Participation and Democratic Theory

'This is a very important book … a lucid, intelligent and direct challenge to the presuppositions of most American and West European sociology and political science. All social science, implicitly or explicitly, in its choice of topic and its mode of treatment, bears on the kind of society that the social scientists consider possible. By accepting a caricatured 'classical doctrine of democracy' or otherwise ignoring the somewhat diverse reasoning of Rousseau, Mill, Marx, Cole and others most contemporary social science simply presumes the impossibility of any form of social organization based on genuine rule by the people. Pateman attempts to resurrect the arguments of the 'classical' theorists and to examine them in the light of empirical evidence on political socialization and workers' self-management.' The Antioch Review

• 1. Recent theories of democracy and the 'classical myth'; 2. Rousseau, John Stuart Mill and G. D. H. Cole: a participatory theory of democracy; 3. The sence of political efficacy and participation in the workplace; 4. 'Participation' and 'democracy' in industry; 5. Workers' self-management in Yugoslavia; 6. Conclusions; Bibliography; Index.