Constitutional Deliberative Democracy in Europe

Min Reuchamps is Professor of political science at the Université catholique de Louvain, Belgium. He graduated in political science from the Université de Liège (licence and PhD) and from Boston University (Master of Arts). His teaching and research interests are federalism and multi-level governance, democracy and its different dimensions, as well as participatory and deliberative methods. He has published over ten books and edited volumes and his work has appeared in international journals such as Acta Politica, Ethnopolitics, Government & Opposition Party Politics, Politics, Politique et Sociétés, Regional and Federal Studies, Res Publica, Territory, Politics, Governance and West European Politics. He currently serves as the President of the French-speaking Belgian association for political science (ABSP). Jane Suiter is the Director of the Institute for Future Media and Journalism at Dublin City University. She is a senior lecturer at the School of Communications and her research interests focus on political participation, deliberation and the media. Jane is deputy research director of the Irish Constitutional Convention and founding member of We the Citizens. Jane has published widely and her work has appeared in journals such as Electoral Studies, Journal of Elections, Public Opinion and Parties, Parliamentary Affairs, International Political Science Review, Irish Political Studies and Politics.

Table of Contents

List of Figures and Tables vii

Contributors ix

Preface xiii

Chapter One – A Constitutional Turn for Deliberative

Democracy in Europe? 1

Jane Suiter and Min Reuchamps

Chapter Two – Participatory Constitutional Deliberation

in the Wake of Crisis: The Case of Iceland 15

Eirikur Bergmann

Chapter Three – The Irish Constitutional Convention:

A Case of ‘High Legitimacy’? 33

Jane Suiter, David M. Farrell and Clodagh Harris

Chapter Four – The Macro Political Uptake of the G1000

in Belgium 53

Vincent Jacquet, Jonathan Moskovic,

Didier Caluwaerts and Min Reuchamps

Chapter Five – Constitutional Deliberative Democracy

and Democratic Innovations 75

Brigitte Geissel and Sergiu Gherghina

Chapter Six – How Can Constitutional Reforms Be Deliberative?

The Hybrid Legitimacies of Constitutional Deliberative Democracy 93

Julien Talpin

Chapter Seven – Designing Mini-Publics for Constitutional

Deliberative Democracy 109

Kimmo Grönlund

Chapter Eight – Legitimacy without Visibility? On the

Role of Mini-Publics in the Democratic System 129

Stefan Rummens

Chapter Nine – Ideas of Constitutions and Deliberative

Democracy: A Conceptual Conclusion 147

John Parkinson

Index 169