Collective Self-Rule and Comprehensive Participation: A Critique of Council Democracy

This article critically explores council democracy as a utopian state order, on the basis of anarchist and Marxist works from western Europe and the United States, post-World War 2. As a system of national government, council democracy cannot possibly deliver on its utopian promises. Collective self-rule cannot put an end to domination/hierarchy/rule but will engender another variety of ‘democratic hierarchy’. Comprehensive citizen participation locks citizens in an overregulated ‘democratic bureaucracy’, and delivers no feasible, working formula of government. In a paradox, council democracy is likely greatly to reduce the share of the population participating in the country’s political process, thus carrying less rather than more democratic legitimacy than representative democracy.