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  1. Home
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  3. The Democratic Horizon
  • Cited by 56
Publisher:
Cambridge University Press
Online publication date:
March 2014
Print publication year:
2014
Online ISBN:
9781139565004
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139565004
Subjects:
Politics and International Relations, International Relations and International Organisations, Philosophy, Political Philosophy
Information

Book description

Alessandro Ferrara explains what he terms 'the democratic horizon' - the idea that democracy is no longer simply one form of government among others, but is instead almost universally regarded as the only legitimate form of government, the horizon to which most of us look. Professor Ferrara reviews the challenges under which democracies must operate, focusing on hyperpluralism, and impresses a new twist onto the framework of political liberalism. He shows that distinguishing real democracies from imitations can be difficult, responding to this predicament by enriching readers' understanding of the spirit of democracy; clearing readers' views of pluralism from residues of ethnocentrism; and conceiving multiple versions of democratic culture, rooted in the diversity of civilizational contexts.

Reviews

‘A major contribution to contemporary political philosophy, which analyzes the pitfalls and promises of liberal democracies by emphasizing the spirit of democracy and imaginative openness. Alessandro Ferrara develops a set of innovative categories such as hyperpluralism, conjectural strategies, and the multivariate democratic polity to offer solutions to present quandaries.'

Seyla Benhabib - Eugene Meyer Professor of Political Science and Philosophy, Yale University

'In this brilliant and wide-ranging work, Alessandro Ferrara demonstrates the capacity of some of the core ideas of political liberalism to deepen and renew the ethos and imaginative horizons of modern democracy in what appear to be inhospitable times.'

Charles Larmore - W. Duncan MacMillan Family Professor in the Humanities, Brown University

'Alessandro Ferrara forcefully confronts twenty-first-century realities that pose very real challenges to the future of democracy and responds with fresh proposals that emerged from engaged dialogue with a remarkably broad range of political philosophers, legal theorists, and political scientists. This is a breakthrough book.'

Bruce Ackerman - Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science, Yale University

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