What role does democratic mediation play in deepening democracy in the global South? Democratic mediation is an increasingly common component of engagements between citizens and public authorities across the globe. This paper surveys three kinds of democratic mediation observed across a large number of case studies. It argues that increasing opportunities for democratic engagement and the growing complexity and remoteness of governance will mean that democratic mediation becomes increasingly relevant.
‘Democratic mediation’ refers to actors and practices that link citizens’ claims to existing local, national or international decision making, in order to gain greater legitimacy for their demands. A diverse range of actors mediate on behalf of citizens, including local civil society organisations, national advocacy organisations and international social movements.
These actors engage in a range of mediation practices, from advocating the inclusion of representatives of marginalised groups, to advocating the interests of such groups. Whilst these actors may be advocating on behalf of marginalised groups, they are not members of these groups, which raises complex questions around their legitimacy.
Through the analysis of research carried out by the Citizenship Development Research Centre, three versions of democratic mediation can be identified:
- Mediation as professional advocacy in national policy change. The mediator is a professional individual or organisation in a CSO-led partnership, with highly developed mobilising structures linking national reformers to local groups. The general strategy is to secure effective representation for marginalised groups, although mediators may play a leading role in substantive policy engagements.
- Mediation as representational entrepreneurship. Mediators are ‘hybrid actors’ who remain rooted in their local origins, even as they move within and across different global arenas. Strategies vary, but include an agenda-setting politics involving multi-site representation and the innovative use of knowledge to reinforce the legitimacy of popular interests.
- Mediation as citizen development. Some forms of mediation play important roles in building citizens’ knowledge of rights and capacities for active participation. Such mediators are often social mobilisation organisations that run training programmes or play a coordinating role to build capacities to campaign around social problems to influence public policies.
Democratisation has been increasing opportunities for marginalised groups to pursue their rights. However, neoliberal globalisation has made governance more complex and decentred, and, at least in part, as responsive to market logics as to popular will. In this context:
- Democratic mediators are defined by the role they play rather than who they are as actors. They mediate between marginalised communities and public authorities, but may be from either side of this divide or neither.
- Public authority can exist from the local to the global level, and includes governments, public-private partnerships and public-community partnerships. This complexity creates a need for mediating experts.
- Public participation processes driven ‘from below’ require mediation that can relate popular concerns to formal systems of power. Processes driven ‘from above’ require mediation to connect formal systems of power with community needs. Thus any form of social action requires leadership and coordination.
- The necessity and legitimacy of democratic mediation are framed in terms of ‘democratic deficits’ suffered by the poor. These can include deficits of knowledge, or be representational or ideological, and these deficits will exist in different degrees and combinations across different cases.
- Democratic mediation requires us to question the boundaries between opposed categories, such as ‘representation’ and ‘participation’; and spaces created ‘from below’ and those created ‘from above’.
