Democracy and Cultural Diversity

Democracy and Cultural Diversity
Author: Michael O'Neill
Publisher:
Total Pages: 248
Release: 2000
Genre: Political Science
ISBN:

This book is a study of how some of the world's leading democratic states have responded to the challenge of territorial or sub-national movements seeking to increase the salience of cultural differences--ethnic, linguistic, and regional identity--on the national agenda. International experts explore the various ways that cultural differences have acquired political significance and how these are managed by democratic states in every region of the world.

Democracy and Diversity

Democracy and Diversity
Author: Anna Elisabetta Galeotti
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 134
Release: 2018-12-07
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1351246852

The chapters in this book deal with different, though related, topics concerning the tense relationship between democracy and diversity. On the one hand, social diversity represents an opportunity, widening the horizon of social options and perspectives of innovation, but, on the other hand, it creates problems for the social cohesion and peaceful coexistence of many groups, be they majority or minority. The chapters depart from the intrinsic connection between democracy and diversity – and the unavoidable challenges that pluralism poses to decision-making procedures – investigating, from different perspectives, how the normative requirement of fully respecting agents’ reflexive agency impacts the revision of democratic decision-making procedures and the way in which institutions react to citizens’ justice-based claims. All the contributions share the theoretical insight that diversity is one of the raisons d’être of democracy, and, still, all acknowledge that the fact of pluralism poses challenges to the legitimacy of democratic procedures of decision-making. Indeed, if citizens had the same values and preferences, collective decisions would be easily achieved and the institution of democratic procedures would be redundant. Yet the wide pluralism of doctrines, habits, social standards, and conceptions of the goods typical of contemporary societies has often led citizens to challenge the legitimacy of democratic decisions because these choices do not fit their preferences or values. To address these challenges following recent accounts of democratic decision-making, in this volume, different strategies are introduced, defended, and criticized in order to outline a perspective that is able to guide actual decision-making processes (guidance), define standards that everyone has equal opportunity to fulfil (inclusion), and grant that citizens exercise their reflexive control on the whole democratic system (reflexivity). The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of the Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy.

Difference without Domination

Difference without Domination
Author: Danielle Allen
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 366
Release: 2020-11-30
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 022668122X

Around the globe, democracy appears broken. With political and socioeconomic inequality on the rise, we are faced with the urgent question of how to better distribute power, opportunity, and wealth in diverse modern societies. This volume confronts the dilemma head-on, exploring new ways to combat current social hierarchies of domination. Using examples from the United States, India, Germany, and Cameroon, the contributors offer paradigm-changing approaches to the concepts of justice, identity, and social groups while also taking a fresh look at the idea that the demographic make-up of institutions should mirror the make-up of a populace as a whole. After laying out the conceptual framework, the volume turns to a number of provocative topics, among them the pernicious tenacity of implicit bias, the logical contradictions inherent to the idea of universal human dignity, and the paradoxes and problems surrounding affirmative action. A stimulating blend of empirical and interpretive analyses, Difference without Domination urges us to reconsider the idea of representation and to challenge what it means to measure equality and inequality.

Parliament the Mirror of the Nation

Parliament the Mirror of the Nation
Author: Gregory Conti
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 433
Release: 2019-04-25
Genre: History
ISBN: 1108428738

The notion of 'representative democracy' seems unquestionably familiar today, but how did the Victorians understand democracy, parliamentary representation, and diversity?

Decentralized Governance and Accountability

Decentralized Governance and Accountability
Author: Jonathan A. Rodden
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 313
Release: 2019-02-28
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 110849790X

Reviews recent lessons about decentralized governance and implications for future development programs and policies.

The Challenge of Diversity

The Challenge of Diversity
Author: Forum Scholars for European Social Democracy. Conference
Publisher:
Total Pages: 340
Release: 2003
Genre: Cultural pluralism
ISBN:

Nowadays, the political discourse of European Social Democracy seems to pose more questions than to offer sound solution patterns and policies. This is, given the dynamic field of migration and integration, not unexpected and surprising. How migration and integration policies should be constructed and built up against the background of divergent national histories and cultures is still a demanding task. Thus formulating the right questions and intimating paths to solutions is the first decisive step. This book explores social democratic reactions, responses, and policies concerning the big issues of migration and multiculturalism. The authors map out a range of new social-democratic thinking having experienced waves of migration, different approaches of integration policies, and right-wing populist reactions in their respective countries.

Devolution

Devolution
Author: Max Brooks
Publisher: Del Rey
Total Pages: 304
Release: 2020-06-16
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1984826794

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The #1 New York Times bestselling author of World War Z is back with “the Bigfoot thriller you didn’t know you needed in your life, and one of the greatest horror novels I’ve ever read” (Blake Crouch, author of Dark Matter and Recursion). FINALIST FOR THE LOCUS AWARD As the ash and chaos from Mount Rainier’s eruption swirled and finally settled, the story of the Greenloop massacre has passed unnoticed, unexamined . . . until now. The journals of resident Kate Holland, recovered from the town’s bloody wreckage, capture a tale too harrowing—and too earth-shattering in its implications—to be forgotten. In these pages, Max Brooks brings Kate’s extraordinary account to light for the first time, faithfully reproducing her words alongside his own extensive investigations into the massacre and the legendary beasts behind it. Kate’s is a tale of unexpected strength and resilience, of humanity’s defiance in the face of a terrible predator’s gaze, and, inevitably, of savagery and death. Yet it is also far more than that. Because if what Kate Holland saw in those days is real, then we must accept the impossible. We must accept that the creature known as Bigfoot walks among us—and that it is a beast of terrible strength and ferocity. Part survival narrative, part bloody horror tale, part scientific journey into the boundaries between truth and fiction, this is a Bigfoot story as only Max Brooks could chronicle it—and like none you’ve ever read before. Praise for Devolution “Delightful . . . [A] tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review) “The story is told in such a compelling manner that horror fans will want to believe and, perhaps, take the warning to heart.”—Booklist (starred review)

Deepening Democracy

Deepening Democracy
Author: Archon Fung
Publisher: Verso
Total Pages: 328
Release: 2003
Genre: Democracy
ISBN: 9781859846889

The forms of liberal democracy developed in the 19th century seem increasingly ill-suited to the problems we face in the 21st. This dilemma has given rise to a deliberative democracy, and this text explores four contemporary cases in which the principles have been at least partially instituted.