The challenge ahead for deliberative democracy: In reply to Weale

If new democratic practices are more important for increasing the deliberative capacity of a political system, rather than the level of political participation, as Weale argues, then proponents of deliberative democracy have to address a critical missing link in their thinking. Rather than blaming vested power interests for the lack of influence of the new democratic practices, the proponents themselves have to answer how the outcomes of these practices can be understood, captured and transferred into wider political processes. In the absence of such an answer, blaming vested power interests is little more than an admission of weakness of an intrinsically flawed school of thought. Copyright , Beech Tree Publishing.