Empowering Affected Interests

Many demands for democratic inclusion rest on a simple yet powerful idea. It’s a principle of affected interests. The principle states that all those affected by a collective decision should have a say in making that decision. Yet, in today’s highly globalized world, the implications of this “All-Affected Principle” are potentially radical and far-reaching. Empowering Affected Interests brings together a distinguished group of leading democratic theorists and philosophers to debate whether and how to rewrite the rules of democracy to account for the increasing interdependence of states, markets, and peoples. It examines the grounds that justify democratic inclusion across borders of states, localities, and the private sector, on topics ranging from immigration and climate change to labor markets and philanthropy. The result is an original and important reassessment of the All-Affected Principle and its alternatives that advances our understanding of the theory and practice of democracy. This title is available for Open Access on Cambridge Core.

Archon Fung is the Winthrop Laflin McCormack Professor of Citizenship and Self-Government and directs the Roy and Lila Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University.

Sean W. D. Gray is Assistant Professor of Political Science at Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada.