Deliberative Environmental Politics: Democracy And Ecological Rationality

In Deliberative Environmental Politics, Walter Baber and Robert Bartlett linkpolitical theory with the practice of environmental politics, arguing that the "deliberative turn"in democratic theory presents an opportunity to move beyond the policy stalemates of interest-groupliberalism and offers a foundation for reconciling rationality, strong democracy, and demandingenvironmentalism. Deliberative democracy, which presumes that the essence of democracy isdeliberation -- thoughtful and discursive public participation in decision making -- rather thanvoting, interest aggregation, or rights, has the potential to produce more environmentally soundpolicy decisions and a more ecologically rational form of environmental governance.Baber andBartlett defend deliberative democracy's relevance to environmental politics in the twenty-firstcentury against criticisms from other theorists. They critically examine three major models fordeliberative democracy -- those of John Rawls, Jurgen Habermas, and advocates of full liberalismsuch as Amy Gutmann, Dennis Thompson, and James Bohman -- and analyze the implications of each ofthese approaches for ecologically rational environmental politics as well as for institutions,citizens, experts, and social movements. In order to establish that democracy is ecologicallysustainable and that environmental protection can (and must) become a norm of culture rather than amere fact of government, they argue, new models of ecological deliberation and deliberativeenvironmentalism are required.

Walter F. Baber is Associate Professor in the Graduate Center for Public Policy and Administration, California State University, Long Beach. Baber is the Fulbright Distinguished Chair of Environmental Policy at the Polytechnic Institute of Turin (Italy) for 2009.