This paper aims at a critical re-evaluation of deliberative democracy which has become in recent years one of the alternatives to both mainstream political theory and practice. My purpose is to undermine the emancipatory potential of the concept while retaining some of its key elements. Therefore the paper is divided into two parts. In the first, deconstructive part I argue that deliberative democracy is an ambiguous and to large extent dubious project and as such, in its current form should be eventually abandoned. Not only does it fall short of the promises of a truly revolutionary political ideal, it also legitimizes certain set of practices which are at worst hostile and at best inconsistent with democratic government/governance and citizen participation. In the second, reconstructive part I work out a possible solution to the shortcomings of deliberative democracy. My intention is to propose a concept of democratic theory built upon a notion of public dialogue rather than public deliberation – the latter being only a part of the former. In dialogue there are no predetermined ways of expression (like rational argument) or expected goals (like consensus) though, presumably they play some role in the entire framework. Free flow and exchange of preferences, and not their substantial change, becomes the source of individual and collective action. What sustains dialogue is the basic, deeply-rooted need to be part of an open-ended process oriented towards developing a mutual understanding of One Another. In turn this process creates opportunities for emergence of a shared interest. Carried out in public, trans-personal space dialogue becomes essentially political because people cannot form a society and state without means of inter-personal communication by which they can express their intra-personal satisfaction/support or discontent/distrust. Ultimately this multi-layered socially-embedded process must result in a radical exchange of all possessed and various resources, bringing about a genuine transformation of social conditions in the long-run.
