Javnost kao medij demokracije
The public as the medium of democracy

Summary/Abstract: As the medium of democracy, the Public is a communicational trace of the missing Collective Sovereign: the People or Demos. In political life, we often refer to the People, but in reality the People does not make a community. It is instead a notion, a missing Sovereign, the one who exists as concept but does not speak for oneself. The community is yet to be established, and this can be done only by communication. The aim of such communication is to formulate norms, rules and principles which are to be implemented or encouraged in public life. On a more normative level, this can be done in the process of writing a Constitution. The other objective is to discuss the concept of public good. This is left to communicational functions of the Public. The concept of the Public is left to citizens, who communicate with other citizens, and thus create public opinion. By doing that, the Public is here to remind the government that somebody else is to be Sovereign, i.e. that there is also the People. The Public is thus a substitute for the “missing Sovereign”. There can be no Democracy without this role of the Public.

• Details
• Contents