Deliberative democracy and the politics of difference

This paper looks into the politics of difference’s criticism of deliberative democracy in the work of Iris M. Young. According to Young, theories of deliberative democracy are not as inclusive as they pretend to be. She proposes a theory of communicative democracy based on “greeting,” “storytelling” and “rhetoric.” To begin with, this paper examines three conditions of deliberative democracy (the inclusiveness-condition, the rationality-condition, and the legitimacy-condition) and argues that Young’s criticism of the deliberative democracy is based on wrong assumptions. Secondly, the paper investigates Young’s proposed theory of communicative democracy. Although “greeting,” “storytelling” and “rhetoric” play a role in the process of political communication, it is not the role proposed by Young. Accordingly, as a mechanism to increase inclusiveness, her theory is politically unproductive.