Abstract
In democratic Athens it was the practice to use a vermilion-smeared rope to drive citizens from the market-place (the agora) to the assembly on the pnyx.1 Thus it would seem that Athenians fell somewhat short of Rousseau’s ideal that men would ‘fly to the assembly’ and that, even in this most politicised of communities, they were inclined to stay around in the market, trading for their own advantage. This reluctance to use one’s political voice may, perhaps, be reflected in the ambivalent relationship between states and markets which has run through political thought. What is it that people can do or that they prefer to do through politics which they cannot do through the market?
We acknowledge with gratitude the support of the Economic and Social Research Council under Grant No. E0022003.
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Notes
Aristophanes, The Akharnians, ed. A. H. Sommerstein, (Warminster: Aris and Phillips, 1980) lines 19–22. For interpretations of this device see R. K. Sinclair, Democracy and Participation in Athens (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988) pp. 116–17.
H. Arendt, The Human Condition (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1958) p. 179.
The importance of speech or dialogue and communication in Arendt and in the work of Habermas is interestingly discussed by R. Beiner, Political Judgment (London: Methuen: 1983) pp. 11–30;
M. Canovan, ‘A Case of Distorted Communication: A Note on Habermas and Arendt’, Political Theory, 11 (1983), 105–16;
D. Miller, Market, State and Community: Theoretical Foundations of Market Socialism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989) pp. 261–7.
This is despite inadequacies in Arendt’s own understanding of ordinary democratic processes. See B. Parekh, Contemporary Political Thinkers (Oxford: Martin Robertson, 1982) pp. 18–20.
J. Elster, ‘The Market and the Forum’, in J. Elster and A. Hylland (eds) Foundations of Social Choice Theory (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986) pp. 103–4 (emphasis in the original).
K. B. Smellie, A Hundred Years of English Government (London: Duckworth, 1950) p. 10.
A. Pizzorno, ‘An Introduction to the theory of political participation’, Social Science Information, 9 (1971), p. 36.
S. Verba and N. H. Nie, Participation in America: Political Democracy and Social Equality (New York: Harper and Row, 1972);
S. Verba, N. H. Nie and J-O. Kim, Participation and Political Equality: A Seven-Nation Comparison (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978);
N. H. Nie, S. Verba, H. Brady, K. Schlozman and J. Lunn, ‘Participation in America: Continuity and Change’. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association, Chicago, Illinois, 1988.
In addition there were local studies of six specially selected communities covering a further 1,600 citizens and some 300 local leaders. Full details will appear in G. Parry, G. Moyser and N. Day, Political Participation and Democracy in Britain (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991. See also
G. Parry and G. Moyser, ‘A Map of Political Participation in Britain’, Government and Opposition, 25 (1990), 147–69.
See A. Heath, R. Jowell and J. Curtice, How Britain Votes (Oxford, Pergamon Press, 1985) pp. 13–16. We use here their five-fold scheme distinguishing salariat, routine non-manual, petty bourgeoisie and farmers, manual technicians and foreman, and working class.
Compare K. Schlozman and S. Verba, Injury to Insult: Unemployment, Class and Political Response, (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1979);
H. McClosky and J. Zaller, The American Ethos: Public Attitudes toward Capitalism and Democracy, (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1984.)
Whilst the relevant question did not employ the term ‘political’, it did ask about ‘issues, needs and problems that people might consider taking action on: actions such as contacting a local councillor or official, signing a petition, joining in a national protest march or working in a group’. It is the case that the vast majority of respondents did not think of the actions taken as ‘political’. See G. Parry and G. Moyser, ‘What is “Politics”?: A Comparative Study of Local Citizens and Leaders’, in D. Sainsbury (ed.), Democracy, State and Justice: Critical Perspectives and New Interpretations (Stockholm: Almqvist and Wiksell International, 1988) pp. 33–54.
G. Parry and G. Moyser ‘A Map of Political Participation in Britain’, pp. 160–3. There are somewhat comparable findings for the Netherlands, West Germany and the United States in M. Kent Jennings and J. van Deth et al., Continuities in Political Action: A Longitudinal Study of Political Orientations in Three Western Democracies (Berlin and New York: de Gruyter, 1990) pp. 364–71.
See S. Barnes, M. Kaase et al., Political Action: Mass Participation in Five Western Democracies, (Beverly Hills and London: Sage, 1979); See also
C. Rootes, ‘On the Future of Protest Politics in Western Democracies — A Critique of Barnes, Kaase et al, Political Action’, European Journal of Political Research, 9 (1981), 421–32.
Compare the analyses in R. Jowell and C. Airey, British Social Attitudes: the 1984 Report (Aldershot: Gower, 1984) pp. 20–7;
R. Jowell, S. Witherspoon and L. Brook, British Social Attitudes: the 1987 Report, (Aldershot: Gower, 1987) pp. 55–9.
See R. J. Dalton, Citizen Politics in Western Democracies: Public Opinion and Political Parties in the United States, Great Britain, West Germany and France (Chatham, N. J.: Chatham House, 1988) p. 40. See also
I. Crewe ‘Electoral Participation’ in D. Butler, H. Penniman and A. Ranney, Democracy at the Polls: A Comparative Study of Competitive National Elections (Washington: American Enterprise Institute, 1981) pp. 216–63.
See M. Walzer, Spheres of Justice: A Defence of Pluralism and Equality, (Oxford: Martin Robertson, 1983) pp. 95–128;
R. A. Dahl, Dilemmas of Pluralist Democracy: Autonomy vs. Control (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1982) pp. 170–2.
We necessarily concentrate here only on the egalitarian aspects of such democratic technology. There is a host of arguments for and against such devices — technical, moral and logical. For some discussions see for example F. C. Arterton, Teledemocracy: Can Technology Protect Democracy? (Newbury Park: Sage, 1987);
I. McLean, Democracy and New Technology (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989);
B. Barber, Strong Democracy: Participatory Politics for a New Age, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984) pp. 273–90;
G. Sartori, The Theory of Democracy Revisited (Chatham N. J.: Chatham House, 1987) pp. 111–20, 246–7.
See P. Hoggett and R. Hambleton (eds), Decentralisation and Democracy: Localising Public Services (University of Bristol, School for Advanced Urban Studies, 1987) pp. 9–28, 53–83; R. Hambleton, P. Hoggett and F. Tolan, ‘The Decentralisation of Public Services: A Research Agenda’, Local Government Studies, (1989) 39–56. Also,
R. I. Hadley and S. Hatch, Social Welfare and the Failure of the State (London: Allen and Unwin) 1981.
A. O. Hirschman, Exit, Voice and Loyalty: Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations and States (Cambridge Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1970).
See comments reported in G. Parry, G. Moyser and M. Wagstaffe, ‘The Crowd and the Community: Context, Content and Aftermath’, in G. Gaskell and R. Benewick (eds), The Crowd in Contemporary Britain (London: Sage, 1987) pp. 248–50.
For an examination of the drawbacks as well as the claims on behalf of decentralisation see B. C. Smith, Decentralisation: The Territorial Dimension of the State (London: Allen and Unwin, 1985).
See Parry and Moyser, ‘A Map of Political Participation’, (1990).
See R. Dahl and E. Tufte, Size and Democracy (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1974) pp. 134–42.
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© 1991 Michael Moran and Maurice Wright
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Parry, G., Moyser, G. (1991). Voices and Signals — Active Citizens and the Market-Place. In: Moran, M., Wright, M. (eds) The Market and the State. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-21619-2_5
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