Liberal Legitimacy and the Question of Respect

DOIhttp://doi.org/10.1111/raju.12051
Published date01 September 2014
AuthorKlemen Jaklic
Date01 September 2014
Liberal Legitimacy
and the Question of Respect
KLEMEN JAKLIC*
Abstract. In a modern pluralist society, the idea of liberal legitimacy as proposed by
John Rawls offers a promising foundation for the further historic advancement of
democracy. However, liberal legitimacy still seems to lack one key element—a
unique type of respect at its foundations—without which such democratic advance-
ment may not be achieved. Nor, on closer inspection, could the idea of liberal
legitimacy succeed without this particular type of respect. When further refined at
its foundation, arguably liberal legitimacy could open doors to previously unat-
tainable improvements in democracy and legitimacy.
1. In Search of a Foundation
My approach to the examination of the concept of liberal legitimacy is contextual. I
approach it through the perspective of my broader work (Jaklic 2012, 2014) on Europe
and the future of democracy.I believe this strategy to be important since it is by this
route that it is possible to shed some new light on the core of the idea. This way we
can detect the remaining weakness at the heart of liberal legitimacy, and then point
to the way in which this can be remedied, and the idea further improved. Let me thus
begin this examination of liberal legitimacy and the question of respect with a few
remarks on Europe and democracy. This will naturally lead on to the discussion
about liberal legitimacy, while also crucially informing that argument.
It is conventionally understood that democracy is one of the biggest problems
of European integration. The “democratic deficit” is seen as the most serious defect
of the new Europe. Some think that it is malignant, and that in order to preserve
democracy we should revert to fully sovereign and democratic nation-states.
Others believe that, given the advantages brought by the EU in this age of
globalization, it is the type of imperfection that could perhaps be lived with, or that
we could try to live with. What unites the various traditional perspectives is the
conventional view that the globalizing Europe has clearly suffered in democratic
* I would like to thank Frank Michelman for the privilege of all those unforgettable
discussions on this issue, his priceless insights, and attentive support without which this piece
would never have been written. I am indebted to him, though any remaining errors are my
own.
bs_bs_banner
Ratio Juris. Vol. 27 No. 3 September 2014 (409–39)
© 2014 The Author. Ratio Juris © 2014 John Wiley& Sons Ltd, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main
Street, Malden 02148, USA.
terms, that it continues to do so, and that further strengthening of the EU
institutions would probably not be the best thing for democratic values.
This is indeed a serious concern, as well as an immense practical problem. On the
one hand, the EU institutions and some influential Member-States are eager to
continue the process of integration, irrespective of the alleged democratic deficit.
They refer to other pressures in the globalizing world that call for further such
development. On the other hand, others protest fiercely. They feel that they are
being led by elites far removed from the grassroots, and that further strengthening
of Europe is thus tantamount to stealing power from those who are entitled to it:
the people. The failure to ratify the Constitution for Europe as well as the serious
problems with the ratification of the Lisbon Treaty are but the surface manifesta-
tions of these deeply rooted feelings.
The puzzle of democracy in Europe is intricate and has reached a stage which to
many seems to be hopeless. This is not a good time for democracy. At least that is
the conventional view. In my broader work on democracy, however, I propose a
radically different thesis. The argument is that, though in democratic deficit, Europe
has paradoxically found itself at an unprecedented historic turning point that opens
up the possibility of providing the concept of democracy with improvements of
historic proportions. These proportions are comparable in breadth and significance
only perhaps to the “first coming” (Dunn 2005, 23) of democracy in human history
in ancient Greece and its “second coming” (ibid., 71) in the aftermath of the French
and American revolutions. Arguably both the traditional views on Europe and
democracy are underpinned by conventional assumptions about democracy and
are thus placed within too narrow a perspective. From a more historical perspec-
tive, there may be an elegant solution to the seemingly hopeless puzzle. The elegant
way out, it is suggested, ultimately leads to a third historical leap of democracy that
originates in Europe as a result of the new post-sovereign configuration that makes
such an improvement possible for the first time. If true, this would not only enable
the Old Continent to solve its current weakness, but also to turn it into a historical
solution, not only for Europe, but potentially for the world and the concept of
democracy as such. Provided that, in this new post-sovereign European context,
matters are correctly constitutionalized at the level of essential constitutional
principles, this would then gradually, but inevitably, lead humanity to a full-blown
realization of the third democratic leap.
Any project with a democratic aim of this sort will inevitably have a starting
point with deep foundations. This means foundations at a level even prior to the
constitutional essentials. Such foundations are just as crucial since they give rise to
those essentials in the first place. Here, at this deepest level, we are not working
from a clean slate. Long before our moment, theorists tirelessly pursued the
question of how to construct the best political system. Naturally, the different
approaches include some that are more promising for our democratic objective than
others, as well as those that would not be capable of realizing the historic
democratic potential of the new European context.
At one end of the spectrum there is the wide-ranging group of traditional
approaches that do not sufficiently take reasonablepluralism into account. This is the
fact about the human condition that only the age of modern democratic society,more
than any other era thus far, has managed to fully reveal. By ignoring this and instead
externally (heteronomously) prescribing more than the “other” could reasonably
410 Klemen Jaklic
© 2014 The Author. Ratio Juris © 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd. Ratio Juris, Vol. 27, No. 3

To continue reading

Request your trial

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT