De-presentation rights as a response to extremism

Abstract

Due to the persistent rise of extremism, democrats in recent years have been exploring old and new possibilities of democratic self-defence. This article explores an unconventional and little known alternative to militant democracy that places the demos at the centre stage of the struggle against extremism. Through a neo-procedural reinterpretation of ancient ostracism and modern-day recall, I suggest that citizens should have rights of democratic de-selection of elected parties and candidates. I argue that, if properly designed, such a mechanism of de-presentation distributes the burden of democratic self-defence among citizens and creates a bottom-up majoritarian resistance to anti-democratic threats, without compromising free parliamentary mandate or minority rights.

Keywords:

• representation
• de-selection
• ostracism
• recall
• militant democracy
• democratic self-defence
• extremism

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank all my interlocutors at three seminars in Adelaide, Sydney and the Swedish Archipelago during spring 2015, and, especially my co-editor Lisa Hill and the anonymous reviewer for their valuable comments on earlier drafts of this article.

Notes

This paper was presented in spring 2015 at the universities of Adelaide, Sydney and Uppsala.

1. Consider, for example, the case of Greece today: while the anti-democratic extremist Golden Dawn has been increasing in popularity, the quasi-bankrupt state clearly lacks financial resources (and time) to offer universal welfare as a means to counteract political extremism.

2. See, for example, the right-wing terrorism backed by Golden Dawn in Greece (Lowen 2013).

3. For a normative justification of compulsory voting see Hill in this volume.

4. The question of whether the grounds for having a recall should be open-ended or pre-determined is a contentious one (see Judge 2012).

5. As noted above, such adjustment should involve restrictions on the frequency of use and a high participation quorum, as well as an explicitly laid out rationale.

6. There are of course different views about the required quota for triggering a recall. In ostracism, a quorum of 6000 potsherds was required, i.e.10% (Rhodes 2004, p. 3). In the most US states today, the threshold for a valid recall is 25% of the actual turnout in the last regular elections, though some have lower thresholds (e.g. 12% in California), while others have higher (e.g. 40% of eligible voters in British Columbia, 50% in Nigeria) (IDEA 2008, pp. 111–112, 119–120).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the European Commission FP7 Marie Curie Actions [grant number 625351].