User:ObeliskBJM/Sandbox

The outlook of Democratic Future is indicated by its name. The founders of this new magazine share the opinion that democracy is not merely an established fact, but an ongoing development, inscribed in the process of social becoming. Social and economic changes, in the same moment that they create new situations of domination and subjection, reveal a future of new and ever-broadening demands for democratic self-government. The purpose of Democratic Future is to examine, to make known, and to support these struggles for self-government wherever they arise.

The editors and supporters of Democratic Future come from a diversity of political traditions and represent a broad spectrum of political, social, and moral opinion. We are liberals, democrats, socialists, libertarians, republicans. But we are brought together by the common task of studying the democratic method and of promoting its adaptation to new social situations –the workplace, the corporation, and the international institutions with which the world’s states entrust a growing number of their traditional powers, just to name a few. A large part of Democratic Future’s purpose is to demonstrate in practice our conviction that, in the complex and rapidly changing world of today, the fight for democratic self-government has not ended; it has merely assumed new forms, shifted to new grounds, and acquired diverse and unforeseen protagonists.

The aims of Democratic Future can be summarized under four main headings:


 * First, we aim to study democracy and democratic movements. A large part of Democratic Future’s work will be devoted to interpreting the meaning, or meanings, of democracy, both as a method and as a system of government existing under determinate historical conditions. We shall also concentrate on examining democratic movements and campaigns, past and present, in all social situations; and on investigating political, economic, social, and cultural issues relevant to democratic theory and practice.


 * Second, we aim to defend the vital importance, in a democratic society, of the liberal values of self-government, pluralism, political discourse, and moral freedom, as well as the socialist values of solidarity and collective action. Of all the modern world’s political movements, Liberalism and Socialism have made the greatest and most lasting contributions to democracy. Certainly, the relationship of each tradition to democratic government has been at times ambiguous, at times openly hostile. Nonetheless, the critical analyses of democracy offered by Liberalism and Socialism have done a great service for democratic theory and practice. From Liberalism, democrats have learned to reconcile democracy with the rights and the initiative of the individual; from Socialism, that the problems of establishing and maintaining democracy, though they are political problems at heart, contain economic and social elements which cannot be ignored. Thus, though sometimes unwitting, these great movements have largely crafted the world of liberal and social democracies in which we live today. Liberalism and Socialism continue to inform Democratic Future’s perspectives on the enrichment of democratic life.


 * Third, we aim to contribute to a vibrant, critical, and reflective democratic culture. The founders of Democratic Future are united in opposing the populist radicalization of our democracies; we stand for a reasoned public discourse. To stand against the extremes, the radicalizations, and the manipulations of democracy, we uphold its norms: pluralism, dialogue, and the search for a consensus which, far from ever being all-encompassing, (a contrat social on the model of Rousseau's,) can only be called provisional.


 * Fourth, we aim to promote the extension of the democratic method to existing, and emerging relationships of domination and subjection. Democratic Future will investigate the feasibility of establishing self-government in those settings, among them the workplace, the corporation, and international bodies, currently subject to the laws of autocracy or oligarchy. We will stress the importance of not merely transplanting democratic forms to new settings, for which they may be ill-adapted, and their intended recipients unready to make use of them. The democratic method must be adapted to particular circumstances; the citizens must be made to feel a strong sense of dignity, autonomy, responsibility, and mutual respect.