1 Deliberation and Stochastic Consensus

Theories of Deliberative Democracy are en vogue. They seem to give a new foundation and justification for democracy that goes beyond the procedural interpretation of liberal democracy. For theorists of European integration it has a particular attraction: it links the peace project, which is at the core of European integration, to institutional forms of political decision making. For as long as people (and governments) talk to each other, they will not shoot at each other. In recent years these theories have influenced academic debate on institutional arrangements, particularly with respect to a European Constitution (Eriksen and Fossum, 2000) Theories of deliberative democracy have been inspired by Habermas ’ work on communicative action and discourse theory. One of its strongest points remains the shift from strategic to communicative rationality. People act strategically, when they chose a course of action that allows them the realization of their best preferences. Game theory models the complexities of strategic interaction of independent actors with given sets of preferences. However, preferences also change. The question is: why? Theories of deliberative democracy emphasize the epistemic quality of deliberation: in free, open an