Impartiality in Political Judgment: Deliberative Not Philosophical

Abstract

Is impartiality possible or desirable within the conduct of political judgment? Many philosophers and democratic theorists have answered this question with a resounding “no.” This article provides an affirmative answer to this question based upon the empirical study of deliberative democracy within “mini-publics.” Through a reconstruction of the phenomenology of deliberative democracy within groups, this article offers an alternative conception of impartiality that can overcome many of the political and philosophical challenges that have been raised about this quality. “Deliberative impartiality” is a group-mediated orientation born from reflective civic collaborations within deliberative processes that prioritize free, equal, and inclusive communicative participation. This process-dependent form of mutually enacted deliberative impartiality differs from the individual, cognitive “standpoint” model of impartiality that still informs much of the theoretical literature, and it is for this same reason an intriguing and overlooked approach to impartiality that is worthy of empirical and theoretical consideration.