Complexity and deliberative democracy

Communism may be dead, but a quasi‐Marxist critique of liberal democracy survives in the writings of a number of thinkers ‐ most notably, David Miller and John Dryzek ‐ who deplore the self‐centered apathy of their fellow citizens and defend the radical ideal of deliberative democracy. Inspired mainly by Rousseau and Habermas, this emergent school of thought argues for a more participatory system where the public interest takes precedence over private interest, and where rational argument replaces cynical manipulation. The paper questions whether the deliberative model can cope with the incalculable complexity of modern society. Deliberative democracy, it is contended, rests on doubtful metaphysical assumptions, a blinkered approach to empirical evidence, and a common misapprehension about the nature of political argument.     

Asymmetric population axiology: deliberative neutrality delivered

Two related asymmetries have been discussed in relation to the ethics of creating new lives: First, we seem to have strong moral reason to avoid creating lives that are not worth living, but no moral reason to create lives that are worth living. Second, we seem to have strong moral reason to improve the wellbeing of existing lives, but, again, no moral reason to create lives that are worth living. Both asymmetries have proven very difficult to account for in any coherent moral framework. I propose an impersonal population axiology to underpin the asymmetries, which sidesteps the problematic issue of whether or not people can be harmed or benefited by creation or non-creation. This axiology yields perfect asymmetry from a deliberative perspective, in terms of expected value. The axiology also yields substantial asymmetry for large and realistic populations in terms of their actual value, beyond deliberative relevance.     

Africa and the prospects of deliberative democracy

Preoccupation with multiparty aggregative democracy in Africa has produced superficial forms of political/electoral choice-making by subjects that deepen pre-existing ethnic and primordial cleavages. This is because the principles of the multiparty system presuppose that decision-making through voting should be the result of a mere aggregation of pre-existing, fixed preferences. To this kind of decision-making, I propose deliberative democracy as a supplementary approach. My reason is that deliberation, beyond mere voting, should be central to decision- making and that, for a decision to be legitimate, it must be preceded by deliberation, not merely the aggregation of pre-existing fixed preferences. I agree with arguments that when adequate justifications are made for claims/demands/conclusions, deliber- ation has the potential to have a salutary effect on people's opinions, transform/ evolve preferences, better inform judgments/voting, lead to increasingly ‘common good’ decisions, have moral educative power, place more burden of account-giving on public officers, and furnish subjects/losers/outvoted with justifications for collec- tively binding decisions. I argue that a deliberative turn in politics in Africa will have a mitigating effect on tribal and money politics.     

Reflections on the Reflections

Pastoral Psychology -     

The effect of past behavior on variety seeking: Automatic and deliberative influences

Consumers often make multiple purchases of products to use over a period of time. In doing so, they sometimes choose their most preferred option for use on each occasion. In other cases, however, they are likely to distribute their choices over several alternatives. These decision strategies could be applied either deliberately or spontaneously without awareness of the factors that give rise to their application. Three studies examined the conditions in which these spontaneous and deliberative processes exert an influence on variety seeking.     

Populism and democracy: The challenge for deliberative democracy

Theorists of democracy have long grappled with the question of how to uphold the promise of popular government while restraining populist excesses. The deliberative conception of democracy proposes to do so by subjecting power to collective decision making through procedures of free and equal public deliberation. Critics of this idea often target its realizability. Though valid in theory, they claim, deliberative democracy is hopelessly utopian. The paper argues that, given a proper understanding of the deliberative approach and its underlying ideal of collective self‐government, this line of criticism is not very potent. However, another line of criticism, less pronounced in the contemporary debate, is more effective, questioning the very cogency of public discussion, even by a competent public, as a means of collective self‐government. Open public discussion is prone to various forms of manipulation and deception, which subvert rather than facilitate self‐government. Deliberative democracy's egalitarianism and populism therefore run counter to its deliberative aspiration, which underpins its ideal of democratic legitimacy.     

Fitting decisions: Mood and intuitive versus deliberative decision strategies

We investigated the influence of the compatibility between mood and decision strategies on the subjective value of a decision outcome. Several studies have provided evidence for the idea that a sad mood induces people to analyse information carefully, probably fitting well with a deliberative decision strategy. In a happy mood, people tend to act more strongly on their feelings, probably fitting well with an intuitive decision strategy. However, sometimes the situation demands the use of decision strategies that seem incompatible with mood states. We expected that decision makers would value a decision outcome higher in the case of a fit between mood and decision strategy than in the case of a non-fit. After a mood manipulation, participants were instructed to decide either based on their first affective reaction or after deliberation. Results confirmed our expectations: fitting decisions enhanced the subjective value of a decision outcome.     

The effects of mindset on behavior: self-regulation in deliberative and implemental frames of mind

The effects of deliberative and implemental mindsets--cognitive and motivational states associated with predecisional and postdecisional frames of mind, respectively--were examined in the context of the self-regulation of behavior. Participants who had been induced to deliberate the merits of participating in a specified task formulated more pessimistic expectations about this task than did participants who had been induced to imagine implementing a plan to complete the task. Moreover, participants in the deliberation condition underperformed relative to the participants in the implemental condition, demonstrating that deliberative and implemental thinking can influence behavior as well as cognition.     

Reflections on Supervision

The American Journal of Psychoanalysis - This paper explores basic tasks involved in the supervisory process, and frequent problems in carrying out these tasks. Basic tasks include clarification of...