This book is explicitly modernist at a time when many scholars have either forgotten the emancipatory promise of the Enlightenment or railed against it in the name of postmodernism. The book, broadly, adopts a hybrid epistemology that utilises the critical insights of Geisteswissenschaften Tradition (Weberian ‘Ideal-Type Analysis’) and the Habermas (1988) notions of the ‘public sphere’ and deliberative/dialogic democracy (‘ideal speech’) to advance a general proposition of democratic renewal by way of cyberdemocracy. Curiously, as democracy spreads across the world in the age of globalisation, it has also been accompanied by increased discontent with democratic systems. To that end, this book is not overly concerned with saving democracy beyond the liberal representative model, rather the focus is on how modern representative democracy has failed and how cyberdemocracy might function as a more effective model that truly represents the people by broadening participation and reflexive deliberation.
Author(s): Harem Karem
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Year: 2023
Language: English
Pages: 232
City: Cham
Contents
1: Introduction
Bibliography
2: Democracy with an ‘E’
Introduction
Democracy: A Brief History
Modern Democracy
Current Issues Facing Democracy
Making a Path for Cyberdemocracy
The Rise of the Platform Society
Bibliography
3: The Enlightenment and Beyond
Introduction
The Enlightenment
Enlightenment Rationalism and the Rise of Capitalism
Questions of Subjectivity in the Enlightenment and Beyond
Questions of Representation in the Enlightenment and Beyond
Bibliography
4: Representative Democracy and Crisis
The Decline of Representative Democracy
Modern Democracy and Its Shortcomings: A Survey of Data and Recent Scholarship
Globalism, Populism, Representative Democracy, and Government
The Decline of the Nation-State (Die postnationale Konstellation)
Bibliography
5: The Public Sphere and Global Capital
Deliberation
Reconsideration of the Public Sphere (Institutions of Democracy)
Legitimation Crisis: Declining Confidence in Institutions and Leadership
Neoliberalism: Against Democracy and Equality
Cyberdemocracy: Addressing the Institutional and Political Vacuum Created by Neoliberalism
Bibliography
6: Deliberative Democracy
The Imminent Decline of Representative Democracy: Myth or Reality?
Can Representative Democracy Be Participatory and Deliberative?
Liquid Democracy and the Global Village
Bibliography
7: Theorising the Cyberdemocratic Terrain
Is Deliberative Mass Participation in the Political Sphere Possible Under Capitalism?
Democracy Transformed: Cyberdemocracy as the Fourth Democratic Transformation
Barriers to Cyberdemocracy
Technological Determinism: Crisis of Legitimation and Cyberdemocracy
Transforming the Ecology of Mobilisations (Extremism, Populism, Post-Truth)
Bibliography
8: Civic Engagement and the Privatisation of the Public Sphere
The Geisteswissenschaften Tradition: Free Will and Political Agency
Revitalising Civic Engagement Through Cyberdemocracy
Privatisation of the Public Sphere and the Platform Society
Bibliography
9: The Westminster Model: Points and Issues
Accountability and Transparency (Ethical Standards)
Free and Fair Flow of Information
Justice (The Rule of Law)
Merit-Based Competitions
Bibliography
10: Cyberdemocracy and the Public Sphere
John Rawls’s Theory of Justice and the Veiled Ignorance Thought Experiment
Freedom and Fairness for All
Collective, Direct Decision-Making (Inclusivity)
Frequent Citizens’ Consultation (Civil Discourse)
The Public Sphere
Empowering Citizen Participation
Bibliography
11: The Cyberdemocratic Future: Some Final Thoughts
Conclusion
Bibliography
Bibliography
Index
