Democracy and the extended republic: Reflections on the fishkinian project

Good Society

Volumn 19, Issue 1, 2010, Pages 63-67

  Levinson, Sanford ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN   (United States)

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EID: 78549295574     PISSN: 10890017     EISSN: 15389731     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1353/gso.0.0087     Document Type: Conference Paper

References (17)

1. http://www.america.gov/st/texttrans-english/2009/April/ 20090403140808xjsnommis8.250064e-02.html?CP.rss=true
2. http://www.america.gov/st/texttrans-english/2009/April/ 20090403140808xjsnommis8.250064e-02.html?CP.rss=true
3. James S. Fishkin, When the People Speak: Deliberative Democracy and Public Consultation (Oxford University Press, 2009), 179.
4. James S. Fishkin, When the People Speak: Deliberative Democracy and Public Consultation (Oxford University Press, 2009), 179.
5. I would personally prefer the term "deliberative assemblies", but, as we shall see toward the end of this essay, whether one uses the term "poll" or "assembly" may depend on the extent to which one wishes simply to aid, or supplant, representative government.
6. And some, of course, have taken part in revolutionary movements.
7. See Avashai Margalit, On Compromise and Rotten Compromise (Princeton University Press, 2009).
8. See, e.g., Sanford Levinson, Our Undemocratic Constitution: Where The Constitution Goes Wrong (and How We The People Can Correct It) (Oxford University Press, pb. ed. 2008). The book is the subject of a PEGS symposium, available at http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/good-society/toc/gso.18.1.html.
9. One of the many sites at which Federalist 10 is available is http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa10.htm.
10. Fishkin, 48.
11. Fishkin, 48.
12. For a debate on the implication of such realities, see Ilya Somin & Sanford Levinson, Debate, "Democracy, Political Ignorance, and Constitutional Reform", 157 U. PA. L. Rev. Pennumbra 239-59 (2009), http://www.pennumbra.com/debates/pdfs/ConstitutionalReform.pdf.
13. Fishkin, 191.
14. Fishkin, 196.
15. Though one should recognize that the exclusion of the polity to "citizens" is itself subject to debate. See Sanford Levinson, "Suffrage and Community: Who Should Vote?" 41 University of Florida Law Review 545(1989).
16. Putting to one side, of course, the fact that there are no "national elections" in the United States.
17. For Madison's views on the necessity of "veneration" and the concomitant skepticism about the kind of questioning that might produce new amendments, see Federalist 49, available at http://www.constitution.org/fed/ federa49.htm.