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7 - Self-Government

from Part I - Values

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 March 2025

Richard Bellamy
Affiliation:
University College London
Jeff King
Affiliation:
University College London
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Summary

The political idea of self-government has a natural elaboration, which is that a society is self-governing when it is ruled by the will of the people of that society. A variety of attempts to vindicate popular will conceptions of self-government exist but I argue that they are fatally flawed. In its place, we need a conception of self-government that is deflationary (that is does not rely on the existence of a popular will) but nevertheless quite demanding. I discuss some deflationary accounts of self-government and I argue for an account that emphasizes an egalitarian collective decision-making process but that also recognizes the importance of outcomes. I argue that attention to the conditions necessary to the achievement of self-government of an egalitarian sort is essential to how we are to think of the proper aims of constitutional institutions. We need to attend to how information is disseminated to citizens and how citizens can have the sophistication necessary to understand information. An egalitarian conception of self-government can show how the constitution of a society should be structured so as to achieve equality in these two dimensions of the information system.

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Chapter
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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2025

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References

Recommended Reading

Anderson, E. (2006). The Epistemology of Democracy. Episteme: A Journal of Social Epistemology, 3 (1–2), 822.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Christiano, T. (2008). The Constitution of Equality: Democratic Authority and Its Limits, Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cohen, J. (2009). Philosophy, Politics, Democracy: Selected Essays, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Downs, A. (1957). An Economic Theory of Democracy, New York: Harper Books.Google Scholar
Estlund, D. (2008). Democratic Authority, Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Hardin, R. (2000). Constitutionalism, Liberalism and Democracy, Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Locke, J. (1988). Second Treatise on Civil Government. In Two Treatises on Government. Edited by Laslett, P.. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mill, J. S. (1991). Considerations on Representative Government, Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books.Google Scholar
Pettit, P. (2012). Republicanism: A Theory of Freedom and Government, Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Riker, W. H. (1982). Liberalism Against Populism: A Confrontation Between the Theory of Democracy and the Theory of Social Choice, San Francisco: Waveland Press.Google Scholar
Rousseau, J.-J. (1973). The Social Contract. Translated by G. D. H. Cole. London: J. M. Dent & Sons.Google Scholar
Schumpeter, J. (1958). Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, New York: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Somin, I. (2014). Democracy and Political Ignorance: Why Smaller Government is Smarter, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Waldron, J. (1999). Law and Disagreement, Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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