Democratic reason : politics, collective intelligence, and the rule of the many / Helene Landemore.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Landemore, Hélène, 1976-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Democracy.

Democracy--Philosophy.

Majorities.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (304 p.)

Edition:

Core Textbook

Place of Publication:

Princeton, N.J. : Princeton University Press, c2013.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Individual decision making can often be wrong due to misinformation, impulses, or biases. Collective decision making, on the other hand, can be surprisingly accurate. In Democratic Reason, Hélène Landemore demonstrates that the very factors behind the superiority of collective decision making add up to a strong case for democracy. She shows that the processes and procedures of democratic decision making form a cognitive system that ensures that decisions taken by the many are more likely to be right than decisions taken by the few. Democracy as a form of government is therefore valuable not only because it is legitimate and just, but also because it is smart. Landemore considers how the argument plays out with respect to two main mechanisms of democratic politics: inclusive deliberation and majority rule. In deliberative settings, the truth-tracking properties of deliberation are enhanced more by inclusiveness than by individual competence. Landemore explores this idea in the contexts of representative democracy and the selection of representatives. She also discusses several models for the "wisdom of crowds" channeled by majority rule, examining the trade-offs between inclusiveness and individual competence in voting. When inclusive deliberation and majority rule are combined, they beat less inclusive methods, in which one person or a small group decide. Democratic Reason thus establishes the superiority of democracy as a way of making decisions for the common good.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

Acknowledgments

Prologue

Chapter One: The Maze and the Masses

Chapter Two: Democracy as the Rule

Chapter Three: A Selective Genealogy of the Epistemic Argument for Democracy

Chapter Four: First Mechanism of Democratic Reason: Inclusive Deliberation

Chapter Five: Epistemic Failures of Deliberation

Chapter Six: Second Mechanism of Democratic Reason: Majority Rule

Chapter Seven: Epistemic Failures of Majority Rule: Real and Imagined

Chapter Eight: Political Cognitivism: A Defense

Conclusion: Democracy as a Gamble Worth Taking

Bibliography

Index

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 08. Jul 2019)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9781283864121

1283864126

9781400845538

140084553X

OCLC:

824698850