Epistemic Democracy And Political Legitimacy

This compelling new book explores whether the ability of democratic procedures to produce correct outcomes increases the legitimacy of such political decisions. Mapping and critically engaging with the main theories of epistemic democracy, it additionally evaluates arguments for different democratic decision-making procedures related to aggregative and deliberative democracy. Addressing both positions that are too epistemic, such as Epistrocracy and Scholocracy, as well as those that are not epistemic enough, such as Pure Epistemic Proceduralism and Pragmatist Deliberative Democracy, Cerovac builds an innovative structure that can be used to bring order to numerous accounts of epistemic democracy. Introducing an appropriate account of epistemic democracy, Cerovac proceeds to analyse whether such epistemic value is better achieved through aggregative or deliberative procedures. Drawing particularly on the work of David Estlund, and including a discussion on the implementation of the epistemic ideal to real world politics, this is a fascinating read for all those interested in democratic decision-making.

This book offers a systematic treatment of the requirements of democratic legitimacy. It argues that democratic procedures are essential for political legitimacy because of the need to respect value pluralism and because of the learning process that democratic decision-making enables. It proposes a framework for distinguishing among the different ways in which the requirements of democratic legitimacy have been interpreted. Peter then uses this framework to identify and defend what appears as the most plausible conception of democratic legitimacy. According to this conception, democratic legitimacy requires that the decision-making process satisfies certain conditions of political and epistemic fairness.

This book offers a systematic treatment of the requirements of democratic legitimacy. It argues that democratic procedures are essential for political legitimacy because of the need to respect value pluralism and because of the learning process that democratic decision-making enables. It proposes a framework for distinguishing among the different ways in which the requirements of democratic legitimacy have been interpreted. Peter then uses this framework to identify and defend what appears as the most plausible conception of democratic legitimacy. According to this conception, democratic legitimacy requires that the decision-making process satisfies certain conditions of political and epistemic fairness.

The book explores the latest debates in the field of social epistemology, concerning epistemic justification of democracy. On the one side, we find those who support a standard approach, assuming that democratic legitimacy must be grounded on the production of epistemically high-quality decisions (true, truth-sensitive, truth-conductive, correct, justified, rational, epistemically responsible and so on). On the other side, there are those who don’t deem epistemic justification as either necessary or conducive to democratic legitimacy, and those who accept the necessity of the epistemic justification of democracy while rejecting its reduction to the production of true or justified decisions. Fundamentally, this range of positions is highly influenced by their respective stances regarding the status of experts within the democratic decision-making process. This book offers both a unique perspective on this debate and registers the challenge of a new discipline of applied, ‘real world’ epistemology.

Political decisions have the potential to greatly impact our lives. Think of decisions in relation to abortion or climate change, for example. This makes political legitimacy an important normative concern. But what makes political decisions legitimate? Are they legitimate in virtue of having support from the citizens? Democratic conceptions of political legitimacy answer in the affirmative. Such conceptions rightly highlight that legitimate political decision-making must be sensitive to disagreements among the citizens. But what if democratic decisions fail to track what there is most reason to do? What if a democratically elected government fails to take measures necessary to protect its population from threats related to climate change? Peter argues that the legitimacy of political decisions doesn't just depend on respect for the citizens' will; and defends a novel hybrid conception of political legitimacy, called the Epistemic Accountability conception. According to this conception, political legitimacy also depends on how political decision-making responds to evidence for what there is most reason to do. The Grounds of Political Legitimacy starts with an overview of the main ways in which philosophers have thought about political legitimacy, and identifies the epistemic accountability conception as an overlooked alternative. It then develops the epistemic accountability conception of political legitimacy and discusses its implications for legitimate political decision-making. Considering the norms that should govern political debate, it examines the role of experts in politics, and probes the responsibilities of democratically elected political leaders and as well as of citizens.

This book characterizes Mill as a political instrumentalist and an epistemic democrat, analyzing the epistemic arguments he uses to support his political proposals. Exploring his endeavor to resolve the conflict between political and epistemic values, it sets the epistemic criteria as a basis for unifying Mill's political thought.

The chapters in this book deal with different, though related, topics concerning the tense relationship between democracy and diversity. On the one hand, social diversity represents an opportunity, widening the horizon of social options and perspectives of innovation, but, on the other hand, it creates problems for the social cohesion and peaceful coexistence of many groups, be they majority or minority. The chapters depart from the intrinsic connection between democracy and diversity – and the unavoidable challenges that pluralism poses to decision-making procedures – investigating, from different perspectives, how the normative requirement of fully respecting agents’ reflexive agency impacts the revision of democratic decision-making procedures and the way in which institutions react to citizens’ justice-based claims. All the contributions share the theoretical insight that diversity is one of the raisons d’être of democracy, and, still, all acknowledge that the fact of pluralism poses challenges to the legitimacy of democratic procedures of decision-making. Indeed, if citizens had the same values and preferences, collective decisions would be easily achieved and the institution of democratic procedures would be redundant. Yet the wide pluralism of doctrines, habits, social standards, and conceptions of the goods typical of contemporary societies has often led citizens to challenge the legitimacy of democratic decisions because these choices do not fit their preferences or values. To address these challenges following recent accounts of democratic decision-making, in this volume, different strategies are introduced, defended, and criticized in order to outline a perspective that is able to guide actual decision-making processes (guidance), define standards that everyone has equal opportunity to fulfil (inclusion), and grant that citizens exercise their reflexive control on the whole democratic system (reflexivity). The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of the Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy.

Experts and Democratic Legitimacy challenges the technocratic reading of expert bodies, such as central banks, advisory committees and regulatory agencies. Expert contributors ask in what way expert bodies are subject to some of the key pressures in contemporary governance, such as democratisation, politicisation and expertisation. Based on empirical studies, the book traces the multiple social ties of expert bodies and refines the common perception of expert bodies as ‘de-politicised’ institutions that are detached from political interference and societal input. It further theorises the tension and reconcilability between reliable, independent expert knowledge on the one hand and the need for accountability and legitimacy in modern policy-making on the other hand. Refining the detached, de-politicised image of non-majoritarian institutions, Experts and Democratic Legitimacy will be of great interest to scholars of European studies, political and social theory, modern governance and policy-making. This book was originally published as a special issue of European Politics and Society.