Democracy and Positive Liberty

Constitutionally speaking, "democracy" signifies something beyond the rule of many or the crowd as opposed to die few or "the one." Constitutional democracy marches arm-in-arm with freedom. A Dworkinian substantive ("constitutional") conception of proper democracy means some form of institutional entrenchment of basic human-rights interpretations against procedural-democratic revision. To reply to the majoritarian objection, Ronald Dworkin needs to uphold the constitutional conception. To uphold that conception persuasively, he needs to demonstrate its consonance with endorsement of positive liberty as a basic human interest. Dworkins self-assigned task is defense of the constitutional conception of democracy against the charge of defeating positive liberty. Dworkin concludes that if any beings positive liberty is in principle infringed when the constitutional conception allows non-popularly determined basic-rights interpretations, it can be that of the citizenry taken whole. Crucial to the demonstration is Dworkins distinction between "kinds" or &s;readings" of collective action—between ways of interpreting the idea that a decision has been made "by the people."