The Activities of Citizens. Towards an agonistic re-conceptualisation of citizenship.

T

HE

A

CTIVITIES OF

C

ITIZENS

Towards an Agonistic Re-Conceptualisation of Citizenship

by

Sophie van Balen

22 June 2015

“Practicing criticism, or, is it really important to think?”

~ Michel Foucault

Foucault (1981) interview by Didier Eribon, May 30-31, p. 155 2_{Brown (2010)}

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION p. 5

Chapter 1

THE DEMOCRATIC DEFICIT OF CITIZEN PASSIVITY p. 10

Liberal democracy p. 11

The deliberative turn p. 14

Neoliberal Governmentality p. 22

Deliberative ideals in a neoliberal context p. 25

Chapter 2

POLITICAL IDENTIFICATION IN AGONISTIC THEORY p. 28

Political games p. 30

Participatory agency p. 34

Adversarial agency p. 38

Playful agency p. 43

Chapter 3

POST-FOUNDATIONALISM AND INSTITUTIONALISING

AGONISTIC DEMOCRACY p. 45

Contingent foundations p. 46

Agonisms of plurality p. 50

Tools for institutionalisation p. 55

Chapter 4

TWO DIMENSIONS TO THE AGONISTIC RE-CONCEPTUALISATION

OF CITIZENSHIP p.58

Conflictual self-identification p. 59

Critical participation p. 65

Towards plurality and inclusivity p. 68

CONCLUSION p. 70

INTRODUCTION

Democratic theory suggests that the dèmos is required to participate and self-legislate in democratic procedures for the elected government to be legitimised, but in the age of near-global democracy the substantive meaning of democratic procedures may have become unclear2_{. From the many procedures, concepts, practices and structures that are}

in need of a renewed substantive conceptualisation, in this thesis I will focus on the meaning of citizenship within democracy. More specifically, I will attempt to strengthen the meaning of citizenship within the predominant democratic structure by considering some agonistic conceptualisations. The reason for focusing on citizenship is manifold. The story of whistle-blower Edward Snowden has unleashed (and possibly in a way resulted from) the debate on transparency in democracies3_{. As a result we have started}

asking ourselves to what extent citizens need to have a say in such matters, to what extend they need to at least know of practices that affect themselves so much. In many ways the possibilities for contributing to the public (political) debate have extended. Modern media such as the internet have increased transparency and moreover the possibilities for contributing indirectly and informally to the public and political debate. It is deemed important - at the very least in political philosophy - for citizens to have a say, to self-legislate and with that aim many areas of political, social and economic life have undergone transformations that should nourish this. However, there seems to be a difference between opening up ways for participation and expecting or demanding certain kinds of participation. In the Netherlands the discussion on the responsibilities of citizens towards the state, towards one another and towards one’s personal situation intensified due to budget cuts in many social security systems4_{. The idea presented by}

the government was that citizens should participate more in collective matters such as (health)care, but the question is, can the government expect citizens to participate in this manner?

This question is interesting because the debate on the passivity of citizens and their disinterestedness in politics simultaneously has guided the practices of political parties and political or social actors such as trade unions. Even governments themselves addressed the issue, understanding its problematic nature. To take a fairly random example, the Australian government acknowledges that citizen passivity is problematic

3 _{It also vehemently unleashed the debate on privacy, but that is a separate matter.}

4 _{The ‘participatiesamenleving’ (participatory society) - or at least the aim of transforming into such a} society instead of the welfare state we used to have - is a clear example of this.

on the basis of disturbingly clear statistics, demonstrating that, first, people have very little knowledge of politics and second, that (especially young) people have very little to no

interest in politics. As the Australian government also infers, low turn-outs during

elections and little interest and knowledge of politics render the chosen representation ‘empty’, and reveal that there is “no check on potential tyranny”5_{. The result that is}

observed by governments such as the Australian is that citizens turn their backs on politics, as demonstrated by low turn-outs and the lack of knowledge on political procedures. Confronted with this discrepancy between the apparent passivity or disinterestedness of citizens and the increased responsibility of these same citizens regarding many social and economic issues, the question of the meaning of citizenship within democracies rises.

An important starting point and assumed background to this inquiry into citizenship is the critique on the overwhelming presence of big business in the political arena. The assumption is that the influence of business, the proximity of the market to the state, has emptied the political sphere from its political power of decision-making and therefore has a negative effect on citizen’s political activities. Virtually every important political decision is made under heavy influence of business and financial elites. The British sociologist Colin Crouch, author of Post-Democracy, is an important voice in this line of argument. According to Crouch “while elections certainly exist and can change governments, public electoral debate is a tightly controlled spectacle, managed by rival teams of professionals expert in the techniques of persuasion, and considering a small range of issues selected by those teams. The mass of citizens plays a passive, quiescent, even apathetic part, responding only to the signals given them”6_{. The influence of}

business on political procedures as described by Crouch find their bedding in the strange result of democratic transformations that take place in well-developed liberal constitutional democracies7_{. These transformations are connected to two important}

philosophical discussions in political philosophy that I will take as the starting point of my analysis and re-conceptualisation of citizenship, deliberative democratic theory in the positive sense and neoliberalism in the negative. By positive I here mean that deliberative theory as I will discuss it has given rise to ideas of increased political participation, whereas I will discuss neoliberalism as resulting in the opposite. In this thesis I will attempt to formulate a re-conception of citizenship in light of the current

6 _{Crouch (2004) p. 4. Crouch’s work on Post-democracy informs my work in this thesis, but it will} not function as an argument towards a new understanding of citizenship per se.

democratic deficit of citizen passivity with the aim of opening up ways for thinking about citizenship and democratic politics in a critical, yet positively engaging manner. I will aim at cataloguing some of the qualities and criticisms concerning deliberative theory, liberal constitutionalism and neoliberal governmentality, and further inquire into some of the suggestions made by agonistic on the measures that can nurture instead of discourage a critical ethos.

In my view the agonistic conceptualisations of citizenship have some important notes to offer to our predominant understanding of citizenship and within the agonistic field of thoery I will focus on the works of two influential thinkers, James Tully and Chantal Mouffe. The positions of both theorists give rise to critical activity, or activity that goes against the predominant structure of laws and practices, and carry the promise of emancipation and activation in spite of the existing structures. The theories of Tully and Mouffe play both a structural and a structuring role throughout this thesis, which allows me to make their conceptualisations of citizenship central. This does have the effect that other agonist conceptualisations as well as nuances within the neoliberal and deliberative debates are overlooked. However, within the scope possible I saw no other way.

Before jumping into a re-conceptualisation of citizenship from an agonistic perspective I will in the first chapter consider three political philosophical theories that analyse and inform the predominant concept of citizenship in well-developed liberal democracies. These are deliberative theory and neoliberalism. Deliberative democratic theory figures an active and highly politicised citizen that participates in political debates that have been structured according to specific guidelines. Deliberative theory is a theory that formulates an alternative conceptualisation of citizenship, but it has also - and within this thesis that will be more important - informed the setting up of certain deliberative structures in current democracies. By critically assessing the theoretical assumptions of deliberative procedures and the type of subjects (citizens) it conceptualises I will attempt to find some possible reasons for the ‘failure’ of the potential (and in a derivative manner, the actual) implementation of these procedures. Then, to complement the picture of the current conceptualisation of citizenship, I will address the influence of neoliberalism on democratic decision-making and will-formation, focusing again on the type of citizen that is the result of this type of government. At the end of this chapter the paradox of the increased potential for democratic participation and self-legislation (deliberative procedures) vis à vis the decreasing actualisation of this potential (due to both deliberative and neoliberal influences) will be clear. Based on the discussion of

deliberative theory and neoliberal governmentality, I will argue that both theories run into problems with citizen identification with the political and/or as a citizen.

In the second chapter I will introduce the conceptualisations of citizenship as presented by James Tully and Chantal Mouffe, which are central to this thesis. Informed by the processes discussed in the first chapter, I will consider the potential strength of these theories in favour of the paradox I ended with, starting with an understanding of citizenship and the political as a game-like set of activities. Thereby, I will translate (partially) the question of citizen’s participation into the question of citizen identification with the political and as a citizen. As we will see, whereas the current concept of citizenship is weak in its conceptualisation of citizen’s identification, agonistic theory has a lot to offer in this respect. For Tully, identification comes from participating in the discussion on de proliferating rules, but also the possibility of their modification. Or in Tully’s formulation, “[a] collection of humans becomes, or takes on the identity of, a ‘free people’ in virtue of governing themselves by their own laws over time”8_{. A}

democracy is, according to Tully, meant to consist of (a) free people(s) and free citizens. Therefore, the legitimacy of government can be derived from the level of self-governance, i.e. the extent to which a people (and: the citizens) is free. Mouffe instead focuses on the conflictuality of the political, both at the level of personal identification as well as at the level of political relations. Mouffe most explicitly focuses on a pluralisation of identities and identifications, thereby creating a sharp contract with the universalist subject in deliberative theory. However, the combination of the proximity to legislative practices (as put forward by Tully) and the pluralisation of identities is problematic, as we will see, because the first tends to freeze identifications much more then render them flexible (and interchangeable). Based on this line of thinking, political identification consists in participation as well as in conflict, but the combination of the two remains for now unclear.

The notions of the modification of rules and of conflict - even as they are embedded in their respective theories - do not necessarily lead to a democratic system, nor do they inform us extensively about what this system should look like. In the third chapter I will therefore take a step back and consider the strong and positive relationship between agonism and democracy. Agonism is ‘founded’ in a post-foundational framework, a theoretical disposition that holds that all foundations (truths, laws etc.) are contingent. It is this idea of contingency that is very important for the potential of democratisation

through agonism, since the instability of foundations necessarily creates a space for discussion and moreover brings to light the ways in which hegemonies can be countered. However, looking into post-foundationalism cannot inform us on the actualisation of the re-conceptualisation of citizenship in line with agonist thinking. Therefore, I will also consider the relation between agonism and democracy in an institutional sense, thereby relying on the works of Mouffe and Tully, and also on Wingenbach, whom has convincingly categorised the distinct ways in which agonism can be thought of in an institutional setting. The three types of agonism that will be discussed here are constitutional, adversarial and responsive agonism. The aim of this assessment of agonism and democracy is to address some of the issues encountered in the second chapter, but more importantly, to find out more about the combination of participation and conflict.

Starting with the democratic deficit from the first chapter and with the two conceptualisations of citizens identification with the political in chapter two in mind, we conclude chapter three with a range of possibilities for institutionalising agonism. In the fourth chapter it is therefore important to take this view of institutionalisation and let it inform the return to the discussion on the two types of identification discussed in the second chapter. Because the focus of this thesis is on citizenship itself, I will leave the institutional discussion in more detail and here really return to the question of the specific dimensions that can help strengthen our concept of citizenship. Critical self-identification will be the first important pillar, since it has the potential of emancipation and can therefore foster a post-foundational understanding of predominant structures, which is important to activation. Critical participation is next indispensable, for it is the only way to increase the actualisation of the increased potential for citizen’s activities. These two dimensions are reliant on each other, but they also have independent value and should not be understood as one and the same.

Chapter 1

THE DEMOCRATIC DEFICIT OF CITIZEN PASSIVITY

Citizenship in (neo-)liberal and deliberative democracy

“Both the techniques for manipulating public opinion and the mechanisms for opening politics to scrutiny become ever more sophisticated, while the content of party programs and the character of party rivalry become ever more bland and vapid”9_.

Citizen passivity is an important threat to current democracies. Not only critical thinkers, but also governments themselves have acknowledged this fact, resulting in, among other strategies, a return of politicians ‘to the streets’10_{. Even though these}

strategies do have an effect on citizens and the face of politics, they do not seem to address the ‘roots’ of the apparent citizen passivity. Liberal constitutionalism, deliberative theory and neoliberal governmentally should be taken as the three main theoretical dispositions that can shed light on the current conceptualisation of citizenship and therefore might be considered the origin of this passivity. The analysis in this chapter will form the starting point from which to look at alternative conceptualisations of citizenship and the extent to which they carry the potential of citizen activation and democratic legitimation. John S. Dryzek, centenary professor at the Institute for Governance and Policy Analysis, has written extensively on the malfunctions in current democracies, criticising some aspects of deliberative structures as well as neoliberal ones11_{. In this chapter some of his points of critique will be}

addressed, taking on his starting point in Deliberative Democracy and Beyond that current Western democracies can be understood as both liberal and deliberative. This combination is not harmonious, nor unproblematic, according to Dryzek, “for deliberative democracy by definition is open to preference transformation within political interaction, while liberal democracy by definition deals only in the reconciliation and aggregation of preferences defined prior to political interaction”12

. If the current system relies simultaneously on individual, prefixed preferences and preferences that are subject to argumentation and other perspectives, then how should

10 _{One of the biggest political parties of the Netherlands (PvdA), for example, will be demanding} from its employees that they spend a third of their working hours outside in the streets, in order for them to ‘connect to the people’. Meijer & De Pré (2014)

11 _{Consider for example Deliberative Democracy and Beyond (2000). Dryzek himself argues for a} discursive democracy, but the details of his alternative will not be treated here. He also criticises agonism, which I will come back to.

the relation between the citizen and the democratic procedures be understood? How can the political activities of citizens (in this case democratic will formation) be understood, granted this combination of liberal and deliberative procedures? The sociologist and political scientist Colin Crouch, professor emeritus of the University of Warwick, offers a distinct critique on the combination of liberalism and democracy, whereby he does not directly address deliberative influences13_{. Since Crouch, in his book}

Post-democracy, argues more specifically from the point of view of the critical role of

citizens themselves, in this chapter some of his main points will subsequently be addressed. Most importantly, Crouch’s concept of post-democracy and his analysis of nay-saying citizens and the lack of critical sovereignty will play their part. After these two problematisations of the current democratic form, I will then address the discussion on deliberative theory by the philosopher and political scientist James Tully, as argued in his book Public Philosophy in a New Key: Volume 114_{. Tully’s work is especially interesting,}

because he also addresses neoliberalism and he will furthermore return in the next chapter as he furthers one of the central agonistic approaches to politics and citizenship. Tully’s main criticisms discussed here are that deliberative democracy is less critical than it proposes to be, and second, that it relies on a universalist subject who’s universality cannot be questioned (nor proved) from within the system. To complement the discussion with an analysis of neoliberalism, I will last discuss the work of Wendy Brown, professor of political science. Brown demonstrates that neoliberal governmentality leads to passive citizens whom are stuck in a success narrative15_{. At this point we will be left}

with the question of combination. In the last section I will therefore try to combine some of the insights on citizenship within liberal, deliberative and neoliberal structures and deduce what the most important processes are to counter. For the reason of clarity, not necessarily mirroring the historical developments, I will start by discussing liberal democracy, then move to deliberative theory and its influences om liberal democracy, and last look into neoliberalism and the effects thereof on our conceptualisation of citizenship.

Liberal democracy

Liberal democracy is a widespread form of democracy enjoying continuous popularity all over the world16_{. Not only ‘western’ countries such as the states of the European}

13 _{Crouch (2004) p. 17} 14 _{Tully (2008)} 15 _{Brown (2003)}

Union, The United States, and Australia, but also countries such as Japan, India and many countries in South America are considered ‘free states’ by definition of free elections. Political and civic liberties, a high level of democracy, the rule of law and the protection of human rights are further prerequisites for such status of ‘freedom’17_{. These}

democracies may have little in common, but they all up to a point defend the freedom of their citizens through the rule of law, on the negative conception of freedom as the freedom from interference (by the states or others)18_{. Such democracies can grosso modo}

be related back to certain assumptions foundational to liberalism. Dryzek’s analysis of current democracies to be both liberal and deliberative is built upon this political-economic understanding of liberalism. Political liberalism can be described as roughly assuming that “individuals are mostly motivated by self-interest rather than any conception of the common good, and that they themselves are the best judges of what this self-interest entails”19_{. In combination with democracy, liberalism often amounts to}

some version of the ‘constitutional free market democracy’20_{. The free market allows}

most public matters to be solved within a realm of private interests, subsequently de-politicising important areas of communal life21_{. The constitution can protect the citizen}

from possibly far-reaching state interference, whilst securing civic duties ‘in return’22_.

Both features secure the negative freedom of citizens. Within this type of liberal democracy the role of the citizen is to vote (for representatives), whereby the balloting system is built around the assumption that people most likely vote egoistically (i.e. personal interests), not directly for the common good23_{. The representatives take care of}

the ‘day to day’ decisions and are imposed with the responsibility to create equal rules for (economic) contest amongst civilians24_{. Since citizens no longer (except for the voting}

moment) need to address political issues, they are encouraged to act economically and

18 _{Crouch (2004) p. 13 speaks of the negative rights of the citizen, protecting them from the state} and each other in contrast to the positive right of citizens (how and when to participate). Liberal democracy is a specific form of democracy in which the negative rights (and negative freedom) are considered more important.

19 _{Dryzek (2000) p. 9. To be sure, this is not a definition of liberalism, it is merely an important} assumption.

20 _{Ibid. Ch. 1}

21 _{De-politicisation will in this thesis refer to processes or movements away from the political} arena, practices and the public debate thereabouts. De-politicisation, therefore, denotes the process in which citizens are primarily occupied with matters outside of politics or the political, whereas politicisation is the movement towards such matters.

22 _{Civic duties are generally duties such as tax-payment. It is sometimes discussed whether voting} should also be a civic duty, thereby obligating instead of encouraging citizens to vote.

23 _{If citizens were to vote directly for the common good it would make sense to re-arrange the} balloting system in a way that comes closer to a consensus – or majority vote – than a focus on pluralist politics in which every groups interests are represented. Reconsider also the comment of Dryzek quoted at the start of this chapter.

24 _{Also, liberal democracies are often pre-occupied with stability and safety, again to secure the} free flow of the market.

consequently citizen’s identities are usually bound to their economic position in society25_{. Liberal democracies often focus on creating a fair (or what a certain group}

considers to be fair) ground for economical contest and economic success becomes one of the most important demarcations of ‘the good life’26_{. Since economic success enjoys}

this central position it is thought that citizens should not have to ‘worry’ too much about political matters, because this is time-consuming and moreover does not lead to the good life. Political agency, the capacity to act in the political realm, is therefore primarily contained in the act of voting for, and complaining against, certain representatives.

Colin Crouch, but also Pierre Rosanvallon, argue that the decimation of citizen’s political activities to voting gives rise to a process in which citizens primarily ‘punish’ representatives for ruling27_{. Throughout Europa one can observe that most parties or}

representatives that have ruled for an electoral period are often dismissed in elections. According to Crouch this dismissal is generated by the system in which citizens ‘only’ vote, since this system gives rise to a negative sovereignty rather than a critical sovereignty28_{. The fall of multiple governments in the years surrounding the economic}

crises of 2008 and 2010 demonstrates the role of the citizen in the dismissal of policy and political officials29_{. In contrast to critical sovereignty, negative sovereignty entails the}

habit to ‘sanction’ politicians and policy, resulting in – among other things – the very negative focus of political campaigns. According to Rosanvallon, negative sovereignty knows at least three distinct causes. First off, the decline or disappearance of the ‘grand narrative’, the post-ideological political world that sprung from taking down the Berlin Wall, “contributed to the shift from a politics of ideas to a politics of distrust”. In other words, the ‘creativity’ of formulating ideas was replaced by the cynicism regarding politics30_{. Second, different kinds of liberals found each other in their common aim of}

countering totalitarianism, thereby securing several liberal democracies. According to Rosanvallon, the emancipatory ideal that was then still present, now has left liberalism, thereby changing it into a politics of ‘defensiveness and distrust’. Third, reactive

25 _{This may seem like a ‘natural’ or reasonable segmentation, until one considers that in the} Middle Ages public identity was related to one’s position in the Church, or in Ancient Rome to one’s status as a free man or slave.

26 _{Habermas (1994) p. 7. Even though, as will be pointed out later on in this chapter, not as much} as neoliberal society.

27 _{Crouch (2004); Rosanvallon (2008)} 28 Crouch (2004) p. 4, pp. 24-28 29

Rosanvallon (2008) pp. 173-190. For example, the years 2002 – 2012 knew five different governments in The Netherlands, only one of which completed the four years they set out to complete.

coalitions have proven to be easily organised and last but not least, a reaction can have immediate effect. Therefore, democratic politics have effectively changed into negative politics. This does not mean a lack of commitment, says Rosanvallon, but it means a ‘commitment to rejection’31_{. In agreement with Crouch, Rosanvallon does not end his}

analysis of democratic politics here. Both Crouch and Rosanvallon argue that we are now experiencing a ‘weak’ form of democracy, in which this kind of negative politics has emptied out its emancipatory potential and therefore demonstrates the emptiness and the lack of critical potential in current citizen activity32_{. It is exactly this critical potential}

of citizens that is both central to this thesis, but might also be considered central to the ideal of deliberation. Installing deliberative procedures is supposed to commit citizens to politics in a way that encourages them to surpass mere nay-saying. A more complete picture of the current conceptualisation of citizenship therefore requires looking into deliberative democracy more closely.

The deliberative turn

Let’s now return to Dryzek’s statement that current democracies seem to combine liberal and deliberative features. Topics that gained political importance, such as the transparency of decision-making procedures, the knowledge of the perils and wishes of the people, or the institution of referenda, can be attributed to the influence of deliberative theory on democratic procedures and thinking. These procedures and practices imply the proximity of citizen to state and therefore the citizen’s influence on political procedures. The question I set out to approach in this chapter was how to understand the causes of citizen passivity in current democracies, by researching the activities of citizens and the concept of citizenship, considering the combination of liberalism and deliberative democracy. As we just saw, within liberalism the political function of the citizen is limited, and preferences (voting behaviour) are considered to be individual (egoistic) and pre-fixed. The political act of voting, basically the only political act left to citizens, was then said to be used as a tool for the expression of negative sovereignty instead of critical sovereignty. In contrast, deliberative democracy needs citizens to be actively engaged in collective processes aimed at the common (political) good, participating and constantly being open (critical) to an adjustment of one’s preferences. In other words, deliberative democracy relies on the critical sovereignty of its citizens. In order to understand the role of the citizenry in democracies combining

both liberal and deliberative ideas I will first consider deliberation and deliberative theory.

Deliberative theory is a normative theory based on an ideal set of rules that has been abstracted from assumptions about the workings of language33_{. As developed by Jürgen}

Habermas, deliberative democracy is based on the idea that language has the quality that people aim for consensus or agreement34_{. Communication can be governed by}

communicative rationality or instrumental rationality. Whereas instrumental rationality is primordially strategic, in communicative rationality the other is not taken as a means, but as a source of reasons. In communicative action people pose validity claims on the levels of truth (objective), correctness of a norm (intersubjective) and sincerity (subjective)35_{. A ‘discourse’ consists of the exchange of arguments on a certain}

conception of the world in which both (or all) parties are truthful and have no strategic aims. A discourse in which the best argument excels is set in a sphere of equal and rational debate without coercion, where people are able to recognise the best argument and will choose for the accompanying policy. A deliberative democracy therefore needs to supply in this demand. It is assumed that within deliberation the citizens does not choose egoistically nor does he or she need to know what will be best for him-/herself, since he or she will be able to recognise the best argument (which is also taken to be the best for the community, i.e. the common good). This reliance on argument dictates that citizen’s preferences need to by definition be open to revision. It “insists on the fact that democratic will-formation does not draw its legitimating force from a previous convergence of settled ethical convictions, but from both the communicative presuppositions that allow the better arguments to come into play in various forms of deliberation, and from the procedures that secure fair bargaining processes”36_{. This}

means that (1) the validity claims and (2) the procedures that secure the power-free setting for deliberation are the two dimensions that legitimate deliberative theory, on the assumption that they secure preference formation based on argument and the absence of instrumental rationality. Deliberative democracy is a specifically politicising theory, because of this explicit focus on the central role of the citizen in decision making procedures and the assumption of preference transformation. The inclusivity of debates, transparency of procedures and consensus are core ideals. Citizens (or their

33 _{Deliberative theory is also often used in its critical function, from which it can criticise the} shortcomings of current democracies. According to Dryzek, deliberative theory has ‘lost’ its critical voice by assimilating into liberalism. Dryzek (2000) p. 30

34 _{Tully (2008) p. 43}

35 _{Habermas (1984) p. 297; Tully (2008) p. 44} 36 _{Habermas (1994) p. 4}

immediate representatives) need to participate in the creation of policy that governs them. Argument, not power, money or rhetoric is decisive, as is secured by the validity claims. This means that the concept of citizenship within deliberative democracies is aimed at stimulating critical sovereignty, not mere nay-saying, for that is not founded in argument. So, deliberative theory presents an alternative to the liberal conception of citizenship in which the citizen is politicised and critical thinking or sovereignty is encouraged.

As suggested in the introduction of this thesis, I wish to research the agonistic critique on the predominant conceptualisation of the citizen as formulated in a combination of liberal democracy with deliberative and neoliberal influences, focussing on the criticisms of Dryzek and Crouch, but also Mouffe and Tully whom will be addressed more specifically in the next chapter. Alongside the possibly paradoxical combination of the concepts of citizenship in liberal and deliberative democracy, the extent to which citizens are politicised by deliberative procedures seems to fall short and the means of deliberation as well. In the next section I will therefore discuss first the issue of the malleability or rather fixed character of preferences by going into the likelihood of a power-free setting for deliberation and the three aspects of validity claims, two of the legitimating factors for deliberative politics. Second, I will discuss the inclusivity problem, thereby also addressing the question of the politicisation of ‘all’ citizens. Third, I will address the form of subject that is proposed and which links all these issues together.

The possibility of a power-free, all-inclusive, equal setting for deliberation is often considered to be highly debatable, as I will come back to below, but, as Dryzek explains, “[l]iberal constitutionalists and critical theorists [predecessors of the development of deliberative theory, red.] alike can believe in distortion-free political dialogue as the essence of deliberative democracy”37_{. On the premise of these circumstances, then, the}

question of preferences remains. According to liberals people will be tempted to vote egoistically on the basis of their (well-informed) self-interest. According to deliberative theory, people (can be taught to) choose for the best argument. Critical theorists, however, have pointed towards the immense threat of hegemonic discourses and ideologies, thereby complicating both stances38_{. Hegemonic discourses are discourses}

37

Dryzek (2000) p. 21. Distortion-free here refers to the fair and equal playground for deliberation.

38 _{Ibid. p. 20 Apparently (at least according to Dryzek) this does not mean they cannot believe} in the possibility of distortion free dialogue.

that are structurally dominant over other alternative ones. Conceptual and normative frameworks of subjects can be deeply influenced by premises and terms of discourse, making it difficult to think critically about aspects of social relations or alternative possibilities for institutionalisation and action”39_{. The fear of critical theorists lies in the}

often ‘hidden’ nature of these hegemonic discourses, making it difficult to address or overthrow them. Democracy is often said to be such a hegemonic discourse, seeing that (and resulting in the situation where) most of the world’s politics have no alternative to speak of anymore40_{. Can citizens, or even scientists or philosophers, still critically}

question democracy41_{? Critical theorists disagree on the extent to which citizens can be}

taught to think critically and thereby render these hegemonic discourses visible. The procedures of deliberative democracy assume that deliberation can aid citizens in rendering hegemonic discourses visible, disable their powerful positions and critically assess these discourses in light of critical or possibly even radical alternatives. If this would be possible, for example through education (on the construction of ‘truth’ or social reality), and if that would simultaneously mean that people would choose the common good over their egoistic preferences (because of the implementation of the validity claims), then deliberative democracy as theorised over might be legitimised. However, I would argue that deliberative democracy is not able to create this situation, because of its idealised conception of the workings of language (games) and plurality42_.

As is spelled out by Tully in his chapter on Wittgenstein and Habermasian communicative action, language games do not function in the way Habermas normatively frames them. Tully formulates several points of critique against Habermas’s conceptualisation of deliberative settings in order to subsequently propose a more agonistic outlook on the political game that will be addressed extensively in the next chapter. If we return to the three claims that are helt within a validity claim within a setting of deliberation, we see that there is a claim to sincerity, one to truth and one to the correctness of a norm. First of all, argues Tully whilst using the Wittgensteinian theory of language, we cannot be expected to question sincerity in everything we say and moreover it would not be rational43_{. In the example of Habermas stating his name}

and next stating that he would suggest a democratic working environment it would simply make no sense to question the sincerity (and simultaneously therefore the truth)

41 _{Crouch (2004) argues for example that many researchers of democracy amend the features of} democracy to the status quo so that the conclusion of the research will be that democracy is already nearly perfect and the few points of critique can be quite easily dealt with. 42

In chapter 2 I will discuss alternative ways of understanding human relations and plurality. In chapters 3 and 4 I will attempt to work towards a more accurate conception of citizen activity. 43 _{Tully (2008) pp. 47-49}

of his claim that his name is Habermas. For starters, what should we accept as prove? The same is true for the questioning of the truth of a validity claim. At some point, the game of giving reason after reason comes to an end. “That is, activities (language games) of justification, of giving reasons, are themselves grounded in customary or conventional uses of words; in what is not called into question in the course of our activity of asking and answering questions, of offering, rejecting and accepting reasons”44_{. It seems fair to}

question the effectiveness of the validity claims on these grounds. Confiding in this critique would entail renouncing the first of the two legitimating aspects of deliberative democracy. As we can see, then, the assumption that procedures of deliberation can effectively call into question the conventions of society or the hegemonic structures is quite optimistic. This is not to say that it is unimportant: the creation of an environment in which the exchange of reasons is central to the discussion on public matters is certainly a very important building block for democracy. Moreover, there can certainly be deliberative settings in which hegemonic structures are made visible. Dryzek likewise argues that discourses will always be embedded within conventions and assumptions, but he suggests that this is not what should be countered. We cannot ‘wish the discourses away’, we should instead make the contestation of discourses central. According to Dryzek this was also understood by Habermas in his later work Between

Facts and Norms, constructing a democratic better fitted to political reality45_{. “The kind of}

admissible discourse is now extended to include not just issues of truth and morality, but also pragmatic discourse about what should be done in terms of translating consensus into binding decisions capable of implementation, and negotiations concerning what to do when values and interests irreducibly conflict”46_{. However, this work also}

demonstrated a redirection towards a liberalism, thereby providing ‘easy legitimacy’ to the administrative and legal system, which should be understood as the loss of the theory’s critical potential47_{. Dryzek and Tully therefore both contend that deliberative}

democracy in this liberal setting is not the best remedy against hegemonic structures, without giving up completely on the deliberative ideal. Or as Tully argues, Habermas “has proffered a form of critical reflection in which we are free to call into question and dissent from the conventions governing our political and legal practices, but we are not free in turn to call into question and to dissent from the conventions governing the practice of critical reflection itself”48_{. The procedure of deliberation is not open to}

self-reflection since it is grounded in conventions that are considered universal. These

conventions are bound to protect certain hegemonic structures and therefore the setting for deliberation cannot be adequately called power-free. This undermines the second of the two legitimating forces that Habermas distinguished.

Alongside (1) predicting what type of rationality produces individual voting choices, (2) the difficulties with adhering to the demands of the Habermasian validity claims and (3) recognising possible hegemonic discourses, deliberative theory has also been criticised for an uncritical stance towards the demand of inclusivity. I will address this problem of inclusivity, because I believe it to be indicative to the points just made and moreover link these points to the question of identity, which will be the main subject of the next chapter. According to the normative standards of deliberation “[p]olitical decisions ought to be made by processes that bring all the potentially affected parties or their representatives into a public deliberative process”, but, as Iris Marion Young, a well-known criticiser of deliberative democracy, inserts, “actual political processes are [...] usually found wanting”49_{. For starters, it seems to be - even in the age of internet - hard}

or even impossible to include all parties that might possibly be affected by the outcome of deliberation. Even situations in which it is seemingly possible to gather all the affected parties, some of them might be overlooked because of their invisibility as effected parties, or for example because the consequences of particular policy cannot be overseen. Tot take a recent example, the student protests in Amsterdam and most notably the occupation of the Maagdenhuis demonstrated the formal exclusion of students and (academic) staff from deliberation on budget management. If we assume the board not to be malevolent, we can see that the idea that students should be included did not rise before, because the problematic nature of this exclusion remained (and arguably remains) unseen. This correlates with the critique on the possibilities for rendering hegemonic structures visible. An important form of hegemony in societies with great differences is often the dominance of certain groups. For example, in the Netherlands there have been comments on the structural racial bias against (large) minority groups such as Moroccans and Turks in civil society as well as in politics50_.

Both Young and Tully address such structural bias against minority groups and suggest that even though deliberative democracy aims at the inclusion of all groups in society,

49 _{Young (2001) p. 672. I will here focus on the aim of full inclusivity, but, as will be discussed in} chapter 3, agonists do not believe it is possible to reach this goal. Exclusivity should be fought, but it can never be completely tackled.

50 _{Consider for example the debate on ‘Zwarte Piet’ that dominated public debate in newspapers} throughout the autumn and winter of 2014-2015.

the difficulty it has with debunking hegemonic structures renders the procedure flawed in this respect51_.

In line with this, access to deliberation can be said to be unequally distributed for the unequal distribution of time, money and education in society. It can be argued, therefore, that even if it were possible to formally include everyone, ‘informal exclusion’ will continue to pose a challenge52_{. As Young puts it “[i]n a society structured by deep}

social and economic inequalities, he [the activist, red.] believes that formally inclusive deliberative processes nevertheless enact structural biases in which more powerful and socially advantaged actors have greater access to the deliberative process and therefore are able to dominate the proceeding with their interests and perspectives”53_{. If we return}

to the example of the Moroccan and Turkish representation in deliberative settings and we assume for a moment that they have been formally included - they are represented - then still there are possible biases that have their effect on the proceedings themselves as well as on the outcome. For example underlying cultural assumptions - in this case possibly assumptions that stem from a different religious background - might color the speech of the (dominant) group in a way that is either invisible to themselves or is deemed ‘natural’, ‘normal’ or ‘neutral’ . A second example might be the history certain groups have with access to and participation in decision-making procedures which make them more or less apt to act in such situations. Crouch’s analysis that Western democracies are heading towards a post-democratic period in which a small elite effectively uses the decision making procedures confirms this analysis. The elites have built such a history of governing that they effectively are the only ones that can. The people are in contrast left with mere ‘negative sovereignty’.

So, what does the problem with inclusivity have to do with citizen’s identity? The ideal setting for deliberative democracy is reliant on a certain type of subject. The three dimensions of validity claims correspond with the attitudes, worlds and areas of modern societies, more specifically science (truth), law and morality (norms) and aesthetics and

53 _{Ibid. p. 679. Of course it is debatable whether speaking of societies ‘structured by deep social} and economic inequalities’ is legitimate. On the one hand I am prone to argue against this characterisation by Young, especially in light of the much graver inequalities witnessed outside of continental Europe. However, research from different angles – philosophical, but also sociological and political – repeatedly shows that there are in fact structural inequalities structuring western society, not in the least because of great inequality in wealth, influence (Crouch (2004)), visibility (Arendt (1951); Benhabib (2004)), or access. With these research conclusions I deem it reasonable to conclude that we should be cautious when claiming continental Europe has developed beyond these inequalities and therefore that we should be aware of structural biases that might govern deliberation.

ethics (subjectivity)54. A ‘modern’ subjects in Habermas’ sense separates these three

areas, a process called ‘decentring’ and the decentred subject is the outcome of the development towards modernity, thereby occupying the ‘highest stage’55_{. The question}

of the validity of this statement, whether taken in a developmental or a cross-cultural understanding remains, according to Tully, since it can neither be proven to be true nor has it been conclusively falsified56_{. As we will see, Tully and other agonists do not pursue}

an equally universalist subject, on the premise of exclusivity. If the deliberative structure is reliant upon this decentred subject and its universal validity, then the non-universality of this subject form would prima facie exclude all other subjects from the system.The question of inclusivity is therefore unmistakably connected to the question of the universality of this subject form. Since the universality of this type of subject cannot be questioned, we should ask ourselves whether we would wish to rely on it this much. In this section I have addressed the aims as well as the possible flaws in reaching the aims of deliberative democracy. Deliberative democracy was taken to aim at critically expanding the role of the citizen in liberal constitutional states. In order to reach this a power-free setting should be secured in which communicative action could take place between modern decentred subjects. Following the criticisms of Dryzek and Tully, it was demonstrated that all these dimensions are problematic in their own sense. In short, the power-free setting is inevitably subject to hegemonic structures, the validity claims to conventions and they cannot be questioned (which renders them uncritical) and the decentred subject was deemed universal without proof (or the possibility of counter-proof). In sum I agree with Tully, who states that the “idealisation of a set of rules of validation cannot play the quasi-transcendental role assigned to it in this theory“57_{. Is it}

the idealisation that is origin to the criticisms above?

According to Dryzek, “[t]he central problem of modern society to Habermas is that instrumental rationality [goal-directed rationality, red.] has invaded and conquered realms where it does not belong, leading to the thorough scientisation, bureaucratisation, and commercialisation of social life and politics”58_{. The diffusion of}

spheres in which instrumental rationality has become dominant complicates achieving the communicative rationality necessary for satisfying the deliberative standards. This is

by all means something that Habermas himself understood, the question I want to raise here therefore is not whether his theoretical and ideal construction of deliberative democracy is flawed in this respect, but whether the processes in current democracies, inspired by deliberative theory, have been (un)able to circumvent these forms of strategic rationalities and why. Dryzek’s formulation points towards the marketisation of areas in society that were formerly political, social or private and therefore governed by a different type of rationality. This might mean that neoliberal governmentality plays a role in the pluralisation of fields in which instrumental rationality is hegemonic over communicative rationality. Therefore, in the next section I want to last address neoliberal governmentality, thereby hoping to have created in this chapter an analysis of some of the most important factors influencing our current concept of citizenship.

Neoliberal governmentality

As just suggested and as affirmed by Zuidhof and Brown, the amount of areas of life that are considered to be economic has increased over the past thirty years59_{. Neoliberalism}

can be seen as a successor of liberalism (even though it is not a necessary development) and is commonly understood as the multiplication of markets60_{. Areas of social, political}

and private life are increasingly made subject to market mechanisms and even states need to develop into markets, thereby strengthening my claim that neoliberalism is, on top of deliberative democracy, of influence on current democracies and therefore on the meaning of citizenship61_{. Domains traditionally considered to be political, such as}

housing plans, private, like children’s education and nurture, or important for their own sake, such as healthcare, are transformed into competitive markets62_{. Since the liberal or}

‘traditional’ conception of democracy highlights the importance of a certain balance between the public and the private, on the one hand, and the economic and the political, on the other, this neoliberal expansion is often considered problematic63_{. In}

line with the former section it is good to keep in mind that this multiplication of markets means the decimation of places in which communicative action can take place. In this

62 _{Also Michael Sandel sketches this development of markets and the proliferating need to alter} areas of quality into areas of quantity. In his latest book What Money Can’t Buy (2012) multiple examples are given to this end. There is an important difference between Michael Sandel and P.W. Zuidhof to the extent that Zuidhof focuses more on the neoliberal use of the market as an all-explaining metaphor (“think of … as a market”, p. 8) and Sandel researches the different areas in which market-mechanisms have effectively taken over (i.e. paying kids to write a thank-you-note instead of teaching them that this something is good for its own sake).

current setting what is most important is to find out what the consequences for the concept of citizenship are when society moves into a neoliberal structuring. In line with Wendy Brown I will argue that the re-allocation of multiple areas of life as economic is problematic because the double movement of de-politicisation and economisation leads to a loss of the possibility of political action by citizens.

So, what is the role of the citizen within a neoliberal democracy? Zuidhof suggests that “[w]here traditional, for instance liberal conceptions of politics take the organisation of social life largely as given and view politics as a contest of preferences and opinions, discursive politics of neoliberalism mobilises the metaphor of the market to re-articulate how we [are, red.] to think of a certain area of life”64_{. This means that neoliberalism is,}

just like deliberative theory, an expansion of the concept of citizenship, even though in neoliberalism it is an expansion to all aspects of life and in deliberative democracy an expansion of the means for participation in the political only. The marketisation of formerly political discourses influences the way in which people themselves understand social life and ethics, affecting people’s normative conception of ‘good citizenship’: whereas liberalism was keen on maintaining a division between private and public life, neoliberalism permeates both and simultaneously influences and connects the two realms. Citizenship is to be understood within its place in the market that is society. In connection to that, “[w]hat we observe today is not a diminishment of state sovereignty and planning capacities but a displacement from formal to informal techniques of government (e.g., nongovernmental organisations) that indicate fundamental transformations in statehood and a new relation between state and civil society actors”65_{. In other words, citizens no longer are citizens only in relation to the state}

itself, but many other actors, such as organisations, influence or even constitute this relation. So, first, citizenship should be understood as a subjectivity within a market structure and second, that structure has expanded from the state to non-governmental organisations. That means, however, that it is unclear to what extent the ‘citizen’ should still be understood as a citizen. Within neoliberalism, the citizen is to be understood rather as an entrepreneur.

The neoliberal subjectivity of the ‘entrepreneur’ is an active agent, he is “an entrepreneur of himself, being for himself his own capital, being for himself his own producer, being

for himself the source of [his] earnings”66_{. The entrepreneur appears to be someone who}

systematically (through rational strategic thinking) reacts and adapts according to changes in his or her environment, aiming for (economic) success, but he is therefore not a political being as such67_{. The entrepreneur is an active participant in the governing of}

his or her own behaviour, but not in the conscious and critical way that would create political agency, because the content of his self-management is economic and individual, not political (nor moral, for that matter). Political power, in this respect, entails “‘making up’ citizens capable of bearing a kind of regulated freedom”68_{. Governmentality (the}

kind of political power distinctive of neoliberalism) is described as the ‘conduct of conduct’ and is distinct from for example sovereign power, because it is not to be understood as a simple relationship between the one in power and the one whom power is held over. It is a de-politicizing kind of power in the sense that disputes are avoided by the micromanagement of subjects, both economizing and individualizing them69_{. The}

neoliberal conduct of conduct has this effect on many areas of human activity and “ranges from ‘governing the self’ to ‘governing others’”70_{. Neoliberalism, according to}

this Foucauldian line of thinking, comprises of a diffusion of techniques of government, meaning that many areas that were traditionally non-political are now subject to micro-management71_{. As suggested by Miller and Rose, but also by Huijer, technologies such}

as telephones that make it possible to be online and linked up 24 hours per day can be said to have an even greater potential to govern individuals behaviour72_{. These modern}

technologies play an important role in the way individuals lead their lives which makes it unsurprising that the technology itself would be a ‘carrier’ of power relations. What this points out is the way in which neoliberalism makes it hard to criticise political power, because it is diffused into so many little parts and it touches so many areas of life that it has become hard to even see what the power is held over and how it works. This diffusion is grasped by the term ‘micro-management’. Also critical in this respect is the connection of moral autonomy to self care: the entrepreneur is fully responsible for “the

67 _{See Miller & Rose (2008); Lemke (2001) p. 202, leading to a more variable uptake on the} different meanings of ‘economic success’ that the entrepreneur is after.

68 _{Miller & Rose (2008) p. 53}

69 _{For example, Miller & Rose (2008) ch. 5, demonstrate the way in which neoliberal}

governmentality produces employees that work harder because they feel they have the freedom to develop themselves.

70 _{Lemke (2001) p. 191}

71 _{The different techniques of government denote the different ways in which governmentality} functions. There is a vast multiplicity of possible techniques of government.

consequences of his or her action no matter how severe the constraints on this action”73_.

This means that good citizenship is captured in a success narrative (being an entrepreneur) and that success narrative should be understood as good self-management (being responsible), no matter ones capabilities or intellect74_{. “The model neoliberal}

citizen is one who strategises for her/himself among various social, political and economic options, not one who strives with others to alter or organise these options”75_.

In other words, the notions of solidarity or citizenship as part of a collectivity have become meaningless. A very important consequence of a neoliberal society, then, is the erosion of possibilities for critique, for questioning, for rendering the power structures of economic or capitalist thinking visible and unstable76_{. We can see now that this would}

prove to be a very bad combination with the normative theory of deliberation, in which critiquing and the visibility of power are crucial to the workings of deliberations. To come back to the main subject of this chapter then, what is the role and meaning of citizenship in a society based on liberal constitutionalism, influenced by deliberative ideals and permeated by neoliberal governmentality?

Deliberative ideals in a neoliberal context

In the aftermath of liberal democracy, both neoliberalism and deliberative theory made their mark on the democratic system77_{. To make sense of the current meaning of}

citizenship as brought about by these influences, in this chapter different analyses of the current democratic form have been assessed. Starting with liberal democracy, it was demonstrated that our system of elections assumes a citizen that enjoys certain rights and liberties and in return acts on certain duties. The electoral system is in such a way construed that it manages the plurality of perspectives, which it receives through egoistically voting citizens. This ‘common’ liberal democracy was subject to both neoliberal and deliberative influences. As it appears this combination is far from straightforward in its conception of citizenship. Deliberation enjoys popularity due to its focus on ways for citizens to ‘have a say’ and denotes a much more politicised concept of citizenship. However, the reality of the implementation of deliberative procedures does

73 _{Brown (2003) p. 6, the constraints are here meant as intellectual, physical, social capacities, or} rather incapacities.

74 _{It would be interesting to research to what extent the policy of the Dutch government discussed} in the introduction can be captured or described by this development.

75 _{Ibid. p. 7} 76 _{Ibid. p. 9}

77 _{It can be considered the aftermath of liberalism, because of the rise of neoliberalism over the} past thirty years as described by Zuidhof (2012). Where liberalism, then, still is the most important foundation of our institutional make-up, neoliberal governing techniques have effectively changed the power relations in society and the way we should understand the role of the citizen.

not meet the promises of its theoretical counterpart. Formal and informal exclusion and the hegemony of certain discourses damages its initial promise. Theoretically, it was demonstrated that the decentred subject poses a universalistic claim that cannot be questioned from within the deliberative setting, thereby making it impossible to test its universality. Secondly, the conditions placed on validity claims are most importantly not fit to render hegemonic structures visible, because they are grounded in conventions themselves. Thirdly, the combination with the assumption of egoistic voting in liberal democracy questions the possibility for citizens being concerned with the common good whilst deliberating amongst one another. In sum, deliberative procedures in liberal democracy politicise citizens, but at the same time are blind to the background assumptions of the deliberative setting, more precisely the proposed (neutral and universal) decentred subject and the realisability of the validity claims. Throughout this thesis I will assume that it is the first two points (the universal subject and the validity claims) that have a negative effect on a third, namely inclusivity.

If we move to the influence of neoliberalism we encounter a completely different conception of citizenship. Neoliberalism produces a type of subject, the entrepreneur, that should be understood as an economical, not a political, actor. Neoliberal governmentality permeates public and private lives, thereby leaving little room for critical activity. Following Brown, “a “mismanaged life” becomes a new mode of de-politicising social and economic powers and at the same time reduces political citizenship to an unprecedented degree of passivity and political complacency”78_{. What}

we are left with is a constitutionally liberal nationstate with deliberative procedures, a focus on transparency and the ideal of actively participating citizens, and at the same time a centrality of the market that de-politicises, economises and individualises citizens, thereby disabling political critical engagement. The deliberative processes are in a neoliberal ‘democracy’ redirected into individual management-issues, which instead of activating citizens into collective procedures of political decision-making, individualise citizens and transform the issues into economical ones. Moreover, these processes deconstruct the polity or the formation of a public sphere by its invasive individualisation, due to the almost complete responsibility of the citizen over his or her own success. Citizens are left isolated and incapable of political opposition, again affirming Crouch’s theory of a post-democratic situation. This suggests that the influence of neoliberalism, understood (in a minimal sense) as the creation of entrepreneurial subjects, effectively paralyses the politicising potential of deliberation.

The relationship between the citizen and their political role, or in other words the identity of the citizen as a citizen through the practices that constitute this political role, is very weak. With weak I mean that it has little - too little - political content for the ‘legitimation’ of the democratic structure. Therefore, in the next chapter I will consider two alternative conceptualisations of citizenship, which I think can shed light on the possibilities for strengthening this relationship between the citizen and the political by focusing on the identification of subjects as citizens.