510393 - CONTEMPORARY DEMOCRATIC THEORY

The course introduces students to fundamental debates in contemporary political philosophy surrounding the nature and justification of democracy. The course is taught exclusively in English, and is open both to Pavia-based students and to international exchange students.
The course is divided into three parts treating (i) foundational values, (ii) theories of democratic legitimacy, and (iii) specific challenges for democracies.
In the first part of the course, we will focus on two grounding values of democracy: freedom and equality. We will investigate the meanings of these ideals, and ask in what way they might ground democracy. In the case of freedom, we will consider justifications of democracy based on the idea of freedom as non-interference, and rival justifications based on the ideas of self-determination and non-domination. In the case of equality, we will focus on the differences between distributive and relational equality, and on the foundational problem of ‘basic equality’. In what sense should citizens be thought to have an equal moral status, such that they ought to enjoy equal political rights rather than unequal ones? What goods (voting power, basic liberties, access to certain resources, and so on), need to be equalized among citizens in order for a society to qualify as democratic?
In the second part of the course, we will apply some of the above reasoning to the task of examining, and assessing, different theories of democratic legitimacy. In particular, we will compare procedural and outcome-oriented accounts of the validity of democratic decisions. Does democratic legitimacy depend on the fact of democratic decision-making having intrinsic value? This idea might be defended by reference to values that are inherent in democratic procedures (for example, there might be something inherently fair about making democratic decisions on matters on which people disagree). Or does democratic legitimacy depend on the goals that might be achieved through democratic decision-making, and in this sense on its instrumental value? Such goals might include maximizing the probability of reaching the “correct” collective decisions, assuring peaceful coexistence, promoting economic welfare, or robustly protecting liberal rights.
In the third and final part of the course we will consider some of the specific theoretical challenges faced by contemporary democracies. This part of the course is likely to cover at least the following issues: how to deal with dissent and conflict through democratic processes; the pros and cons of different electoral systems; criteria for defining the demos (including the so-called “boundary problem”); the status of non-voters (e,g children; animal; future generations); the proposal to lower the voting age and/or disenfranchise the elderly; the ethics of voting (whether citizens have a moral duty to vote, or to abstain if they are not well informed).