Are Citizens Mere Spectators? Reflecting on the Effects of Democratic Innovations

The idea of citizens being spectators in political life is often associated to a passive and uncritical citizenry incapable of teeming power play by self-interested elites. From an empirical and theoretical standpoint this negative view of citizens as mere spectators has its merits. Indeed, from this approach has led to theoretical and practical efforts towards empowered inclusion (e.g Barber, 2003). However, the skeptical view, has also been used to undermining representative institutions, intermediary bodies (see Kriesi, 2014) and democratic innovations. We take issue with the skeptical approach and we propose a more exhaustive view of spectatorship, of its strengths and weaknesses in a democracy. We argue, that the skeptical view overlooks the fact that spectatorship can also be positive in two related ways. First, besides uninformed, cynical and disrespectful forms of spectatorship, our democracies can also host positive forms of spectatorship in the citizenry, which is informed, confident and tolerant. Second, fostering the latter type of spectatorship over the former is vital to the life of a democratic political system, particularly so in those contexts where citizens might lack authority and knowledge to make binding decisions. How do we foster positive spectatorship in the citizenry? To answer this question we draw for from a case study: a nation-level deliberative processes commissioned by the Belgian Ministry of Health in view of an updated of the legislation on the use of citizens’ genetic data. We use survey data, direct observation and interviews. At the micro-level we show what aspects of the process allowed for the development of positive spectatorship among participants. At the macro-level we investigates how the positive spectatorship that emerged was connected to the broader political system. We discuss our findings in light of debates on deliberative systems. In particular, we side with scholarship highlighting the importance of the discursive effects of mini-publics (Niemeyer, 2014). However, our investigation suggests that, although mini-publics might foster positive spectatorship at the micro-level, there are major obstacles curtailing their ability to spread positive spectatorship across the system. The features enabling positive spectatorship to emerge in mini-publics should be integrated in existing intermediary bodies and representative institutions in order to generate substantial levels of positive spectatorship in democratic systems. In the first part of the paper we introduce the idea of citizens as spectators. We then discuss the ways in which the skeptical view of spectatorship has prevented the development of a more balanced account of spectatorship in a democracy. In the second part, we argue a positive form of spectatorship exists that is also beneficial to democratic life. In the third part, we first introduce our case study. Following, we show how positive spectatorship was generated among participants and then connected to the wider political system. Before concluding, we engage with recent literature on deliberative systems and suggest ways to build positive forms of spectatorship. Creating channels for direct democracy remains crucial to democracy. Yet, fostering positive spectatorship is crucial in order to address the growing malaise with democracy and its institutions.