Julia Cagé 民主的代價 金錢塑造政治

卡吉為更新我們的民主提出了三項雄心勃勃的建議：

1）嚴格限製民主的私人資助（限製為每年 200 歐元）； 

2）創建“民主平等券”（"bons pour l’égalité démocratique”——BED），旨在更新政黨和運動的資助。 每個公民在填寫納稅申報表時，都可以選擇獲得“優惠券”的政黨或運動，每年可獲得7歐元的公共資金； 

3）建立社會多樣性議會，其中三分之一的席位將保留給“社會代表”，這些代表是從反映人口社會職業多樣性的名單中選出的。

Cagé makes three ambitious proposals for renewing our democracy: 

1) a drastic limitation of the private funding of democracy (with a limit set at 200 euros a year); 

2) the creation of “democratic equality vouchers” (“bons pour l’égalité démocratique” – BED) aimed at renewing the funding of political parties and movements. Every citizen, when they fill out their tax return, would be able to choose the party or movement that will be given their “voucher”, for an annual amount of 7 euros of public money; 

3) the establishment of a Social Diversity Assembly, in which a third of seats would be reserved for “social representatives”, elected from lists that reflect the socio-professional diversity of the population.

用歐元投票

簡介：朱莉婭·卡格 (Julia Cagé)、民主獎、法亞德 (Fayard)

https://laviedesidees.fr/Voting-with-Euros

作者：Pierre-Yves Néron，2019 年 4 月 29 日，翻譯：Kate McNaughton

在法國和其他地方，政黨的資助方式往往會加強某些群體的隱形性和社會上最富有的人的政治影響力，特別是通過右翼政黨。 朱莉婭·卡吉想知道，是否有更民主的方式來資助民主？

在《民主的代價》一書中，朱莉婭·卡吉分析了包括法國在內的多個國家政黨的資助方式。 通過建立有關多個政治運動和政黨資助信息的數據庫，她為我們提供了當今民主資助方式的國際概覽。 她的書引導我們得出兩個主要結論，這些結論超越了她觀察到的不同國家之間的實質性差異：1）當前對民主的資助往往會延續並強化某些群體代表性的缺乏以及他們在政治上的隱形性。 在她研究的所有民主國家中，社會最富有的成員在民主生活的資助中所占的比重非常高。 2）如果我們要對此采取行動，最關鍵的戰場和對抗根源之一就是稅收。 你說話題度如何？

寡頭傾向？

如果她的書能幫助我們了解法國政治的現狀，部分原因是卡吉邀請我們遠離對法國政治的簡單慶祝。

“法國式民主”的健康狀況被認為可以輕鬆擺脫困擾美國民主的問題（第 67 頁）。

確實，美國政治運動的投入金額令人眼花繚亂：公司可以通過政治行動委員會（PAC）為自己選擇的事業提供大量資金，而公共政策對社會中較富裕的成員來說非常有利。 所有這一切甚至促使政治學家吉倫斯和佩奇得出結論：美國是一個事實上的寡頭社會。 因此，美國確實有一些自己的實際問題需要應對。 但卡吉研究的所有國家都存在類似的動態，包括法國和加拿大：富人的偏好受到係統性的迎合，而下層階級的偏好則被邊緣化，除了像這些罕見而令人高興的案例。 兩組利益一致。 這就是吉倫斯和佩奇所說的“巧合民主”，即隻有當下層階級的偏好由於各種原因與社會較富裕成員的偏好一致時才會被考慮。

確實，法國的特點是資金上限政策（因此私人向政黨或團體的捐款上限為7500歐元），並且禁止法人實體（包括公司）進行此類捐款。 但卡吉表明，這些措施並不能消除金錢與政治之間所有有問題的關係。 最重要的是，她揭示了構成法國政治生活的財政措施的不良影響。 筆者以一個年收入10萬歐元的個人為例，他捐贈了7500歐元。 政府將從這個人的稅款中扣除這筆金額的66%，即4950歐元，因此這筆捐款實際上讓這個人花費了2550歐元。 對於年收入 9700 歐元的公民（未婚者應納稅的最低金額）來說，7500 歐元的捐款實際上需要花費 7500 歐元。 簡而言之，資助體係掌握在社會最富有的成員手中，他們的捐款得到公共當局的補貼。

卡吉為更新我們的民主提出了三項雄心勃勃的建議：1）嚴格限製民主的私人資助（限製為每年 200 歐元）； 2）創建“民主平等券”（“bons pour l’égalité démocratique”——BED），旨在更新政黨和運動的資助。 每個公民在填寫納稅申報表時，都可以選擇獲得“優惠券”的政黨或運動，每年可獲得7歐元的公共資金； 3）建立社會多樣性議會，其中三分之一的席位將保留給“社會代表”，這些代表是從反映人口社會職業多樣性的名單中選出的。

更一般地說，《民主獎》記錄了不平等加劇背景下民主國家的功能失調。 因此，卡吉的工作繼承了政治學家吉倫斯和佩奇、法律專家理查德·海倫和拉裏·萊斯格或經濟學家托馬斯·皮凱蒂等學者的工作，他們都以自己的方式分析了我們實際上必須稱之為寡頭傾向的出現。 在自由民主國家。 這些著作的豐富性和廣度以至於人們可能會忍不住說它們本身就構成了一個研究領域（“寡頭政治研究”？）。

民主生活經費籌措條例

雖然本書是一部實質性的實證著作，但它也為我們提供了規範性論證的基礎，旨在證明對民主資助采取更積極的監管是合理的。 事實上，卡吉為我們提供了一些工具來推翻一定數量的反監管論點。 讓我們在這裏提到其中兩個。

一個論點涉及這樣一種說法，即花錢資助政黨是一種政治話語形式，是一種完全合法的表達自己聲音的方式，不應受到法規的限製。 這種觀點認為，限製個人資助政治生活的能力與對言論自由的認真承諾是不相容的。 這就是“金錢就是言論”的論點，鑒於金錢在政治中占據的地位以及對有時近乎拜物教的言論自由的承諾，這種論點在美國的政治想象中非常突出。

這個論點被卡吉簡單地提到並取消為“自由意誌論”，它既有力又令人不安。 它之所以強大，是因為它訴諸了我們對言論自由的某些強烈且基本共同的直覺。 它令人不安，因為它似乎導致了對弱勢群體的殘酷形式的政治排斥，以及對政治辯論的構成必然貧乏的概念。

我們應該注意到，卡吉接受了這個論證的前提，但拒絕了它的結論。 事實上，在《民主獎》中，金錢被視為政治話語的一種形式——實際上是其最有影響力的形式之一。 卡吉提醒我們，我們的選票是有代價的，政治支出轉化為選票、特定偏好的滿足以及具體的公共政策，民主的資助是一個至關重要但經常被忽視的問題； 簡而言之，金錢與政治之間的聯係是密不可分的。 但她拒絕接受“自由主義”的結論。 想要規範公民用錢“說話”的方式是有正當理由的。

為了捍衛這樣的論點，我們首先必須擺脫所謂貨幣內容的中立性。 事實上，“金錢就是言論”的論點抹殺了捐款的政治分量，就好像金錢不支持任何特定的政治內容一樣。 然而，正如卡吉所表明的，在她研究的大多數國家中，不僅捐助者之間存在明顯的不平等，受益者之間也存在明顯的不平等。 右翼政黨往往會獲得更多資金。 因此，放鬆管製的體係有利於右翼言論。

另一種經常被忽視但卡吉強調的回應是：如果金錢代表一種政治話語形式，那麽如果我們認真對待政治平等，這就是我們應該重新分配的東西。 從這個角度來看，經濟再分配政策以政治平等的名義是合理的。

另一個反監管論點涉及聲稱向政黨捐款僅僅是意識形態消費的一種形式。 此類捐贈不僅僅是一種以獲取回報為目的的投資，而隻是展示個人財富的一種方式。 它們在政治上相當於揮霍性消費。 簡而言之，是的，金錢確實是一種政治話語形式，但它最終是相當良性的。 它本身並不能讓捐助者確保他們的偏好一定得到考慮。

這是斯蒂芬·安索拉貝希爾（Stephen Ansolabehere）、約翰·M·德·菲格雷多（John M. de Figueiredo）和小詹姆斯·M·斯奈德（James M. Snyder Jr.）在他們頗具影響力的文章《為什麽美國政治中的錢這麽少？》中提出的論點。 他們聲稱，如果金錢確實導致了富人政治偏好的事實上的滿足，特別是在像美國這樣放鬆管製的政治環境中，那麽我們必須承認，政治中的金錢遠非過多，而是存在。 事實上還不夠。 他們得出的結論是，花在政治上的錢隻能服從意識形態消費的邏輯。 社會上的富人按照獨特競爭的邏輯進行捐贈，以維護自己的聲望，或者按照確認的邏輯，確認自己在精英中的地位。

經過反思，這種論點有一個優點：它從一開始就拋棄了貨幣內容的明顯中立性。 事實上，如果花在政治上的錢是一種炫耀性消費，那麽它就不可能是中立的：它的內容必須符合一種非常特殊的話語類型——富人的話語。 貨幣的中立性因此消失，經濟不平等的現實再次出現。 當然，下層階級甚至無法想象如此炫耀的政治參與形式。

但卡吉所展示的恰恰是政治中的金錢不僅僅是意識形態的消費。 相反，它的推出與金錢的重量接管選舉遊戲齊頭並進——即使涉及的金額並不龐大，這也是事實。 對政黨的捐贈不是中立的，尤其是超過一定數額的捐贈，而且它們在非常具體的方麵有利於某些特定利益。 因為我們可以合理地假設，主要捐助者傾向於支持奉行更為保守政策的政黨，特別是從財政角度來看。 他們將堅持允許他們通過將部分賬單轉移給所有納稅人來表達政治偏好的財政戰略。 最後，本次收購體現在

每天都在實施的公共政策，例如勞動力市場靈活性的大幅提高或給予社會最富有成員的大量稅收減免，隻會改變最富有人群的偏好，而不是最貧窮人群的偏好。 （第 329 頁）

因此，金錢不能被視為眾多其他實踐中的一種，據說這種實踐有利於多種不同的觀點。 作為一種話語，從非常具體的角度來看，金錢往往有利於那些擁有最多金錢的人。 因此，它（1）既不是中性的，（2）也不是沒有效果的。

卡吉建議我們放棄“意識形態消費”理論，轉而支持“投資回報”理論。 然後，她提出了與吉倫斯和其他人獲得的結果類似的結果：金錢在民主中具有真正的分量——分量太重了。

什麽民主理論？ 商議、腐敗和政治平等
什麽樣的民主規範理論能讓我們像卡吉一樣思考？ 這裏值得考慮三種類型的考慮因素。

我們可能首先提到協商民主這個詞匯。 對於協商民主人士來說，民主合法性的來源必須來自公共協商，包括在多元和包容的空間內“交換理由”的實踐。 民主社會的公民可以通過相互協商賦予他們共同的未來以意義和合法性。 因此，協商民主具有一個關鍵的認知維度，這意味著它的特點是不斷關注民主辯論的質量，關注這些辯論是否有能力讓我們更接近“真相”並讓我們遠離規則。 無知。

卡吉似乎讚成這種做法，特別是因為她之前在媒體方麵的工作以及她對民粹主義話語的懷疑。 事實上，我們的民主“危機”（部分）是民主話語的危機，也許更接近協商理想的政治話語才是理想的解決方案。 卡吉顯然想要“智慧”的民主機構，並讚揚海倫·蘭德莫爾關於協商機構產生“集體智慧”能力的工作。

而且，從深思熟慮的角度來看，我們的政治偏好不應該被視為“固定的”，而必須不斷受到質疑、評估和批評。 最重要的是，它們不能簡單地通過金錢這樣的不良媒介來推廣。 它們必須在充滿活力的公共空間中接受持續討論的考驗。

因此，我們在這裏看到了對民主生活資助的富有成效的審慎批評的輪廓——卡吉本可以發展出這樣的輪廓。 但混合議會和 BED 等提案的合理性不能僅僅基於這種審議（特別是認識論）考慮。

那麽這裏的問題是診斷民主的腐敗嗎？ 鑒於卡吉參考了勞倫斯·萊西格等人的作品，這是一個可靠的選擇。 因為我們確實必須承認，捐贈與政治偏好的滿足之間的準自動聯係看起來非常像我們通常所說的“交換條件”腐敗，即“金錢換取好處”類型的腐敗。 但是，像萊西格這樣的“製度腐敗”理論家，往往不太關注這種類型的“個人”腐敗，而是通過金錢的私人影響力盜用民主製度。 這是古人所定義的腐敗，指的是不再能夠實現其目的的機構的潮解。

這種觀念似乎是美國最高法院在奧斯汀訴密歇根商會（1990）裁決中的推理基礎，該裁決維持了禁止公司利用其財務資源支持選舉候選人的法律（該裁決 二十年後被公民聯合裁決推翻）。 正如羅納德·德沃金（Ronald Dworkin）指出的那樣，法院警告我們警惕“腐敗的危險”，並不是指作為交換好處的經典腐敗形式，而是指“另一種形式的腐敗”，即民主製度的腐敗。

卡奇絕對可以引起我們對這些不同形式的腐敗的關注。 但這還不是全部，因為再次強調腐敗並不足以證明她的提議是合理的。

我們應該注意到，在美國的背景下，腐敗的語言很快就被調動起來，因為在政治上幾乎不可能使用平等的語言。 簡而言之，“腐敗”激起人們的憤慨並促使人們采取行動，而不平等則“社會主義”。 但這是有問題的，幸運的是，這種情況可能正在改變。 例如，哈森認為，奧斯汀法院提到的“其他形式的腐敗”不僅指金錢對國會和選舉的腐蝕作用，而且還非常簡單地指它對公民之間政治平等的破壞性影響。

因此，我們應該動員平等的語言，並且我們必須希望這樣的事情在法國政治格局中仍然是可能的。 正如卡吉在她的書一開始就指出的那樣，民主承諾我們平等（第 37 頁），但政治生活的資助體係卻將這一點置於危險之中。 在這裏，我們可能會想起羅爾斯，他將人人平等的政治自由置於其社會正義理論的核心。 對他來說，每當“那些擁有更多私人手段的人被允許利用自己的優勢來控製公共辯論的進程”時，這些人人平等的政治自由的價值就會被削弱。 因此，這裏的問題並不是譴責下層階級缺乏對選舉、公共辯論或政黨生活的參與，這表明平等的政治自由“已經存在”，但沒有得到很好的利用。 不，令人不安的是，當這些活動由大部分人口進行時，它們在以經濟不平等為特征的政治動態中被貶值，例如 J. Cagé 所研究的那些活動。

這就是為什麽我們的民主社會的重大缺陷之一仍然是無法保證羅爾斯所說的人人平等的政治自由的公正價值，也無法實施必要的糾正措施。 BED 構成了這些糾正措施之一。 但更重要的是，混合大會項目似乎很有希望。 對於某些人來說，政治自由的貶值可以用我們當前的代表動態來解釋，用卡吉的話說，代表權的赤字“與其說是選擇的，不如說是忍受的”（第415頁）。 因此，正如哲學家安妮·菲利普斯（Anne Philips）所說，僅僅“通過思想”寄托於再現的希望並非徒勞，但已經遇到了一些障礙。 也許現在是時候測試“存在政治”了，這樣下層階級就可以通過參加議會來真正在政治上存在。 正如卡吉本人承認的那樣，這可能是一項“激進”措施，但值得對政治平等做出真正的承諾。

審閱：Julia Cagé，Le prix de la démocratie，巴黎，Fayard，2018 年，464 頁，23 歐元。
作者：Pierre-Yves Néron，2019 年 4 月 29 日

Voting with Euros

About: Julia Cagé, Le Prix de la démocratie, Fayard

https://laviedesidees.fr/Voting-with-Euros

by Pierre-Yves Néron , 29 April 2019 translated by Kate McNaughton

The ways in which political parties are funded, in France and elsewhere, tend to reinforce the invisibility of certain groups and the political influence of the wealthiest people in society, in particular through right-wing parties. Are there, Julia Cagé wonders, more democratic ways of funding democracy?

In Le prix de la démocratie (The Price of Democracy), Julia Cagé analyses the ways in which political parties are funded in several countries, including France. By drawing up a database of information on the funding of several political movements and parties, she provides us with an international overview of the ways in which democracy is funded today. Her book leads us to draw two major conclusions that go beyond the substantial differences she observes between different countries: 1) the current funding of democracy tends to perpetuate and reinforce the lack of representation of certain groups, as well as their political invisibility. In all the democratic states that she studied, the weight of the wealthiest members of society in the funding of democratic life is extremely high. 2) If we are to act on this, one of the most crucial battlefields and sources of confrontation is taxation. How topical, did you say?

Oligarchic Tendencies?

If her book can help us understand the current situation in French politics, this is partly because Cagé invites us to distance ourselves from a simple celebration of the

good health of a ‘French-style democracy’ viewed as comfortably removed from the problems that plague American democracy (p. 67).

It is indeed true that the amounts invested into political campaigns in the United States are dizzying: companies can massively fund the causes of their choice through Political Action Committees (PACs) and public policies are massively advantageous to the wealthier members of society. All of this has even prompted the political scientists Gilens and Page to conclude that the United States were a de facto oligarchic society. It is thus certainly true that the United States have some real problems of their own to contend with. But a similar dynamic is at work in all the countries that Cagé studied, including France and Canada: the preferences of the rich are systematically pandered to, whereas those of the lower classes are side-lined, except in such rare and happy cases as these two sets of interests coincide. This is what Gilens and Page call “democracy by coincidence”, in which the preferences of the lower classes are only taken into account if they happen, for various reasons, to coincide with those of the wealthier members of society.

It is true that France is characterised by its policy of capping funding (donations from private individuals to parties or groups are thus capped at 7500 euros), and by the fact that it forbids legal entities (including companies) from making such donations. But Cagé shows that such measures do not eliminate all problematic relationships between money and politics. Above all, she reveals the perverse effects of the fiscal measures that structure French political life. The author takes as an example an individual with a (taxable) annual income of 100,000 euros, who makes a 7500 euro donation. The government will deduct 66% of this amount from this person’s tax, which comes to 4950 euros, so that the donation will in reality have cost this person 2550 euros. For a citizen who earns 9700 euros a year (the minimum amount above which an unmarried person is liable to pay tax), a 7500 euro donation really does cost 7500 euros. In short, the funding system plays into the hands of the richest members of society, whose contributions are subsidised by the public authorities.

Cagé makes three ambitious proposals for renewing our democracy: 1) a drastic limitation of the private funding of democracy (with a limit set at 200 euros a year); 2) the creation of “democratic equality vouchers” (“bons pour l’égalité démocratique” – BED) aimed at renewing the funding of political parties and movements. Every citizen, when they fill out their tax return, would be able to choose the party or movement that will be given their “voucher”, for an annual amount of 7 euros of public money; 3) the establishment of a Social Diversity Assembly, in which a third of seats would be reserved for “social representatives”, elected from lists that reflect the socio-professional diversity of the population.

More generally, Le prix de la démocratie documents the dysfunctions of democracies in the context of increasing inequalities. Cagé’s work thus follows on from that of academics such as the political scientists Gilens and Page, the legal experts Richard Halen and Larry Lessig or the economist Thomas Piketty, who have all in their own way analysed the emergence of what we must indeed call oligarchic tendencies in liberal democracies. The wealth and breadth of these works are such that one might be tempted to say they constitute a field of study in its own right (“oligarchy studies”?).

For a Regulation of the Funding of Democratic Life

While this book is a substantial piece of empirical work, it also provides us with the basis for a normative argument aimed at justifying more aggressive regulation of the funding of democracy. Indeed, Cagé provides us with some tools for invalidating a certain number of anti-regulation arguments. Let us mention two of these here.

One argument involves the claim that spending money to fund political parties is a form of political discourse, a perfectly legitimate way of making one’s voice heard that should not be restrained by regulations. In this view, limiting an individual’s capacity to fund political life is incompatible with a serious commitment to freedom of expression. This is the “money is speech” argument, which is very prominent in the American political imagination, given the place occupied by money in politics and a commitment to freedom of expression that sometimes borders on fetishism.

This argument, which is briefly mentioned and disqualified by Cagé as “libertarian”, is both powerful and troubling. It is powerful because it appeals to certain strong and largely shared intuitions that we have about freedom of expression. And it is troubling because it seems to lead to a brutal form of political exclusion for disadvantaged groups, as well as to a necessarily impoverished concept of what constitutes political debate.

We should note that Cagé accepts the premises of this argument while rejecting its conclusion. Indeed, in Le prix de la démocratie, money is treated very seriously as a form of political discourse—one of its most influential forms in fact. Cagé reminds us that our vote has a price, that political spending translates into votes, into the satisfaction of given preferences as well as into concrete public policies, that the funding of democracy is a crucial but oft-neglected issue; in short, that the connections between money and politics are inextricable. But she rejects the “libertarian” conclusion. There are legitimate reasons for wanting to regulate the way in which citizens “talk” with their money.

In order to defend such a thesis, we must first get rid of the so-called neutrality of content of money. Indeed, the argument that money is speech erases the political weight of donations, as if money did not favour any particular political content. However, as Cagé shows, in most of the countries she has studied, there is not only a flagrant inequality between donors, but also between beneficiaries. Right-wing parties tend to receive more funding. A deregulated system thus favours right-wing speech.

Another response, which is often neglected, but which Cagé underlines, is the following: if money represents a form of political discourse, then this is what we should be redistributing if we take political equality seriously. From this perspective, a policy of economic redistribution is thus justified in the name of political equality.

Another anti-regulation argument involves claiming that donations to political parties are merely a form of ideological consumption. More than an investment with a view to making a return, such donations are simply one way among others of displaying one’s wealth. They are the political equivalent of ostentatious consumption. In short, yes, money is indeed a form of political discourse, but it is one that is ultimately rather benign. It does not as such allow donors to ensure that their preferences are necessarily taken into account.

This is the argument that is put forward by Stephen Ansolabehere, John M. de Figueiredo and James M. Snyder Jr. in their influential article “Why so Much Little Money in U.S Politics?”. They claim that if money did lead de facto to the satisfaction of the political preferences of the wealthy, in particular in a deregulated political environment like that of the United States, then we must admit that far from there being too much money in politics, there is in fact not enough. They then conclude that the money that is spent on politics can only obey the logic of ideological consumption. The wealthier in society give, following the logic of distinctive competition, to assert their prestige, or alternatively following the logic of confirmation, to confirm their position within the élite.

Upon reflection, this line of argument has an advantage: it discards from the start the apparent neutrality of content of money. Indeed, if the money spent on politics is a form of ostentatious consumption, then it cannot be neutral: its content must correspond to that of a very specific type of discourse—that of the wealthy. The neutrality of money thus evaporates, and the reality of economic inequality reappears. For, of course, the lower classes cannot even imagine such ostentatious forms of participation in politics.

But what Cagé shows is precisely that money in politics is not just ideological consumption. On the contrary, its introduction goes hand in hand with the takeover of the electoral game by the weight of money—something which is true even when the amounts involved are not gargantuan. Donations to parties are not neutral, especially above a certain amount, and they favour, in very concrete terms, certain specific interests. For we can legitimately suppose that major donors tend to favour parties that will pursue more conservative policies, in particular from a fiscal perspective. And they will uphold the fiscal strategy that allows them to express their political preferences by transferring part of the bill to all taxpayers. Finally, this takeover is reflected in the

public policies which are implemented every day and which, like the extreme increase in flexibility of the labour market or the numerous tax breaks awarded to the wealthiest members of society, only translate the preferences of the wealthiest people, against the preferences of the poorest. (p. 329)

Thus, money cannot be viewed as one discursive practice among many others, which supposedly favours a plethora of diverse perspectives. As discourse, money tends to favour, in very concrete terms, those who have the most of it. It is thus (1) neither neutral (2) nor without effect.

Cagé suggests we abandon the theory of “ideological consumption” in favour of a theory of “return on investment”. She then puts forward similar results to those obtained by Gilens and others: money has a real weight in democracy—far too much weight.

What Democratic Theory? Deliberation, Corruption and Political Equality

What normative theory of democracy would allow us to think along the same lines as Cagé? Three types of considerations are worth taking into account here.

We might first mention the vocabulary of deliberative democracy. For deliberative democrats, the sources of democratic legitimacy must be drawn from public deliberation, including a practice of “exchanges of reasons” within multiple and inclusive spaces. The citizens of a democratic community can give meaning and legitimacy to their common future by deliberating among themselves. Deliberative democracy thus has a key epistemic dimension, meaning that it is characterised by a constant concern for the quality of our democratic debates, for the capacity of these to get us closer to the “truth” and to move us ever further away from the rule of ignorance.

Cagé seems to be in favour of such an approach, in particular as a result of her previous work on the media and her scepticism towards populist discourse. Indeed, our democratic “crisis” is (partly) a crisis of democratic discourse, and perhaps a political discourse that is closer to deliberative ideals is the ideal solution. Cagé clearly wants “intelligent” democratic institutions, and praises the work of Hélène Landemore on the capacity of deliberative institutions to produce “collective wisdom”.

And, from a deliberative perspective, our political preferences should not be seen as “fixed”, but rather must be constantly interrogated, evaluated, criticised. And above all, they must not simply be promoted via such a poor medium as money. They must be subjected to the test of a constant discussion within the context of a vibrant public space.

We thus see here the outline of a fruitful deliberative criticism of the funding of democratic life—one that Cagé could have developed. But the justification of proposals such as the Mixed Assembly and the BEDs could not be based only on such deliberative (and in particular epistemic) considerations.

Is the issue here then to diagnose a corruption of democracy? This is a credible option, given Cagé’s referral to the works of Lawrence Lessig and others. For we must indeed admit that the quasi-automatic connection between donations and the satisfaction of political preferences looks very much like what we generally describe as quid pro quo corruption, meaning corruption of the “money-for-favours” type. But the theoreticians, like Lessig, of “institutional corruption”, tend to attract our attention less to this type of “individual” corruption as to the misappropriation of democratic institutions through the private influence of money. This is a corruption as defined by the Ancients, in the sense of a deliquescence of institutions that are no longer able to realise their telos.

Such a conception seems to underlie the reasoning of the Supreme Court of the United States in the Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce (1990) ruling, which upheld a law forbidding companies from using their financial resources to support a candidate in elections (this ruling was overturned twenty years later by the Citizens United ruling). As Ronald Dworkin noted, by warning us against the “dangers of corruption”, the Court was not referring to the classic form of corruption as an exchange of favours, but rather to “another form of corruption”, that of democratic institutions.

Cagé can absolutely draw our attention to these different forms of corruption. But that is not all, since, once more, focussing on corruption is not enough to justify her proposals.

We should note that, in the American context, the language of corruption is quickly mobilised because it seems almost impossible politically to use that of equality. In short, “corruption” arouses indignation and motivates people to take action, while inequality is “socialist”. But this is problematic and, luckily, may be changing. According to Hasen for example, the “other form of corruption” referred to by the Court in Austin does not refer only to the corrosive effects of money on congress and the elections, but also very simply to its destructive effects on political equality between citizens.

We should therefore be mobilising the language of equality, and we must hope that such a thing is still possible in the French political landscape. As Cagé notes from the start of her book, democracy promises us equality (p. 37), but this is put at risk by the system for funding political life. Here, we might call to mind Rawls, who placed political liberties that were equal for all at the heart of his theory of social justice. And for him, it is the value of these political liberties that are equal for all that is diminished whenever “those who have greater private means are permitted to use their advantages to control the course of public debate”. Thus, the issue here is not to deplore the lack of participation of the lower classes in elections, in public debates or in the life of political parties, which would suggest that equal political liberties are “already there” but are poorly used. No, what is troubling is the fact that these activities, when they are conducted by large segments of the population, are devalued within political dynamics that are characterised by economic inequality, such as those studied by J. Cagé.

This is why one of the great failings of our democratic societies continues to be their inability to guarantee what Rawls calls the just value of political liberties that are equal for all, and to implement the necessary corrective measures. The BEDs constitute one of these corrective measures. But even more than these, the project for a mixed Assembly seems promising. For the devaluing of political liberties for some individuals is explained by our current representative dynamics, in which the deficit in representation is “less chosen than endured” (p. 415), to use Cagé’s words. Thus, as the philosopher Anne Philips has argued, the hopes placed in representation solely “through ideas”, without being vain, have already met with several obstacles. Perhaps it is time to test a “politics of presence”, so that the lower classes can really exist politically, by being present in the Assembly. This may be a “radical” measure, as Cagé herself admits, but it would be worthy of a genuine commitment to political equality.

Reviewed: Julia Cagé, Le prix de la démocratie, Paris, Fayard, 2018, 464 p., 23 €.

by Pierre-Yves Néron, 29 April 2019