Democracy Today.indb - Universidade do Minho
Democracy Today.indb - Universidade do Minho
Democracy Today.indb - Universidade do Minho
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from something that is an instant of delegation into a political process<br />
of representation.<br />
This theory brings with it the second surplus. Representation is<br />
coupled with a temporal framework, or a temporal narrative. In this<br />
way representation itself becomes the telling of a story, the process<br />
of history, as the circular relationship between state and society is a<br />
never-ending play taking place from election to election.<br />
Power and Politics<br />
After having pointed to the two surpluses that are characteristic of<br />
representative democracy, I will now look at what it means for the role<br />
of power and for our understanding of politics. The characterization<br />
of representation as having constitutive capacities makes us aware of<br />
the “dark side” of political representation (Saward 2006, 314). Giving<br />
decision-making capacities to a representative is the basic trait of the<br />
creation of power. For Ankersmit power finds its origin in the aesthetic<br />
gap between the ruler and the ruled (1996, 105). [8] As representation<br />
is suited with the power to create and possibly transform the identity<br />
of the represented it also disposes of the power to misrepresent and<br />
to commit a coup on the identity of the represented. It is a thin line<br />
between using and abusing the power to represent.<br />
It is clear that the juridical and institutional theories of representation<br />
leave too much space to the representative to (ab)use the<br />
delegated power. The contract-relation we there described can be<br />
read in light of what we know as trusteeship. It is an elitist rendition<br />
of representation, as the representative is entrusted to judge about its<br />
relation to society. There can be good reasons to give extensive room<br />
of manoeuvre to the representative, for example because “no citizen<br />
can participate in all decisions that affect them”, but as Castiglione<br />
and Warren correctly remark, “as pure trustees, no democratic element<br />
remains, and representatives are little more than paternalistic<br />
aristocrats” (2006, 8-9).<br />
51<br />
GOVERNANCE<br />
THROUGH THE LENS OF<br />
REPRESENTATION<br />
Femmy Thewissen<br />
8<br />
I want to remark that he contests the vision of “Lefort [who] situates its origin in a sphere<br />
beyond both the ruler and the ruled” (Ankersmit 1996, 108). The topic of the origin and<br />
localization of power needs further investigation.