The State of Democratic Theory

The State of Democratic Theory PDF Author: Ian Shapiro
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 140082589X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 196

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Book Description
What should we expect from democracy, and how likely is it that democracies will live up to those expectations? In The State of Democratic Theory, Ian Shapiro offers a critical assessment of contemporary answers to these questions, lays out his distinctive alternative, and explores its implications for policy and political action. Some accounts of democracy's purposes focus on aggregating preferences; others deal with collective deliberation in search of the common good. Shapiro reveals the shortcomings of both, arguing instead that democracy should be geared toward minimizing domination throughout society. He contends that Joseph Schumpeter's classic defense of competitive democracy is a useful starting point for achieving this purpose, but that it stands in need of radical supplementation--both with respect to its operation in national political institutions and in its extension to other forms of collective association. Shapiro's unusually wide-ranging discussion also deals with the conditions that make democracy's survival more and less likely, with the challenges presented by ethnic differences and claims for group rights, and with the relations between democracy and the distribution of income and wealth. Ranging over politics, philosophy, constitutional law, economics, sociology, and psychology, this book is written in Shapiro's characteristic lucid style--a style that engages practitioners within the field while also opening up the debate to newcomers.

The State of Democratic Theory

The State of Democratic Theory PDF Author: Ian Shapiro
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 140082589X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 196

Get Book Here

Book Description
What should we expect from democracy, and how likely is it that democracies will live up to those expectations? In The State of Democratic Theory, Ian Shapiro offers a critical assessment of contemporary answers to these questions, lays out his distinctive alternative, and explores its implications for policy and political action. Some accounts of democracy's purposes focus on aggregating preferences; others deal with collective deliberation in search of the common good. Shapiro reveals the shortcomings of both, arguing instead that democracy should be geared toward minimizing domination throughout society. He contends that Joseph Schumpeter's classic defense of competitive democracy is a useful starting point for achieving this purpose, but that it stands in need of radical supplementation--both with respect to its operation in national political institutions and in its extension to other forms of collective association. Shapiro's unusually wide-ranging discussion also deals with the conditions that make democracy's survival more and less likely, with the challenges presented by ethnic differences and claims for group rights, and with the relations between democracy and the distribution of income and wealth. Ranging over politics, philosophy, constitutional law, economics, sociology, and psychology, this book is written in Shapiro's characteristic lucid style--a style that engages practitioners within the field while also opening up the debate to newcomers.

The Real World of Democratic Theory

The Real World of Democratic Theory PDF Author: Ian Shapiro
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 1400836832
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
In this book Ian Shapiro develops and extends arguments that have established him as one of today's leading democratic theorists. Shapiro is hardheaded about the realities of politics and power, and the difficulties of fighting injustice and oppression. Yet he makes a compelling case that democracy's legitimacy depends on pressing it into the service of resisting domination, and that democratic theorists must rise to the occasion of fashioning the necessary tools. That vital agenda motivates the arguments of this book. Tracing modern democracy's roots to John Locke and the American founders, Shapiro shows that they saw more deeply into the dynamics of democratic politics than have many of their successors. Drawing on Lockean and Madisonian insights, Shapiro evaluates democracy's changing global fortunes over the past two decades. He also shows how elusive democracy can be by exploring the contrast between its successful establishment in South Africa and its failures elsewhere--particularly the Middle East. Shapiro spells out the implications of his account for long-standing debates about public opinion, judicial review, abortion, and inherited wealth--as well as more recent preoccupations with globalization, national security, and international terrorism. Scholars, students, and democratic activists will all learn from Shapiro's trenchant account of democracy's foundations, its history, and its contemporary challenges. They will also find his distinctive democratic vision both illuminating and appealing.

Participation and Democratic Theory

Participation and Democratic Theory PDF Author: Carole Pateman
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521290043
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 134

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Book Description
Shows that current elitist theories are based on an inadequate understanding of the early writings of democratic theory and that much sociological evidence has been ignored.

A Preface to Democratic Theory

A Preface to Democratic Theory PDF Author: Robert A. Dahl
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 9780226134260
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 168

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Book Description
Robert Dahl's Preface helped launch democratic theory fifty years ago as a new area of study in political science, and it remains the standard introduction to the field. Exploring problems that had been left unsolved by traditional thought on democracy, Dahl here examines two influential models--the Madisonian, which represents prevailing American doctrine, and its recurring challenger, populist theory--arguing that they do not accurately portray how modern democracies operate. He then constructs a model more consistent with how contemporary democracies actually function, and, in doing so, develops some original views of popular sovereignty and the American constitutional system.

Digital Technology and Democratic Theory

Digital Technology and Democratic Theory PDF Author: Lucy Bernholz
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022674860X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 328

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Book Description
One of the most far-reaching transformations in our era is the wave of digital technologies rolling over—and upending—nearly every aspect of life. Work and leisure, family and friendship, community and citizenship have all been modified by now-ubiquitous digital tools and platforms. Digital Technology and Democratic Theory looks closely at one significant facet of our rapidly evolving digital lives: how technology is radically changing our lives as citizens and participants in democratic governments. To understand these transformations, this book brings together contributions by scholars from multiple disciplines to wrestle with the question of how digital technologies shape, reshape, and affect fundamental questions about democracy and democratic theory. As expectations have whiplashed—from Twitter optimism in the wake of the Arab Spring to Facebook pessimism in the wake of the 2016 US election—the time is ripe for a more sober and long-term assessment. How should we take stock of digital technologies and their promise and peril for reshaping democratic societies and institutions? To answer, this volume broaches the most pressing technological changes and issues facing democracy as a philosophy and an institution.

Democratic Theory Naturalized

Democratic Theory Naturalized PDF Author: Walter Horn
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1793624968
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 263

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Book Description
To some, the word populism suggests the tyranny of the mob; to others, it suggests a xenophobic nativism. It is often even considered conducive to (if not simply identical to) fascism. In Democratic Theory Naturalized: The Foundations of Distilled Populism, Walter Horn uses his theory of "CHOICE Voluntarism” to offer solutions to some of the most perplexing problems in democratic theory and distill populism to its core premise: giving people the power to govern themselves without any constraints imposed by those on the left or the right. Beginning with explanations of what it means to vote and what makes one society better off than another, Horn analyzes what makes for fair aggregation and appropriate, deliberative representation. Through his examination of the American government, Horn suggests solutions to contemporary problems such as gerrymandering, immigration control, and campaign finance, and offers answers to age-old questions like why dissenters should obey the majority and who should have the right to vote in various elections.

A Democratic Theory of Judgment

A Democratic Theory of Judgment PDF Author: Linda M.G. Zerilli
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022639803X
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 401

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Book Description
In this sweeping look at political and philosophical history, Linda M. G. Zerilli unpacks the tightly woven core of Hannah Arendt’s unfinished work on a tenacious modern problem: how to judge critically in the wake of the collapse of inherited criteria of judgment. Engaging a remarkable breadth of thinkers, including Ludwig Wittgenstein, Leo Strauss, Immanuel Kant, Frederick Douglass, John Rawls, Jürgen Habermas, Martha Nussbaum, and many others, Zerilli clears a hopeful path between an untenable universalism and a cultural relativism that forever defers the possibility of judging at all. Zerilli deftly outlines the limitations of existing debates, both those that concern themselves with the impossibility of judging across cultures and those that try to find transcendental, rational values to anchor judgment. Looking at Kant through the lens of Arendt, Zerilli develops the notion of a public conception of truth, and from there she explores relativism, historicism, and universalism as they shape feminist approaches to judgment. Following Arendt even further, Zerilli arrives at a hopeful new pathway—seeing the collapse of philosophical criteria for judgment not as a problem but a way to practice judgment anew as a world-building activity of democratic citizens. The result is an astonishing theoretical argument that travels through—and goes beyond—some of the most important political thought of the modern period.

A Centripetal Theory of Democratic Governance

A Centripetal Theory of Democratic Governance PDF Author: John Gerring
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521710154
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 223

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Book Description
This book outlines the importance of political institutions in achieving good governance within a democratic polity.

Theories of Democracy

Theories of Democracy PDF Author: Frank Cunningham
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134584954
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 258

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Book Description
This is the first book to be published in this exciting new series on political philosophy. Cunningham provides a critical and clear introduction to the main contemporary approaches to democracy: participatory democracy, classic and radical pluralism, deliberative democracy, catallaxy, and others. Also discussed are theorists in the background of current democratic thought, such as Tocqueville, Mill, and Rousseau. The book includes applications of democratic theories including an extended discussion of democracy and globalisation.

Democratic Political Theory

Democratic Political Theory PDF Author: James Roland Pennock
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 1400868467
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 597

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Book Description
Professor Pennock launches an encyclopedic study that evaluates and ultimately synthesizes a variety of democratic theories. After defining democracy and examining the basic tensions both within and between liberty and equality, and individualism and collectivism, the author sets forth two typologies of operational democratic theories, one related to power, the other related to motivation. In succeeding chapters, he analyzes a series of problems with which any operating democracy must contend, and then measures—on the basis of empirical work done in this area—the adequacy of the various theories in dealing with these problems. Originally published in 1979. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.