In our name : the ethics of democracy / Eric Beerbohm.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Beerbohm, Eric Anthony, 1975-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Democracy--Moral and ethical aspects.

Democracy.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (367 p.)

Edition:

Course Book

Place of Publication:

Princeton, N.J. : Princeton University Press, 2012.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

When a government in a democracy acts in our name, are we, as citizens, responsible for those acts? What if the government commits a moral crime? The protestor's slogan--"Not in our name!"--testifies to the need to separate ourselves from the wrongs of our leaders. Yet the idea that individual citizens might bear a special responsibility for political wrongdoing is deeply puzzling for ordinary morality and leading theories of democracy. In Our Name explains how citizens may be morally exposed to the failures of their representatives and state institutions, and how complicity is the professional hazard of democratic citizenship. Confronting the ethical challenges that citizens are faced with in a self-governing democracy, Eric Beerbohm proposes institutional remedies for dealing with them. Beerbohm questions prevailing theories of democracy for failing to account for our dual position as both citizens and subjects. Showing that the obligation to participate in the democratic process is even greater when we risk serving as accomplices to wrongdoing, Beerbohm argues for a distinctive division of labor between citizens and their representatives that charges lawmakers with the responsibility of incorporating their constituents' moral principles into their reasoning about policy. Grappling with the practical issues of democratic decision making, In Our Name engages with political science, law, and psychology to envision mechanisms for citizens seeking to avoid democratic complicity.

Contents:

Preface

Introduction

How to value democracy

Paper stones, the ethics of participation

Philosophers-citizens

Superdeliberators

What is it like to be a citizen?

Democracy's ethics of belief

The division of democratic labor

Representing principles

Democratic complicity

Not in my name, macrodemocratic design.

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9786613589354

9781280494123

1280494123

9781400842384

1400842387

OCLC:

793207530