Democracy is in trouble, and so is democracy research. In response, the Science of Democracy 2.0 lays out an ambitious agenda. While applauding this endeavour, Jonas Wolff explores a fundamental tension: can a radically pluralist approach to democracy research really be a tool to defend democracy?
A second wave of entries in The Loop's Science of Democracy series, inspired by a new book with UCL Press, stands out for an unusual combination of features. Its scope is astonishingly broad. And it is thought-provoking in manifold ways. It does not aim to answer questions, but to set a research agenda that is, simultaneously, a global political project concerned with the past, state and future of democracy.
There is much to praise and discuss about this second era of the discussion. I will briefly summarise what I see to be at stake and then focus on a critical tension I believe is particularly important for future debates on what Jean-Paul Gagnon and colleagues call the 'sciences of the democracies'.
The core idea of Science of Democracy 2.0 is to establish an inclusive, never-ending study of 'all things democratic' – past and present. Drawing on knowledge in individuals, groups of people, texts, non-textual media, and even non-human species, Gagnon and colleagues seek to catalogue myriad words and synonyms. Future theoreticians (Fourth Theorists, human or AI) could then generate new theories of democracy, as well as insights and options for democratising various spheres of life. A global council of democracy experts would assess the democraticity of the aforementioned.
The core idea of Science of Democracy 2.0 is to establish an inclusive, never-ending study of 'all things democratic' – past and present
The discussion has already raised questions. In the book, Matthew Flinders questions the 'positivist and technocratic' expectation that core criteria of democracy can emerge from data alone. Michael Saward and Michael Freeden echo this, emphasising that the idea to simply 'start with description' is misleading. Description, after all, must involve interpretation and evaluation. Flinders also critiques the elitist notion of a 'super-caste of "Fourth Theorists"' and the 'almost Orwellian' vision of a global democracy commission.
On the one hand, Science of Democracy 2.0 as laid out in the book seeks to foster an 'uncompromisingly pluralist', global debate about everything democratic, free from conceptual restrictions, normative biases and, in fact, 'political ideological and academic conventions'. Democracy, therefore, we should always understand as if in inverted commas.
On the other hand, the project also has an explicitly political mission: to 'combat authoritarianism', 'defend democracy in times of alarming democratic decline', 'end tyranny', and work with 'pro-democracy' actors, while showing 'no tolerance of the non-democracies'. In these latter formulations, the meaning of (non-)democracy seems entirely clear and undisputable.
The refusal to tolerate 'non-democratic' ideas is precisely the argument people use to justify the use of particular, clearly defined conceptions of, for example, liberal democracy
These positions are both understandable, but together they raise fundamental questions. The refusal to tolerate 'non-democratic' ideas is precisely the argument people use to justify the use of particular, clearly defined conceptions of (e.g., liberal) democracy, as I have argued elsewhere. How can a pluralist approach to the 'science of democracy' coexist with a strict line against all that is 'non-democratic'?
To reconcile these aims, Gagnon and colleagues suggest defining democracy not positively, but through negation. Democracy, then, excludes autocracy, which the book defines as 'absolute and unchallengeable rule' or as 'the rule of one person over all others'.
Yet, research on autocracies shows that such absolute rule rarely exists (see The Loop’s ♟️Autocracies with Adjectives series). As a consequence, the discussion at times goes much further than ruling out clear-cut autocracy; for instance, by dismissing 'illiberal' or 'despotic' democracy as signalling 'non-democratic regimes', rather than considering them legitimate subjects of democracy research, as Freeden suggests. This is certainly a valid position, but only if one adopts a specific conception of democracy.
The alternative, I suggest, is to take radical pluralism seriously. This, however, undermines the discussion’s 'pro-democratic' political agenda. It also raises an epistemological problem: how can data collection begin without at least a minimal definition to guide what counts as 'democratic'?
Until a global council of democracy experts exists (if it ever does), we must accept that this research will have to cast a very wide net. The research must capture almost all kinds of ideas and practices of political rule, or governance, that humans have discussed and/or tried in the history of (not only) humankind and that bear some resemblance to various understandings of collective self-rule.
Science of Democracy 2.0 lays out an ambitious and complex project. Its greatest potential, I believe, lies in its aim to pluralise, decentre, and decolonise the study and debate of democracy by collecting a wide range of democracy-related terms, concepts, experiences and ideas – however incomplete such a data archive will necessarily remain and however controversial and blurry its boundaries.
The Science of Democracy project aims to pluralise, decentre, and decolonise the study and debate of democracy by collecting a wide range of democracy-related terms, concepts, experiences and ideas
This effort may not serve as a straightforward tool to 'defend democracy' in any fixed or singular sense. And it should, I think, not be undermined by such a purpose. Still, in addition to opening the academic debate on democracy, it could well inspire sociopolitical forces by offering a broader range and repertoire of ideas, models and practices that we could see (but also dispute) as being democratic in one way or another.
Then, however, it will be these very sociopolitical forces that pick and choose those 'things democratic' they deem attractive and, in doing so, apply their own, necessarily particular criteria to them. In this sense, the project is inherently risky.
In principle, it cannot be protected against the misuse by forces that, with good reasons, might be considered non- or even anti-democratic. This radical openness is both the core promise and the greatest challenge of Science of Democracy 2.0. Democracy, after all, is what people make of it – isn’t it?
One of the more challenging aspects of this discussion has been that many are unhappy with the 'status quo' of democracy but wish to defend their notions of the 'democratic good' without opening avenues for tyrants, despots, and such. I think we're not well versed at speaking in this way and, without much effort, it's simple enough to gather evidence of so-called 'democrats of the status quo' acting like tyrants when proposals for democratic reform come to town. Major political parties are especially guilty of blocking any reforms that may risk them losing power.
Also, today is August 7, publication day! Here is the link to the free (ebook) version of The Sciences of the Democracies: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10211009/