https://theloop.ecpr.eu/the-merits-of-consultative-democracy/

Rongxin Li opens his essay, linked above, with the following two short paragraphs:

"For many people today, democracy still means nothing other than the sacrosanct mantra of one person, one vote. As mainstream accounts of democracy continue to promulgate, there is nothing other than Joseph Schumpeter’s admission that democracy can only work when the powerless are able to equally determine – through their ballots – which elites will govern them. A multiparty, electoral, and representative democracy that rotates powerful people is, therefore, broadly considered the most practicable – and therefore best – manifestation of democracy.

This belief is so strong that voting has become a matter of political correctness in democratic politics. This is the case even though it ignores the fact that electoral outcomes do not generate policy, or training in citizenship, as effectively as participatory and deliberative approaches to democracy do. Although procedure and substance, input and output, always intertwine in democracy, the vote maintains its tyrannical grip."

I understand this ideological grip of 'voting = democracy' and 'democracy = nothing other than voting' to be caused by the insufficient practice of other models of democracy at all levels of government and social organizations like workplaces, schools, and families. Individuals and collectives are both, in my esteem, most often inexperienced with other ways of doing democracy or of being democratic.

The only corrective to this, that I can think of, is joining Li in advocating for a different model - something other than voting. Deliberative and participatory democrats, but also direct, digital and green democrats, have, among others, been leading this advocacy work for decades - even centuries in the case of direct democrats.

What do you think? If democracy means voting to you, what are your thoughts on there being a whole other world of democracy out there for you to, if you like, sample from and engage with?

https://theloop.ecpr.eu/the-merits-of-consultative-democracy/