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Improving deliberative participation: connecting mini-publics to deliberative systems

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 April 2015

Andrea Felicetti ,
Simon Niemeyer  and
Nicole Curato
Andrea Felicetti*
Affiliation:
CeRIES, University of Lille 3, Villeneuve d’Ascq, France
Simon Niemeyer
Affiliation:
Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance, Institute for Governance and Policy Analysis, University of Canberra, Canberra, Australia Department of Government, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
Nicole Curato
Affiliation:
Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance, Institute for Governance and Policy Analysis, University of Canberra, Canberra, Australia
*
*E-mail: andrea.felicetti@univ-lille3.fr
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Abstract

This article argues for the assessment of deliberative mini-publics as a dynamic part of a wider deliberative system. The approach draws primarily on Dryzek’s (2009) deliberative capacity building framework, which describes the democratic process as ideally involving authentic deliberation, inclusiveness in the deliberative process, and consequentiality or deliberation’s influence on decisions as well as positive impact on the system. This approach is illustrated using the comparative assessment of two mini-public case studies: the Australian Citizens’ Parliament and Italy’s Iniziativa di Revisione Civica (Civic Revision Initiative). The application of deliberative capacity as a standard for evaluating mini-publics in systemic terms reveals differences between the cases. The deliberative capacity of both cases overlap, but they do so for different reasons that stem from the interconnections between their specific designs and other components of the deliberative system.

Keywords

deliberative democracydeliberative capacitydeliberative systemmini-publics
Type
Research Article
Information
European Political Science Review , Volume 8 , Issue 3 , August 2016 , pp. 427 - 448
Copyright
© European Consortium for Political Research 2015 

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