Scaling Up Deliberation: From Mini-Ppublics to Deliberative Democracy

Abstract

So far the greatest practical democratic innovation associated with deliberative democracy involves a multitude of small-scale formal deliberative events. The advent of so-called ‘minipublics’ has helped to demonstrate the deliberative capacities of citizens and the promise of deliberative democracy. However the prospect of translating this promise into a flourishing public sphere remains relatively distant. The operation of minipublics has been mostly positive, providing an important touchstone for deliberative democracy. But, apart from exceptional cases they have thus far had relatively little wider impact. And where they have had an impact on policy, they have tended not impact the public sphere. Combined with assertions about the difficulties in scaling up deliberation, this has led to something of a retreat from the pursuit of deliberative democracy as a public-sphere-wide enterprise. This panel seeks to challenge this retreat by exploring mechanisms whereby the ideal forms of deliberation achieved in minipublics might be ‘scaled-up’ into the public sphere. It will draw on empirical evidence from minipublics to develop an understanding the main impact of minipublic forums and clues as which features can be replicated more widely in the public sphere. Different mechanisms will be explored, ranging from those that address the features of the public sphere that contribute to non-deliberative outcomes to those that enhance deliberative capacity. As well as empirical and theoretical findings, practical limitations, such as resource constraints (time, knowledge) are taken into account as part of the development of approaches to scaling up deliberation.

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