BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//208.94.116.123//NONSGML kigkonsult.se iCalcreator 2.26.9// CALSCALE:GREGORIAN METHOD:PUBLISH X-FROM-URL:https://www.noahgreenstein.com/wordpress X-WR-TIMEZONE:America/New_York BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:America/New_York X-LIC-LOCATION:America/New_York BEGIN:STANDARD DTSTART:20231105T020000 TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 RDATE:20241103T020000 TZNAME:EST END:STANDARD BEGIN:DAYLIGHT DTSTART:20240310T020000 TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 RDATE:20250309T020000 TZNAME:EDT END:DAYLIGHT END:VTIMEZONE BEGIN:VEVENT UID:ai1ec-8014@www.noahgreenstein.com/wordpress DTSTAMP:20240328T211210Z CATEGORIES;LANGUAGE=en-US:CUNY CONTACT:https://www.telosinstitute.net/conference2024/ DESCRIPTION:
Democracy is often presented as the sine qua non of politics today. Yet our own democratic political orders across the West c onsistently fail to deliver the desiderata they promise to provide. Does t his failure arise in part from the theoretical insufficiency of convention al diagnoses of democracy’s challenges and ills? As the primaries for the 2024 U.S. presidential election open\, we invite participants to consider critically the status of democracy with an eye toward the concerns that ha ve defined Telos over its 55-year history.
\nThe main advantage of d emocracy over other political forms is that\, by allowing broader particip ation in decision-making\, it prevents domination of the many by the few. In theory\, it also fosters decision-making that is comparatively effectiv e and meaningful by allowing views and information from the many to be com municated efficiently to political leaders\, while also holding the latter to account for their actions. At the same time\, a major difficulty of de mocracy is that the rule by the many requires some procedure for translati ng a multitude of opinions into unified decisions and action. In addition\ , precisely by exercising its majority will\, the many can trammel the int egrity of the individual—the key threat that liberalism seeks to hold at b ay.
\nThese advantages—and\, especially\, these challenges—have prod uced two competing visions of democracy in the contemporary West. Their di vision reflects differences about the politics of representation and decis ion-making. On one hand\, liberals view democracy as the following of appr opriate procedures for channeling the opinions of the multitude through th e election of representatives. On the other hand\, populists might disrega rd such procedural restrictions to arrive at outcomes that are acclaimed b y the people directly.
\nWhile both sides nod to the importance of t he popular will\, both are in fact willing to denigrate it. The liberal ca mp reacts in horror when democratic elections result in the election of po pulists\, who are said to lack proper governing expertise\, as in the 2016 victory of Donald Trump. The populist camp charges conspiracy when electo ral results fail to reflect their own conception of the people’s will\, as in Trump’s reaction to his 2020 ouster. Depending on which camp is descri bing the times\, the false mediator of popular will is either the demagogu e or the bureaucrat—Telos has long opposed both.
\nDifferent narrati ves\, in turn\, have taken hold about democracy’s present challenges. From the point of view of the liberal proceduralist critique of demagogues\, t he means of moving from a multiplicity of opinions to a unified decision i nevitably involves discourse within a public sphere. This discourse depend s on a common understanding of historical facts\, as well as a public sphe re that allows different perspectives to face each other in debate. In our contemporary world\, however\, the breakdown of previous limits to access ing the public sphere has led to an inability to arrive at a consensus on the difference between fact and fiction\, as well as an increasing tendenc y of citizens to exist within a social media echo chamber of their own vie ws\, undermining the common ground that a public sphere presupposes.
\nAt the same time\, public debate necessarily implicates values and iden tities that have an ultimately mythic basis that cannot be rationally dete rmined. People’s opinions\, moreover\, are invariably shaped by leaders as much as the people shape what leaders ought to do. Experts lament how thi s representational dynamic undermines the procedures that govern and chann el the representation of the popular will. Yet the narrative aspect of rep resentation is an ineradicable element of the way in which the popular wil l coalesces. The process of narrativized representation will never be an e ntirely rational one\, and the prominence of media personalities such as R eagan\, Trump\, and Zelensky as politicians underlines the futility of att empting to rid the public sphere of drama and spectacle.
\nFor the p opulist\, by contrast\, the primary threat to democracy lies in bureaucrac y. In his 2016 end run around the political establishment\, Trump’s electo ral success was driven by a broader critique of the administrative state’s undermining of democratic process. The rise of the managerial bureaucrati c state that was set in motion by the development of the welfare state in the twentieth century has created a class divide between managers and mana ged that has shifted decision-making power over the conditions of everyday life away from individuals and toward government and corporate bureaucrac ies. Because more and more of our economic and social welfare is under the direct influence of the state\, the resultant bloated administrative stat e has now become prey to a frenzy of lobbyists\, who further distance the people from political decision-making. The protections of minority rights that constitute the liberal aspect of today’s democracies have turned comm unities into special interests that lobby administrators to pass on privil eges to favored groups. The result has been a growing restriction of freed om of expression in the public sphere and an eroding of a unifying basis f or constructing a political order now dominated by the collusion of bureau cracy with corporations.
\nWhile the liberal critique of demagoguery resorts to more government controls that exacerbate the expansion of bure aucracy\, the populist critique of bureaucracy has attempted to dismantle government without considering how to establish mechanisms that would take over the functions that bureaucracies have coopted. Focusing on oppositio n to government\, the populist perspective often lacks any sense of altern ative institutional structures that could remedy the administration and co mmodification of everyday life.
\nBoth sides have contributed to a p olarization of views that threatens the underlying consensus necessary for democratic politics. The political gridlock that has ensued from their di verging diagnoses has meant that our political orders consistently fail to deliver peace\, prosperity\, and accountable government. Moreover\, regar dless of the rhetoric or credentials of those in power\, democracy today s eems always to leave us with broadly the same basic policies\, despite som e of them being deeply unpopular.
\nWe invite those who are interest ed in presenting at the 2024 Telos Conference to consider critically the s tatus of democracy today by addressing one or more of the following questi ons:
\nDemocratic Values
\nDemocracy and the Administrative State
\nDemocracy and the Public Sphere
\nDemocracy and Relig ion
\nDemocracy and Authorit arianism
\nAbstract Submi ssions
\nWhatever specific questions you address\, we invit e you to present your analysis with an eye toward the long-standing concer ns of the Telos-Paul Piccone Institute and thereby to help develop a trenc hant\, independent view of democracy that can inform both critique and pra ctical action within our present historical moment. Please submit a short c.v. and an abstract of up to 250 words by October 15\, 2023\, to telosnyc 2024@telosinstitute.net and place “The 2024 Telos Conference” in the email ’s subject line. Please direct questions to Professor Mark G. E. Kelly\, W estern Sydney University\, M.Kelly@westernsydney.edu.au.
\nC onference Location
\nThe conference will take place at the John D. Calandra Italian American Institute in New York City from Friday\, March 22\, to Saturday\, March 23\, 2024.
\n DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20240322 DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20240324 GEO:+40.754894;-73.981856 LOCATION:The Telos-Paul Piccone Institute @ 25 W 43rd St 17th Floor\, New Y ork\, NY 10036\, USA SEQUENCE:0 SUMMARY:Democracy Today? URL:https://www.noahgreenstein.com/wordpress/event/democracy-today/ X-COST-TYPE:free X-TAGS;LANGUAGE=en-US:cfp\,conference\,legal\,political\,religion\,social END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR