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ABSTRACT
The contemporary discourse of digitalisation suggests that the music world has been ‘democratised’ through technical protocols that allow for greater access and voice, and eliminate the need for intermediaries such as record company executives and professional music critics. Yet there is little engagement in this formulation with normative conceptions of democracy. Indeed, the formal similarities between technological platforms and democratic structures obscure what are far more significant substantive differences. Using examples of historical moments when the connection between music and normative conceptions of democracy in the US were significantly more robust, I consider developments that led to the hollowing out of such critical public discourse about music and analyse the transposition of meaning of key democratic terms. This work builds on Jeffrey Goldfarb's commitment to the relative autonomy of the arts and sciences and their central place in democratic public life.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 Cf. Nancy Fraser’s work on ‘progressive neoliberalism’ (Citation2017).