Examination of practices of ignorance conducive to democracy based on Rancièrian thought and Rortian pragmatism

Abstract

Theorists, who broadly subscribe to Claude Lefort's characterization of democracy as the dissolution of the markers of certainty, disagree over the proper enactment of democracy. In this article, I consider the possibility of narrowing the gap by attending to the ignorance advocated by each of the two approaches -the disruptive radical route Jacques Rancière describes and the reformist approach of Richard Rorty. I highlight the attributes and shortcomings of the positive link between practices of ignorance and democracy in the work of the two theorists, and explore how the practices they describe can complement each other in the enactment of democracy.