Download This Paper'... What the Hell Do You Think You are Doing There ...?' Comparing Politicians' Practical Theories of Democracy
19 Pages Posted: 13 Aug 2009 Last revised: 30 Sep 2009
Date Written: 2009
Abstract
To find out what politicians and other political actors think about democracy – or even, what democracy is in their conception – seems like a natural object of interest for political scientists. Yet, 36 years after Robert Putnam’s pioneering study “The Beliefs of Politicians” (1973) it is safe to say that this is not the case. We will argue that this omission is based on several conceptual misunderstandings of the relation between democratic theory and democratic practice driving the two ever further apart.
Keywords: democracy, politicians, representation, theory, culture
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation
Petersen, Jürgen and Borchert, Jens, '... What the Hell Do You Think You are Doing There ...?' Comparing Politicians' Practical Theories of Democracy (2009). APSA 2009 Toronto Meeting Paper, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1450302
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