As the United States marks the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence amid democratic erosion, this article asks why 250 years of democratic development have not produced a multiracial democracy. It argues that the United States is a
herrenvolk
democracy—a regime in which democracy coexists with racialized limits on political membership and governing power. By examining colonial law, the Declaration, the Constitution, and the Naturalization Act of 1790, I show how the founding joined popular sovereignty to racial exclusion in ways that continue to shape struggles over belonging, representation, and coercive power. The legacy of 1776 includes both the Declaration’s democratic promise and a durable model for how democracy can coexist with exclusion.
Equality of voice and representation is a foundational value of American democracy anda prerequisite for democratic renewal and adaptation in the twenty-first century. This essay considers the potential and progress made toward three structural reforms – expanding the House of Representatives, implementing Supreme Cour...
Nationalism and democracy are often presented as natural allies: National self‐determination is best achieved through democratic institutions, while a shared national identity generates the trust and willingness to compromise that stable democracies need. This article, however, explores two possible points of confl...
David Miller· Nations and Nationalism· 0 citations
What virtues are necessary for democracy to succeed? This book turns to John Dewey and Reinhold Niebuhr, two of America’s most influential theorists of democracy, to answer this question. Dewey and Niebuhr both implied—although for very different reasons—that humility and mutuality are important virtues for the success...
This article critically explores council democracy as a utopian state order, on the basis of anarchist and Marxist works from western Europe and the United States, post-World War 2. As a system of national government, council democracy cannot possibly deliver on its utopian promises. Collective self-rule cannot put an...
E. van Ree· Philosophy & Social Crit...· 0 citations
This book traces the shifting contours of caste and agrarian inequality, revealing how older hierarchies are being reconfigured in new forms and how they impact democracy. It offers a compelling ethnographic account of how democratic mechanisms-including political participation, elections, and protest movements-actuall...
If political tyranny implies the exclusion of the people from public affairs, then freedom is the practice of common ownership of political institutions. Theodosiadis (2025:5-6) develops this approach by tracing its ancient Greek roots, clarifying its American traditions and identifying its institutional forms for a de...
Eleni Boliaki· Dianoesis· 0 citations
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