Integration of deliberative democracy and policy-making: A vision of a deliberative system

Abstract

The paper examines major propositions of deliberative democratic theory, divided into problems of inclusion, deliberation and citizenship and their parallel articulation, as well as empirical examination and specification, in literature on post-empiricist policy-making. The theory of deliberative democracy and literature on deliberative policy-making have raised similar concerns and made parallel proposals about possible remedies of ills of contemporary democracy i.e. policy-making, specifically concerning broader inclusion in democratic and policy-making practices, deliberative consideration of issues in both policy-making and democratic politics and enhanced civic skills of democratic participants i.e. policy-takers. Authors in both sets of literature reach a similar conclusion about incorpora­tion of democratic i.e. policy-making deliberative efforts into institutions of liberal democracy so as to create a larger ‘deliberative system’ of interconnected chains of communication and legitimacy.

Keywords

• Deliberative democracy
• post-empiricist policy-making
• inclusion
• deliberation
• citizenship