Between Facts and Norms - Contributions to a ... - Blogs Unpad

181A Reconstructive Approach to Law IIamination reveals deep structures that require the satisfaction ofdifferent conditions in each case. This is shown by the consequencesthat the individual forms of communication have for theunderstanding of the representative system and, more generally, forthe relation between parliament and public opinion.Members of parliaments are normally chosen in elections thatare free, equal, and secret. This procedure has an obvious meaningfor the delegation of representatives who receive a mandate tonegotiate compromises. Participation in a fairly regulated bargainingpractice calls for the equal representation of all those affected; it ismeant to ensure that all the relevant interests and value orientationscan be brought to bear with equal weight in the bargainingprocess. For example, whereas the mandate is narrowly circumscribedfor wage negotiations, the mandate given to representativesof a people remains rather diffuse, even if we could viewparliamentary proceedings exclusively in terms of bargaining; thisis because general elections bundle together a wide range ofinterests with a value-generalizing effect. As long as we fully equatepolitics with the balancing of current interests represented byelected officials, the classical discussions over imperative and freemandates, or about whether the representative system mirrors ahypothetical or empirical popular will, lose their point of reference.A difference between the empirical and hypothetical popular willcan appear only when the preferences entering into the politicalprocess are viewed not as something merely given but as inputs that,open to the exchange of arguments, can be discursively changed. 5°An element of reason that alters the meaning of representationonly comes into play with a logic intrinsic to political opinion- andwill-formation. When members of parliament are elected as participantsin discourses conducted by representatives or deputies, theelection does not mean, in the first instance, that just voting powerhas been delegated. The social limitation of representative bodies,then, is in a peculiar tension with the free access that a representativediscourse would actually have to require by reason of theircommunicative presuppositions.Ethical-political discourses must satisfy the communicative conditionsfor achieving hermeneutic self-understanding on the part ofcollectivities. They should enable an authentic self·understanding