Freedom and Political Form: On Philip Pettit’s Republican Theory of Democracy

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article critically engages with Philip Pettit’s republican political philosophy, and with his republican theory of democracy in particular. After a brief summary of Pettit’s conceptualisation of freedom as non-domination, the paper focuses on the question as to which institutional arrangement Pettit considers commensurate with this normative ideal. The paper prepares the ground for a critical reconstruction of Pettit’s theory of democracy by highlighting the understanding of democracy in the republican tradition within which Pettit aims to develop his contemporary theory of democracy. The reconstruction leads to the argument that Pettit, in neo-Roman republican tradition, has written “the people” as a transformative actor out of the script of democratic theory.