The Democratic Paradox and Cosmopolitan Democracy

Abstract

Democracy's narrative on the source of legitimate political power contains a fundamental paradox which surfaces most clearly whenever there is an attempt to inaugurate a new democratic order. The new order is meant to be founded upon the consent of an authority — the people — which can only exist as such after the order is created. This research note begins with an examination of how this paradox re-emerges with the attempt to theorise cosmopolitan democracy, and how it leads such a theorisation into a logical impasse. Rather than seeking a way out of this impasse however, the second half of this note explores how the paradox may in fact be seen as leaving an irresolvable tension within the modern democratic imaginary which may lend itself to the project of theorising forms of post-national democracy.