mode of Communication as a Driver of Sustainable and Equitable Asymmetric Common Pool Resource Use

Most experimental studies on common pool resource usage focus on situations in which actors are in symmetric positions when they use the resource. Many real-world cases do not fit this scenario because users are in asymmetric positions regarding their ability to benefit from the resource. Examples range from irrigation systems to climate change mitigation. Moreover, while there is large evidence on the effects of communication on social dilemmas, few studies focus on different modes of communication. We compare the effects of unstructured and structured communication on the provision of an infrastructure for a common pool resource and appropriation of the provided resource. tructured communication applied rules that are based on the ideals of democratic deliberation. Participants made contribution and appropriation decisions in an incentivized experiment. In the experiment, both communication and deliberation increased contributions in comparison to a baseline. Interestingly, deliberation attenuated the effect of the player position more than communication. Our results suggest that deliberation may be useful for overcoming asymmetric commons dilemmas in the field.publishedVersionPeer reviewe

International courts and global democratic values: participation, accountability, and justification

In a post-Cold War era characterised by globalisation and deep interdependence, the actions of national governments increasingly have an effect beyond their own territorial borders. Moreover, key agents of global governance – international organisations and their bureaucracies, non-state actors and private agents – exercise pervasive forms of authority. Due to these shifts, it is widely noted that world politics suffers from a democratic deficit. This article contributes to work on global democracy by looking at the role of international courts. Building upon an original dataset covering the 24 international courts in existence since the end of the Second World War, we argue that international courts are able to advance democratic values and shape democratic practices beyond the state. They can do so by fostering equal participation, accountability, and public justification that link individuals directly with sites of transnational authority. We contend that the ability of international courts to promote these values is conditioned by institutional design choices concerning access rules, review powers, and provisions regarding judicial reason-giving. We canvass these design features of different international courts and assess the promises and pitfalls for global democratisation. We conclude by linking our analysis of international courts and global democratisation with debates about the legitimation and politicisation of global governance at large

Historical institutionalism in world politics : prospects for democratisation

How can democratisation best be pursued and promoted in the existing global system? Most proposals to ameliorate the global democratic deficit are conceptualised as ideal end-points which should be approximated as closely as possible. However, because there is an ineliminable gap between ideal conception and non-ideal institutionalisation, designers should redirect focus toward the transformative pathway. Institutional designers and policymakers thus require foreknowledge about how institutions may evolve through time. I contend that historical institutionalism - well-placed as it is to incorporate rationalist and sociological insights - can be recalibrated to think through these future pathways. I argue that the structure, sequence, and setting of a proposal all shed light on how institutions may change and the wider effects design might entail. The task for institutional designers then is to determine whether a transformative pathway can feasibly promote democratic values. I reconceptualise global democracy as an on-going process of democratisation promoted by the attainment of three values: equal participation, accountability, and institutional revisability. The thesis engages in comparative analysis of three ideal-typical proposals for global democratisation: federalism (world government), cosmopolitan democracy (piecemeal constitutionalism), and democratic polycentrism (global civil society). Having analysed these approaches, I argue that federalist models -which seek to replicate familiar statist institutions at the global level - would have difficulty inducing the democratising effects sought by proponents. Similarly, cosmopolitan democratic institutions would likely limit future experimentation through path-dependent feedback. While the deliberative base of global civil society offers a more fruitful way to think about global democratisation, it is difficult to envisage how this approach meets a fundamental equality condition of democratic participation. Building on the comparative analysis, I contend that regime complexes are the appropriate unit of democratisation beyond the state. Because each issue area in world politics is different, we require tailor-made (as opposed to one-size-fits-all) solutions. Through a discussion of the intellectual property rights regime complex, I contend that democratisation can be sought on two planes: horizontal deliberative accountability within multilateral negotiations; and the vertical development of deliberative democratic experimentalism. I apply my historical-institutionalist framework to expound both normative and institutional benefits of this prescription