Laura Montanaro, Ph.D.
lmonta@essex.ac.uk
University of Essex
Country: United Kingdom (England)
About Me:
Laura Montanaro is a Senior Lecturer in Political Theory in the Department of Government at the University of Essex. Her research focuses on normative democratic theory, with a particular interest in the gaps between democracy’s norms and outcomes, especially in relation to equality and practices that might counteract inequality. Before joining the University of Essex, she was a Harper Schmidt Fellow in the Society of Fellows at the University of Chicago. Her first book, Who Elected Oxfam?, published by Cambridge University Press, was a finalist for the C.B. Macpherson Best First Book prize. Her work has been published in The American Journal of Political Science, the Journal of Politics, and Perspectives on Politics.
Research Interests
Political Theory
Democratic Theory
History Of Ideas
Political Representation
Publications:
Journal Articles:
The neologism “mansplaining” captures an insidious dynamic in which men explain things to women that women already understand, assuming that, by virtue of being a woman, she lacks the man’s knowledge. Mansplaining has started to receive some attention in contemporary scholarship, conceptualizing the phenomenon and identifying its epistemic harm. My purpose is to consider mansplaining and its harms from the perspective of democratic theory. Setting the problem of mansplaining against the norms we expect of democracy—equality, inclusion, and recognition—I argue that mansplaining poses harms that are not only individual and epistemic but also collective and relational. I distinguish two types of mansplaining based on women’s expertise and experience to elaborate on its collective epistemic harms to decision making and its relational harm of political exclusion. Mansplaining poses further relational harms of inequality and misrecognition, undermining the equal social relations and social trust required for deliberation.
Some women did not participate in the Women’s March, rejecting its claims of unity and solidarity because white women mobilize only in their self-interest. This is a form of exit with three features: (1) rejecting a political claim; (2) providing reasons to the power wielder and the broader public; and (3) demanding accountability both as sanction and as deliberation, which requires a discussion about the claim—in this case, the meaning of the group and the terms on which it understands itself. This combination of exit, voice, and deliberative accountability might accurately be called “discursive exit.” Discursive exit addresses conceptual and normative limitations of standard accounts of exit, voice, and loyalty, in particular, when exit and voice are imperfect—because exit can be seen as disapproval of an entire cause—and morally problematic—because voice “from within” implies that cause trumps disagreement, leaving people morally complicit in an unwelcome exercise of power.
How should we theorize and normatively assess those individual and collective actors who claim to represent others for political purposes, but do so without the electoral authorization and accountability usually thought to be at the heart of democratic representation? In this article, I offer conceptual tools for assessing the democratic legitimacy of such ‘‘self-appointed’’ representatives. I argue that these kinds of political actors bring two constituencies into being: the authorizing—that group empowered by the claim to exercise authorization and demand accountability—and the affected—that group affected, or potentially affected, by collective decisions. Self-appointed representation provides democratically legitimate representation when it provides political presence for affected constituencies and is authorized by and held accountable to them. I develop the critical tools to assess the democratic credentials of self-appointed representatives by identifying nonelectoral mechanisms of authorization and accountability that may empower affected constituencies to exercise authorization and demand accountability.
Books Written:
Non-elected actors, such as non-governmental organizations and celebrity activists, present themselves as representatives of others to audiences of decision-makers, such as state leaders, the European Union, the United Nations, and the World Trade Organization. These actors are increasingly included in the deliberation and decision-making processes of such institutions. To take one well-known example, the non-governmental organization, Oxfam, presses decision-makers and governments for fair trade rules on behalf of the world's poor. What entitles such 'self-appointed representatives' to speak and act for the poor? As The Economist asked, 'Who elected Oxfam?'. Montanaro claims that such actors can, and should, be conceptualized as representatives, and that they can - though do not always - represent others in a manner that we can recognize as democratic. However, in order to do so, we must stretch our imaginations beyond the standard normative framework of elections.
Book Chapters:
In: Making Present: Theorizing the New Politics of Representation. Editors: Pollak, J. and Castiglione, D., . Chicago University Press. 186- 203
In: Reclaiming Representation: Contemporary Advances in the Theory of Political Representation. 210- 226
Entry on 'Representation,' in The Encyclopaedia of Political Thought. Editors: Gibbons, M., Coole, D., Ellis, E. and Ferguson, K., . John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 3209- 3222