My dissertation defends a comprehensive version of meta-nonnative skepticism which holds that no standard, norm, or principle has objective authority or normative force. The view does not deny either that there are norms, standards of correctness, and principles of various kinds or that it is possible both to succeed or fail in measuring up to their prerogatives. What it does deny is that any norm has the status of commanding with objective authority, the status of giving rise to objective normative reasons to take seriously and follow its demands. Many believe objective authority is required if we are to make sense of and explain the significance of our normative practices. Without authority, they fear, any critical standpoint vis-à-vis our practices would evaporate, even when we have reached a consensus regarding critical matters, which, without correctness, appears to reflect nothing but an ultimately arbitrary choice. I disagree, and argue that while authority cannot be accommodated within the world as we know it, we don't need it either. A chief goal of my dissertation is to propose a positive interpretation of our normative practices that dispenses with authoritative facts directing us what to do. The practical question of what to make of our practices and our involvement with them, I counter, retains significance only when pursued from an engaged rather than a detached perspective - one that we adopt when, driven by our concerns and commitments, we actively participate in the resolution of practical problems, including the selection and development of norms to live by, searching for common ground for how to coordinate our individual and joint endeavors. Even though there are no definitive answers, this deliberative enterprise is not unconstrained; it is carried out within a tight web of norms that we do already accept, a web we continuously spin and expand.

With a background in the 17th century’s English political events, but also the ideological scene of that time, the purpose of this essay is to analyze two concepts, freedom and happiness, in Thomas Hobbes’s political writings. Hobbes is well known for his political works, mostly for Leviathan, where his thoughts about government and religion are exposed. But what does he say about freedom? And what about happiness? The study shows that Hobbes’s political thought is quite original from this aspect too. Freedom and happiness are defined both from an individual and a political perspective. His philosophical system is based on materialism and mechanism, and so is his view on the concepts of freedom and happiness. In the study of the concept of freedom attention is paid to another concept associated in a way with freedom: free will. Both Hobbes’ view on free will and the connection between the two of them are highlighted. The aim is to find a connection between freedom and happiness in Hobbes political philosophy. It is found, but it changes according to the perspective one starts to look at it. The title is a question: You are free, so are you happy? Looking into Hobbes’s political writings an attempt to answer this question is made. One conclusion can be: one can be both free and happy as part of a society.

Conventional accounts of classical Athenian democracy represent the assembly as the primary democratic institution in the Athenian political system. This looks reasonable in the light of modern democracy, which has typically developed through the democratization of legislative assemblies. Yet it conflicts with the evidence at our disposal. Our ancient sources suggest that the most significant and distinctively democratic institution in Athens was the courts, where decisions were made by large panels of randomly selected ordinary citizens with no possibility of appeal. This dissertation reinterprets Athenian democracy as “dikastic democracy” (from the Greek dikastēs, “judge”), defined as a mode of government in which ordinary citizens rule principally through their control of the administration of justice. It begins by casting doubt on two major planks in the modern interpretation of Athenian democracy: first, that it rested on a conception of the “wisdom of the multitude” akin to that advanced by epistemic democrats today, and second that it was “deliberative,” meaning that mass discussion of political matters played a defining role. The first plank rests largely on an argument made by Aristotle in support of mass political participation, which I show has been comprehensively misunderstood. The second rests on the interpretation of the verb “bouleuomai” as indicating speech, but I suggest that it meant internal reflection in both the courts and the assembly. The third chapter begins the constructive part of the project by comparing the assembly and courts as instruments of democracy in Athens, and the fourth shows how a focus on the courts reveals the deep political dimensions of Plato’s work, which in turn suggests one reason why modern democratic ideology and practice have moved so far from the Athenians’ on this score. Throughout, the dissertation combines textual, philological and conceptual analysis with attention to institutional detail and the wider historical context. The resulting account makes a strong case for the relevance of classical Athens today, both as a source of potentially useful procedural mechanisms and as the point of origin of some of the philosophical presuppositions on which the modern conception of democracy and its limits depends. / Government

Mexico's innovative health reforms have attracted scholarly attention beyond its own borders, making it a valuable case to study how countries set priorities. This dissertation examines the multifaceted topic of priority setting through a multidisciplinary approach: each of the three papers of this dissertation employs one of three disciplinary perspectives: historical, quantitative or normative. The dual focus on mental health and HIV--two highly stigmatized diseases with almost opposite histories of prioritization--further underscores the social and historical aspects of health priority setting.

My dissertation develops and defends a contemporary Aristotelian form of political liberalism. I articulate an Aristotelian interpretation of individual autonomy as excellence in deliberating about ends, and develop a decision-theoretic model for representing this type of deliberation. I then provide a precise characterization of individual freedom, building on Amartya Sen’s neo-Aristotelian theory of freedom as capability. I argue that we should understand individual liberty, the guiding value of political liberalism, as a compound of autonomy and freedom as I have articulated these notions. I then argue that liberty in this sense is the proper focus of a liberal theory of distributive justice. I provide a teleological justification of the state’s authority to pursue a liberty-based program of distributive justice, and argue for a liberty-based interpretation of the harm principle as the appropriate limitation on state action. / text

If Aristotle was right in claiming that the aim of moral philosophy is to help us determine how we ought to live, then part of the aim of moral philosophy must be to help us improve our prescriptive accounts of moral decision making--our accounts of how we should make moral decisions. In my dissertation I examine implications of empirical research in cognitive science, social psychology, and decision theory for issues in moral decision making. I argue that empirical evidence suggests that principled guidance is in fact beneficial for decision making, which calls into question particularist prescriptive accounts. I also argue that contrary to the prevailing view, research suggests that taking a first-person perspective when making judgments about what we ought to do might actually help us make better moral judgments. Additionally, I argue that jurors will be more likely to make fairer and more accurate judgments by taking the perspective of the defendant than by trying to maintain a detached and 'objective' point of view.

Emerging online discussions in a Weibo (micro-blogging) platform argue for the new possibility of online deliberation in Chinese cyberspace. In order to ascertain the extent to which this platform is being used, the author has conducted a case study to measure the quality of deliberation of an online discussion of genetically modified (GM) foods in the comment section of posts written by Mr. Cui and Mr. Fang on Tencent Weibo. In order to gain a comprehensive understanding of the data, both methods of Discourse Quality Index (DQI) and interview have been used. The findings of the research indicate that the online discussion fails to meet two necessary criteria of deliberation: rational and logical statements and consensus building. However, the study results are not totally negative, since the levels of interaction, information exchange, mutual understanding and neutral expression are relatively high. According to the author, in the contemporary stage, online authoritarian deliberation faces many problems in the PRC. At micro level, first, online expression is irrational and illogical; second, it is hard to reach consensus building; third, participants are stubborn to their pre-given wills; forth, some people are indifferent to online discussions. At macro level, first, most of the online discussions have low external impact on decision-making; second, the strong government control may hinder the development of online deliberation.

This thesis investigates how rural communities negotiate the development of renewable energy projects. Public and local community acceptance of these new technologies in rural areas around the world is uncertain and spatially uneven and represents an area of emerging public policy interest and one where scholarly theory is rapidly developing. This thesis uses Habermasian concepts of public sphere, communicative action and deliberative democracy, as well as the concept of “wicked problems” from the planning studies literature combined with geographical concepts of place and scale to advance theoretical and empirical understanding of how public opinion on renewable energy technologies is formed in place. It documents energy use patterns, attitudes and sociopolitical relations at a time when considerable state and business efforts are directed at the construction of solar, wind, biomass and small-hydro technologies in rural regions. These concepts and theories are applied in a case study of rural communities in the Eastern Ontario Highlands, an impoverished area undergoing rapid restructuring driven by centralization of services and amenity migration but with abundant natural resources in form of forests, numerous waterways and open space which have attracted a broad range of new energy developments. Overall high levels of support for alternative energy development particularly for solar power were found, albeit for reasons of local energy security and not for reasons of preventing climate change. There was some evidence that seasonal residents are less supportive of hydro and biomass projects than permanent residents possibly reflecting broader trends in rural economies away from productive uses of land to consumptive appreciation of rural landscapes. The thesis suggests that collective action to advance energy projects in the case study area require agreement along three world-claims (truth, rightness and truthfulness) and that communication leading to discourse which uncovers hitherto hidden reasons for action is possible. These findings offer rare empirical evidence of the predictions of deliberative democratic theory in environmental planning settings. However, multiple barriers to communicative action were also identified and there is evidence that the state’s reliance on market incentives may have long term costs in terms of diminished public reasoning around renewable energy.

The purpose of this study was to examine in which extent the comments about news in the comment fields, on Swedish news sites Facebook pages were deliberative. To fulfill this purpose we used a quantitative content analysis as a method to interpret the data that we collected about 2203 reader comments from three news sites Facebook pages. Jürgen Habermas theory about deliberative democracy together with theories about public space and Web 2.0 were the theories we based our study on. To determine that a comment was deliberative it had to contain an argument and be written with tolerance and respect. Our result showed that most comments lacked either one or both of these criteria’s and therefore weren’t deliberative. This study helps to show in which extent the comments about news on Facebook are deliberative.

Submitted by Tatiana Lima (tatianasl@ufba.br) on 2016-10-11T20:53:21Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Novaes, Flávio Santos.pdf: 1569915 bytes, checksum: e2ec2286f432c8c17766d42d09e1b7f5 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Tatiana Lima (tatianasl@ufba.br) on 2017-02-15T19:03:55Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Novaes, Flávio Santos.pdf: 1569915 bytes, checksum: e2ec2286f432c8c17766d42d09e1b7f5 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-02-15T19:03:55Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Novaes, Flávio Santos.pdf: 1569915 bytes, checksum: e2ec2286f432c8c17766d42d09e1b7f5 (MD5) / Esta pesquisa analisa a efetividade deliberativa de conselhos gestores de habitação em três municípios baianos: Salvador, Vitória da Conquista e Camaçari. Para tanto, recorre a técnicas qualitativas como entrevistas, pesquisa documental e observação, e se classifica como um estudo de caso múltiplo. O estudo discute os limites da democracia representativa brasileira, ainda com traços autoritários, conservadores e centralizadores do Estado, apesar dos esforços de movimentos sociais e de gestores públicos para ultrapassá-los, introduzindo instituições participativas na gestão pública. Para compreender os meios de ampliação da democracia representativa e o papel que os conselhos municipais de habitação podem exercer, este estudo utiliza conceitos como democracia participativa e deliberativa, deliberação pública e efetividade deliberativa. O objetivo é avaliar a efetividade deliberativa dos conselhos municipais de habitação, mediante a deliberação, aprovação e fiscalização de políticas públicas que supostamente contribuiriam para a universalização do direito à moradia e a solução de sérios problemas habitacionais dos municípios. Foram utilizadas categorias de análise como o contexto de criação desses fóruns e a ação da gestão municipal para assegurar seu caráter deliberativo, a ação de representantes da sociedade civil nas discussões e deliberações, a influência de interesses do capital imobiliário e da construção civil sobre as políticas municipais de habitação, e os efeitos das políticas habitacionais das esferas federal e estadual sobre as políticas municipais e os seus conselhos. Os resultados da pesquisa indicam que os conselhos de habitação não apresentam efetividade deliberativa na universalização do acesso à moradia de interesse social, pois carecem do apoio de gestões municipais, que não liberam recursos financeiros para os fundos de habitação, não convocam regularmente as reuniões ou não implementam integralmente suas deliberações. Os conselhos gestores e as políticas locais de habitação sofrem a influência indireta de interesses do capital imobiliário e da construção civil, interessados em projetos padronizados e de grande porte, a despeito de projetos diversificados de requalificação urbana em comunidades carentes. Os conselhos de habitação também perdem sua capacidade deliberativa quando os municípios dependem de transferências de recursos e se resumem à mera operacionalização de políticas habitacionais aprovadas por outros entes da federação. Assim, o caráter deliberativo dos conselhos de habitação é comprometido pelos resquícios autoritários e centralizadores do Estado brasileiro, pelo controle desses fóruns por representantes da gestão municipal, nem sempre comprometidos com sua democratização e com o seu fortalecimento, revelando uma assimetria de poder e de recursos, o despreparo técnico e político de conselheiros que representam segmentos da sociedade civil. Esses fatores impedem o avanço em direção a uma democracia participativa ou deliberativa, configurando o que conceituo como pós-participativismo na gestão pública. / This research analyzes the deliberative effectiveness of housing councils in three municipalities in Bahia: Salvador, Vitoria da Conquista and Camaçari. In order to accomplish this, it uses qualitative techniques such as interviews, documentary research and observation, and is classified as a multiple case study. This study discusses the limits of Brazilian representative democracy, still with authoritarian traits, conservative and centralized state, despite the efforts of social movements and public managers to overcome them, introducing participatory institutions in public administration. To understand the expansion of means of representative democracy and the role that municipal housing councils can exercise, this study uses concepts such as participatory and deliberative democracy, public deliberation and deliberative effectiveness. The objective is to evaluate the deliberative effectiveness of housing councils through deliberation, approval and monitoring of public policies that supposedly contribute to the universal right to housing and the solution of serious housing problems of municipalities. Further, categories of analysis were used as the context of creating these forums and the action of municipal management to ensure its deliberative character, the action of civil society counselors in their discussions and deliberations, the influence of interests of real estate capital on municipal housing policies, and the effects of housing policies at the federal and state levels on municipal policies and their councils. In addition, research results indicate that housing councils do not have deliberative effectiveness in universal access to housing of social interest because they lack the support of municipal administrations, which do not release budget for housing funds, do not regularly convene meetings or do not fully implement its deliberations. The management councils and local housing policies suffer the indirect influence of real estate capital interested in standard designs and large scale projects, despite diverse projects of urban regeneration in disadvantaged communities. Also, Housing councils lose their deliberative capacity when municipalities rely on funds transfers and reduce to mere operationalization of housing policies adopted by other federal entities. Thus, the deliberative character of housing councils is committed by Brazil's authoritarian remnants; the control of these forums by representatives of the municipal administration, not always compromised to democratization and its strengthening, revealing an asymmetry of power and resources, and civil society counselor’s lack of technical and political skills. These factors thwart progress toward a participatory or deliberative democracy, setting up what I conceptualize as ‘pós-participativismo’ in public management.