Justifying democracy and its authority

Abstract

In this paper I will discuss a recent attempt of justifying democracy and its authority. It pertains to recently published papers by Niko Kolodny, which complement each other and taken together practically assume a form of a monograph (Kolodny 2014a, Kolodny 2014b). It could be said that Kolodny’s approach is a non-standard one given that he avoids typical ways of justifying democracy. Namely, when a justification of democracy is concerned, Kolodny maintains that it is necessary to offer a kind of an independent justification. It is not so much that he insists that the usual approaches are wrong as much as that an independent justification is necessary in order to discern what it is that gives them their significance. Kolodny’s independent justification of democracy is based on the idea of social equality. In this paper I will try to reconstruct and critically assess Kolodny’s approach by paying special attention to the question of democratic authority.