Rising participation and declining democracy

摘要: In November 2009, three hundred Michigan residents from all walks of life converged on the state capital in Lansing to take part in a high-level public debate about what should be done to improve their state’s beleaguered economy. In an atmosphere of brewing unrest about the nation’s direction—most clearly marked by raucous congressional town hall meetings over proposed reforms to the health care system—the absence of party activists yelling at one another was notable. This was a sober, state-ofthe-art affair paid for by the WK Kellogg Foundation, in which technocratic expertise, philanthropic resources, and political capital were brought together. Consistent with a general turn to civil and deliberative practices in diverse institutional contexts, the goal was to facilitate rational deliberation among citizens from across the political spectrum. 1 Governor Jennifer Granholm and the president of the University of …