Long first version from August 2006 of my much shorter book with the same title, published by Ams... more Long first version from August 2006 of my much shorter book with the same title, published by Amsterdam University Press in 2007
Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy, Mar 12, 2014
The contrast between the normative functions of political parties in representative democracies a... more The contrast between the normative functions of political parties in representative democracies and their empirical working is stark and rapidly increasing. This article starts from a sober, realist account of the empirical state of affairs and from structural problems of democracy and participations – in terms of limits of time, information, qualification and relevant expertise – that have to be acknowledged by any realist–utopian proposal of alternatives beyond the exclusive alternative of ‘thin, realist democracy’ or emphatic ‘strong, participatory, direct, or mass democracy’. We can do better. My search for institutional alternatives looks not for the replacement of political parties but for their relief. Many, not all, of their normative tasks can be shared with other functional networks, associations and organizations. In exploring such a new division of political labour I draw on older debates and designs of associative democracy and on recent discussions to democratize expertise and to expertise democracy in order to address urgent societal problems of high-risk decisions under conditions of extreme complexity, contingency, unpredictability and uncertainty and deep contestedness of our knowledge, problems that turn out to be unmanagable by party politics and representative democracy.
Long first version from August 2006 of my much shorter book with the same title, published by Ams... more Long first version from August 2006 of my much shorter book with the same title, published by Amsterdam University Press in 2007
Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy, Mar 12, 2014
The contrast between the normative functions of political parties in representative democracies a... more The contrast between the normative functions of political parties in representative democracies and their empirical working is stark and rapidly increasing. This article starts from a sober, realist account of the empirical state of affairs and from structural problems of democracy and participations – in terms of limits of time, information, qualification and relevant expertise – that have to be acknowledged by any realist–utopian proposal of alternatives beyond the exclusive alternative of ‘thin, realist democracy’ or emphatic ‘strong, participatory, direct, or mass democracy’. We can do better. My search for institutional alternatives looks not for the replacement of political parties but for their relief. Many, not all, of their normative tasks can be shared with other functional networks, associations and organizations. In exploring such a new division of political labour I draw on older debates and designs of associative democracy and on recent discussions to democratize expertise and to expertise democracy in order to address urgent societal problems of high-risk decisions under conditions of extreme complexity, contingency, unpredictability and uncertainty and deep contestedness of our knowledge, problems that turn out to be unmanagable by party politics and representative democracy.
In section I I briefly summarize my earlier criticism of ‘critical recognition-theory’ of Axel Ho... more In section I I briefly summarize my earlier criticism of ‘critical recognition-theory’ of Axel Honneth and others presented as an all-embracing social theory of inequalities, struggles and movements on the one hand, and as a unified, superior normative theory on the other hand. In a descriptive and explanatory perspective ‘misrecognition’ (or individual and collective discrimination) is not an adequate roof-concept subsuming all other forms of structural inequalities such as exploitation, domination/oppression, exclusion and marginalization, and feeling mis-recognized is not the only or paramount motivational force for fighting injustices. In a normative perspective too, a principle of recognition cannot replace but only supplement tolerance, equal respect, equal opportunities etc. In addition, theories of positive recognition have to specify whom and what to recognize why and in which way? This I intent to clarify in section II by summarizing my earlier criticisms of those varieties of theories and politics of multiculturalism that argue for ‘politics of recognition’ of collective identities. In the final section, I extend my criticism of unreconstructed egalitarian individualists such as Brian Barry and of uncritical perfectionist collectivists and their praise of recognition of collective identities to problems of governance of religious diversity. Aggressive individualist secularists of all sorts hope to confine religions (old and new, majority or minority religions) to a strictly ‘private’ sphere as a matter of ‘individual conscience’ only. Critics of this ideology and politics of ‘secularism’ – which should not be confounded with but actually are incompatible with the basics or essentials of Liberal-Democratic Constitutionalism – often frame their claims in terms of ‘politics of recognition of religious identities’. I hope to show that a ‘full recognition of identity claims’ is not only a chimera but would end in totalitarian nightmares. It is also not needed to address religious inequalities and the inevitably collective dimensions of religious practices or cultures that require the recognition of constitutionally guaranteed external freedoms of religions, the collective autonomy (and maybe also funding) of religious associations and organizations, and effective constitutional guarantees of the full freedoms of political communication. Fighting against mis-recognition and formal or substantive unequal treatment of (minority) religions provides a more appropriate normative perspective
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