Departmental Papers (ASC)
Document Type
Journal Article
Date of this Version
2008
Publication Source
Annual Review of Political Science
Volume
11
Start Page
521
Last Page
538
DOI
10.1146/annurev.polisci.11.081306.070308
Abstract
To further dialogue between theory and research on deliberative democracy, I advocate abandoning tests of deliberative theory per se and instead developing “middle-range” theories that are each important, specifiable, and falsifiable parts of deliberative democratic theory. By replacing vaguely defined entities with more concrete, circumscribed concepts, and by requiring empirically and theoretically grounded hypotheses about specific relationships between those concepts, researchers may come to understand which elements of the deliberative experience are crucial to particular valued outcomes.
Copyright/Permission Statement
Reproduced with permission from the Annual Review of Political Science, Volume 11 © 2008 by Annual Reviews, http://www.annualreviews.org
Keywords
deliberation, empirical research, middle-range theory
Recommended Citation
Mutz, D. C. (2008). Is Deliberative Democracy a Falsifiable Theory?. Annual Review of Political Science, 11 521-538. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.polisci.11.081306.070308
Date Posted: 18 March 2019
This document has been peer reviewed.