University and deliberative democracy. towards citizenship education

Abstract

Deliberative democracy represents one of the most relevant political theories and it has acquired a growing importance within political debates and practices. However it presents some crucial problems in relation to the very high standards of rationality required to citizens for the deliberative process, in particular regarding the problem of public ignorance and the capabilities' deficit. Amid these problems this article argues in favour of the necessity of education to political life as an unavoidable precondition for deliberative democracy. Since the theory is mainly concerned with the participation of adults within society, the task of offering possible solutions to these questions evidently stands on the shoulders of university education. The article calls for a fundamental ethical and social role of university within society without which the gap between the abstract theory of deliberative democracy and its real practices would determine its complete rejection and any form of democratic participation would ultimately be meaningless, if not dangerous.