Deliberative democracy has become the
central reference point for democracy theorists over the last decade or so,
influencing normative frameworks and the ways we conceptualize the workings of
democratic societies. It has also been linked with a burst of experimentation
with new procedures that involve citizens directly in deliberations about public
policy.But there is a contradiction at the heart of deliberative democracy: it
seems that it cannot deliver legitimate agreements. Deliberative decisions are
said to be legitimate when all those subject to them take part in free and equal
debate, but in complex societies that can never happen. Few people can
deliberate together at any one time, certainly not in any strict sense, so how
can the results of a deliberative event be legitimate for non-participants? And
why would people with passionatelyheld views sit down and deliberate when there
seems little advantage in them doing so?This book explores these problems in
theory and practice, searching for a solution that does not merely dismiss a
strict understanding of deliberative democratic criteria. It reconsiders the
theory of legitimacy and deliberative democracy, but goes further by examining
cases of deliberation on health policy in the United Kingdom to see what
problems emerge in practice, and how real political actors deal with them. The
result is a complete rethink of the institutional limits and possibilities
ofdeliberative democracy, one which abandons the search for perfection in any
one institution, and looks instead to the concept of a multifaceted deliberative
system
