Post‐conventional Political Cultures via Processes of Direct Democracy

Theoretical Considerations Based on Jürgen Habermas and Lawrence Kohlberg

Bibliographic Data

ID6384247
AuthorsRolf Rauschenbach (corresponding author)
Year2012
Volume18
Issue4
Pages477-497
Publication date2012-12-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSwiss Political Science Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1424-7755 • E-ISSN: 1662-6370
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/spsr.12001
OpenAlexW2058462642
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited17

In this article, it is proposed to differentiate political cultures in two dimensions. First, inspired by Habermas' distinction of the contents of discourse, a distinction is suggested between moral, ethical‐political and pragmatic elements of political culture as well as of an element of culture of balancing interests. Second, inspired by Kohlberg's stage models for the development of the individual moral consciousness and for moral culture, a distinction is similarly suggested between two pre‐conventional, two conventional and two post‐conventional collective stages of political culture. It can be shown that from a normative point of view, only deliberations made in a post‐conventional political culture can produce reasonable or at least fair results. Conceptual considerations indicate processes of direct democracy as the method for promoting post‐conventional political cultures. The more liberty that the citizens have to formulate and trigger processes of direct democracy, the more one can expect from them to generate post‐conventional political cultures

Democracy · Environmental ethics · Epistemology · Lawrence Kohlberg's stages of moral development · Moral reasoning · Normative · Normative model of decision-making · Political culture · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Critical Theory and Philosophy · Law · Philosophy · Political Philosophy and Ethics · Social Media and Politics

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