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togetherness in the citizens is strengthened by various associations,
beyond narrow local interests.
- He sees the free — today we would say horizontal — communication
of the differing and independent parts with each other as the basis of
development."
It is therefore clear that individual freedom is not threatened by the
purposeful operation of public power and not by the demand for
democratic participation in it, but by the centralisation of power, the
decline of associations and the limitation of open dialogue between
differing interests and convictions. Bottom-up deliberative democracy
would be just as effective a countermeasure for a green or any tyranny
in the name of the common good as it would be for the excessive power
of technocracy.
According to Eckersley, the result of the deliberative procedure is
“the economy of moral disagreement”, because the interest of the
participants is in supporting their own views with arguments acceptable
to others and in learning to consider each other’s interests. This improves
the chances of a mutual understanding and, with luck, agreement, but
it makes the participants more patient towards the decisions made even
if consensus fails. The irreplaceable advantages of deliberation are seen
primarily in its being the most suitable for increasing the spirit of
tolerance and mutually taking responsibility in a pluralist society, where
a people who are heterogeneous in every way has to bear the
consequences of the resultant decisions together.'* The participants of
the dialogue tolerate not only the presence of ways of life that differ
from their own, but on occasion are also willing to learn from one
another.
In the deliberative process, Eckersley emphasises, there is room not
only for rational arguments, but for various ways of self-expression for
convincing others or arousing their sympathy. For the Habermasian
ideal speech situation is not sufficient for giving the requisite weight to
the perspective of groups incapable of rational argumentation, informing
themselves or even participation, but nevertheless very much affected
17 T am appealing to the classic of Hungarian liberalism instead of to his sources,
Constant, Montesquieu, Burke, Tocqueville and Mill, because his work, as tends to happen,
receives disproportionately little attention in Hungary as well, despite being on the level
of his Western peers and thinkers with similar views.
108 For the assessment of the advantages, see Nicole Curato — John S. Dryzek et al.: 12
Key Findings in Deliberative Democracy. Daedalus 146.3. 2017. Ian Saphiro’s article in the
same issue points out the drawbacks of deliberation.