Democracy Today.indb - Universidade do Minho
Democracy Today.indb - Universidade do Minho
Democracy Today.indb - Universidade do Minho
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claim, made it possible to give a different characterization of governance:<br />
one that takes into account the (constitutive) representational<br />
aspect of the separate units of governance decision-making. However<br />
inspiring the representative claim-model is in this regard, I want to<br />
contrast it here with representative democracy that characterizes the<br />
‘classical’ government-model. In order to get a better insight in to that<br />
which we admire in ‘representative democracy’ and to know what it is<br />
exactly that we will miss when switching to the governance-model, it<br />
is necessary to uncover the elements that make representative democracy<br />
so valuable.<br />
Spatial division<br />
48<br />
DEMOCRACY TODAY<br />
Nadia Urbinati differentiates between three theories of representation<br />
which can be traced back to the history of representation that started<br />
with liberal parliamentarism. She speaks about a juridical, institutional<br />
and political theory of representation. The separation between state<br />
and society is the basic trait of the three theories. Without this division<br />
there is no representative ‘democracy’. The chronologically two<br />
first systems, juridical and institutional representation, are essentially<br />
and almost exclusively about this relationship. Urbinati associates<br />
these theories amongst others with Hobbes, one of the first to install<br />
this clear division between state and society on the basis of a contract.<br />
The contract-relationship is a relation of authorization. In such a relation,<br />
when the representative has to be appointed, the focus is on the<br />
individual and his/her personal qualities and not on a political issue<br />
itself. The content of decision-making is in a contract-relation only of<br />
concern to the one who is authorized [6] . “It makes representation into<br />
a rigorously state-centered institution whose relation to society is left<br />
to the judgment of the representative (trustee); and it restricts popular<br />
participation to a procedural minimum (election as magistracy designation)”<br />
(Urbinati 2006, 23). This is why these forms of representation<br />
6<br />
“[…] The juridical configures the relationship between represented and representative<br />
along the lines of an individualistic and nonpolitical logic insofar as it presumes that<br />
electors pass judgment on candidates’ personal qualities, rather than their political ideas<br />
and projects” (Urbinati 2006, 22).