This dissertation addresses a debate about the proper relationship between democratic theory and institutions. The debate has been waged between two rival approaches: on the one side is an aggregative and economic theory of democracy, known as constitutional economics, and on the other side is deliberative democracy. The two sides endorse starkly different positions on the issue of what makes a democracy legitimate and stable within an institutional setting. Constitutional economists model political agents in the same way that neoclassical economists (...) model economic agents, that is, as self-regarding, rational maximizers; so that evaluations of democratic legitimacy and stability depend on the extent to which the design of institutional rules and practices maximize individual utility by promoting efficient schemes of collective choice. Deliberative democrats, on the other hand, understand political agents as communicative reason-giving subjects who justify their preferences and positions on issues that jointly affect them in a process of consensus-directed discourse, or deliberation; so that evaluations of democratic legitimacy and order depend on the degree to which institutional norms and practices promote deliberation and draw upon deliberated public judgment. I argue that despite the numerous incompatibilities between constitutional economics and deliberative democracy—which amount to a 'deep divide'—an opportunity to produce a genuine synthesis of the two approaches arises inasmuch as it is possible to overcome several points of opposition in their separate research programmes. The central thesis of the dissertation is that it is possible to construct a bridge spanning the divide between constitutional economists and deliberative democrats, and that Dewey and Bentley's transactional view can facilitate this bridge-building project. Pursuant to this end, the points of opposition between the v research programmes are mediated by way of five concepts which, on balance, favor deliberative democracy and its feasible institutionalization. (shrink)

The deliberative model of democracy, as presented by Jürgen Habermas and others, claims to reconstruct the normative content of the idea of democracy. However, since it overemphasises the epistemic facet of decision‐making, the model is unable to take into account other valuable aspects of democracy. This is shown in reference to two concrete phenomena from political reality: majority voting and the problem of the dissenter. In each case, the deliberative model inevitably fails to account for several normatively desirable features of (...) democracy, such as formal political equality and proper respect for the judgement of each citizen. (shrink)

E l conflict o entr e l a democraci a a g r e gat iva (basad a e n e l v alo r igualitari o d e l a r e gla d e l a m a y oría ) y l a deliberat iva (centrad a e n l a fuerz a epistémic a de l mejo r a r gumento) constitu ye un a d e la s principale s tensione s d e l a (...) teorí a contemporáne a d e l a democracia. Est e trabaj o sostien e qu e quiene s dibuja n dich o conflict o l o hace n a pa r ti r d e un a visión e xces iv ament e optimist a de l v alo r mora l d e l a primer a y demasiad o pesimist a de l carácte r no igualitari o d e l a s e gunda . N i l a con e xió n d e l a r e gl a d e l a m a y orí a co n l a igualda d política sería n ta n fue r t e y e xclus iv a , n i l a deliberació n u n proces o controla b l e únicament e po r la búsqued a objet iva d e solucione s política s co r recta s y n o tambié n po r e xigencia s d e justicia procedimental . N o obstante , aunqu e co n una s proporcione s mucho s meno s e xagerada s a la sugeridas , e xistirí a entr e ambo s procedimiento s u n cie r t o g rad o d e incompatibilida d que podría , s i n o superars e po r completo , s í relajars e d e admiti r qu e cualquie r justi f icació n de u n procedimient o d e tom a d e decisione s n o pued e desa r rollars e d e fo r m a completamente abstracta , sin o qu e h a d e ajustars e a l cont e xto. (shrink)