The Place of Voting in the Ethics of Counterspeech

Dados Bibliográficos

ID21701774
AutoresChiara Fumagalli (0000-0002-5402-162X, South African Institute for Medical Research, autor correspondente)
Ano2023
Volume26
Fascículo4
Páginas595-609
Data de publicação2023-09-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoEthical Theory and Moral Practice (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 1386-2820 • E-ISSN: 1572-8447
EditoraSpringer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1007/s10677-022-10356-y
OpenAlexW4316653357
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas4
Referências citadas28

The literature on counterspeech has been debating how institutions and citizens should respond to offensive or dangerous communicative acts. This article identifies a gap in this debate, namely, the lack of attention paid to the individual vote in large-scale democratic elections as an effective act of distancing from candidates who use explicitly derogatory forms of expression to unify and mobilize supporters. In studying the place of voting in the ethics of counterspeech, this article investigates what counterspeakers can expect other counterspeakers to do in large-scale democratic elections framed as a vote for or against hateful representatives. I argue that even in large-scale elections, the individual act of voting, understood as a contribution to increasing the clarity of the indicators of force of a collectivized speech act, can be an effective form of counterspeech. Voting is one of the first forms of counterspeech that must be taken so that other, and perhaps more controversial, actions can stand criticism on moral grounds. For this reason, I also argue that counterspeakers can expect other counterspeakers to contribute to an electoral outcome that, under certain circumstances, can be received as a vote against representatives who use explicit derogatory forms of expression to gain consensus

CLARITY · Criticism · Democracy · Economics · Law and economics · Offensive · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Voting · Hate Speech and Cyberbullying Detection · Law · Political Philosophy and Ethics · Populism, Right-Wing Movements