Democratizing Inequalities: Dilemmas of the New Public Participation

by Caroline W. Lee (Editor), Michael McQuarrie (Editor), Edward T. Walker (Editor), Craig Calhoun (Foreword by)

Overview

Opportunities to “have your say,” “get involved,” and “join the conversation” are everywhere in public life. From crowdsourcing and town hall meetings to government experiments with social media, participatory politics increasingly seem like a revolutionary antidote to the decline of civic engagement and the thinning of the contemporary public sphere. Many argue that, with new technologies, flexible organizational cultures, and a supportive policymaking context, we now hold the keys to large-scale democratic revitalization.

Democratizing Inequalities shows that the equation may not be so simple. Modern societies face a variety of structural problems that limit potentials for true democratization, as well as vast inequalities in political action and voice that are not easily resolved by participatory solutions. Popular participation may even reinforce elite power in unexpected ways. Resisting an oversimplified account of participation as empowerment, this collection of essays brings together a diverse range of leading scholars to reveal surprising insights into how dilemmas of the new public participation play out in politics and organizations. Through investigations including fights over the authenticity of business-sponsored public participation, the surge of the Tea
Party, the role of corporations in electoral campaigns, and participatory budgeting practices in Brazil, Democratizing
Inequalities seeks to refresh our understanding of public participation and trace the reshaping of authority in today’s political environment.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781479883363
Publisher:	New York University Press
Publication date:	01/30/2015
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	6.90(w) x 9.90(h) x 3.00(d)

About the Author

Caroline W. Lee is Associate Professor of Sociology at Lafayette College. Her research explores the intersection of social movements, business, and democracy in American politics. She is the author of Do-It-Yourself Democracy: The Rise of the Public Engagement Industry.

Michael McQuarrie is Associate Professor of Sociology at the London School of Economics and Political Science and a Poiesis Fellow at New York University’s Institute for Public Knowledge. His work has been published in venues such as: Politics and Society, Public Culture, City and Community, Annals,and Research in Political Sociology. He recently edited Remaking Urban Citizenship with Michael Peter Smith.

Edward T. Walker is Associate Professor and Vice Chair in the Department of Sociology at the University of California, Los Angeles. His research examines how organizations and institutional contexts shape public participation. His research has appeared in the American Sociological Review, American Journal of Sociology, Public Opinion Quarterly, and Social Problems. He is the author of Grassroots for Hire: Public Affairs Consultants in American Democracy.

Craig Calhoun is Director of the London School of Economics and Global Distinguished Professor of Sociology at New York University. His most recent book is The Roots of Radicalism: Tradition, the Public Sphere, and Early Nineteenth-Century Social Movements.

Table of Contents

Contents

Part II Participation and the Reproduction of Inequality

2 Civic-izing Markets: Selling Social Profits in Public Deliberation 27

3 Workers’ Rights as Human Rights? Solidarity Campaigns and the Anti-Sweatshop Movement 46

4 Legitimating the Corporation through Public Participation 66

Part III The Production of Authority and Legitimacy

5 No Contest: Participatory Technologies and the Transformation of Urban Authority 83

6 The Fiscal Sociology of Public Consultation 102

7 Structuring Electoral Participation: The Formalization of Democratic New Media Campaigning, 2000 – 2008 125

8 Patient, Parent, Advocate, Investor: Entrepreneurial Health Activism from Research to Reimbursement 143

Part IV Unintended Consequences and New Opportunities

9 Spirals of Perpetual Potential: How Empowerment Projects’ Noble Missions Tangle in Everyday Interaction 165

10 Becoming a Best Practice: Neoliberalism and the Curious Case of Participatory Budgeting 187

11 The Social Movement Society, the Tea Party, and the Democratic Deficit 204

12 Public Deliberation and Political Contention 222

Part V Conclusion

13 Realizing the Promise of Public Participation in an Age of Inequality 247

Editorial Reviews

"The volume clearly illustrates the complexities of democracy and deliberative politics. It shows us that, despite participatory processes, we have yet to perfect democracy. The book challenges us to consider whether deliberative processes achieve what we want them to."

Mobilization

"The book is incredibly timely and deserves attention for its quality of scholarship and for its subject matter. It is an example of how research can both be scholarly and have uses for actors outside of academia."

Contemporary Sociology

"This is an exceptionally timely volume, consistently strong in its individual contributions and coherent in its collective analysis. Democratizing Inequalities both defines a major question for contemporary politicshow and why does political participation matterand advances a convincing contrarian argument. This volume and the questions raised within highlight a vital conversation about political theory and policy that is likely to be with us for many years."

Elisabeth Clemens

"Democratizing Inequalities is a timely and provocative compilation that demonstrates how participatory practices across a range of expected and unexpected locations cut both waysopening up avenues for citizen engagement while also limiting the democratic potential assumed to follow. The chapters in this volume are a welcome empirical corrective to celebratory discourses of citizen participation, and the book is certain to be an important resource for researchers and practitioners interested in the democratic possibilities of the 'new public participation.'"

Debra Minkoff

"The authors of Democratizing Inequalities set out to problematize the belief in public participation as a simplistic social good. With this collection of research-based studies and theoretical assessments of the field of participation and democracy studies they have thoughtfully and thoroughly achieved their goal."

Mobilization - Lynne M. Woehrle

"Democratizing Inequalities is a timely and provocative compilation that demonstrates how participatory practices across a range of expected and unexpected locations cut both ways—opening up avenues for citizen engagement while also limiting the democratic potential assumed to follow. The chapters in this volume are a welcome empirical corrective to celebratory discourses of citizen participation, and the book is certain to be an important resource for researchers and practitioners interested in the democratic possibilities of the 'new public participation.'"-Debra Minkoff,author of Organizing for Equality

“This is an exceptionally timely volume, consistently strong in its individual contributions and coherent in its collective analysis. Democratizing Inequalities both defines a major question for contemporary politics—how and why does political participation matter—and advances a convincing contrarian argument. This volume and the questions raised within highlight a vital conversation about political theory and policy that is likely to be with us for many years.”-Elisabeth Clemens,author of The People's Lobby

From the Publisher