The Two Faces of Democracy: Between Agonism and Deliberation

• In Event: Between Trust and Contestation

Abstract

This paper critically assesses two recent and related trends in democratic theory. The first involves a cooling toward specifically deliberative models of democracy, while the second involves a warming to more overtly conflictual, or agonistic approaches to politics. We examine both the deliberative and agonistic models of democracy, showing that while each captures essential intuitions about democracy, the underlying moral infrastructure that connects them is poorly understood. The paper goes on to articulate what we call the “two faces of democracy” and to demonstrate their relationship to the normative core of democracy. We ask, what would it mean to keep a vivid sense of attunement to both faces of democracy?

Authors

• Molly Scudder, Purdue University

• Stephen K. White, University of Virginia