Non-arbitrary governance needs contestability rather than actual consent

Evidence

The idea of contestability gives us a cue for the right response to our question. What might enable one of us to own a public decision? What might make it possible for such a decision not to have the aspect of an arbitrary act of interference? The answer which suggests itself is: the fact that we can more or less effectively contest the decision, if we find that it does not answer to our relevant interests or relevant ideas. The decision may materialize, like most public decisions, on a basis that is consensual only in a vanishingly weak sense. That does not matter, provided that it materializes under a dispensation of effective contestability. The non-arbitrariness of public decisions comes of their meeting, not the condition of having originated or emerged according to some consensual process, but the condition of being such that if they conflict with the perceived interests and ideas of the citizens, then the citizens can effectively contest them. What matters is not the historical origin of the decisions in some form of consent but their modal or counterfactual responsiveness to the possibility of contestation. — Philip Pettit, Republicanism, 839

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines the core republican principle of contestability as modal/counterfactual rather than historical, replacing consent as the test of legitimacy.
• DEEPTHINKING: The shift from consent (historical) to contestability (modal/counterfactual) is the load-bearing theoretical move of the whole book — a genuinely paradigm-shifting reconception of what legitimates state power.
• XREF: connects to: Delegated discretionary authority need not reduce freedom when properly constrained — Frank Lovett, Republicanism, 31; Laws should be selected through contest and testing rather than consensual design — Philip Pettit, Republicanism: A Theory of Freedom and…, 1271; An act is arbitrary when chosen without tracking affected parties’ interests (+6 more)

Broader Connections

• Non-domination requires normative reasons for respect, not just legal sanctions #corroborates (0.80) — Philip Pettit, Republicanism, 1289
• Legislative capacity requires both coercive instruments and spontaneous mass consent #qualifies (0.75)
• Participation without control over parameters is not democracy but its evisceration #expands (0.72) — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos, 247
• Parliamentary rule institutionalized permanent voluntary consent from the urban class #corroborates (0.72)