It has become commonplace to talk about the "crisis" of democracies, to denote various current phenomena such as abstention, rise of authoritarian governments through electoral processes themselves, or a supposed inability of democratic institutions to address pressing problems like environmental issues. In response to such diagnoses, public discourses and philosophical theories of democracy have taken two main paths. On the one hand, criticisms of the intrinsic limits of democracy have emerged, pointing out its inherent inefficiency. As Justo Serrano Zamora argues in this book, this path usually leads to defend "restrictions in citizens' participation or the substitution of experts for democratic representatives" (71). On the other hand, the diagnosis of democratic crisis has led to an endeavor to strengthen theoretical justifications of democracy. Democratization and Struggles Against Injustice falls within the latter. As the book relevantly remarks, these justifications of democracy, in turn, can be divided into two main trends. First, a set of "epistemic justifications" attempts at demonstrating democracy's efficiency, that is to say its ability to generate good outcomes and to solve social problems (XVI). Secondly, a set of "intrinsic justifications" puts the emphasis on Review of Justo Serrano Zamora, Democratization and Struggles Against Injusti...

La réponse de John Dewey aux critiques élitistes de la démocratie de la première moitié du xx e  siècle se fonde notamment sur une justification épistémique de ce régime, considéré par le philosophe pragmatiste comme le mieux à même de résoudre les problèmes et injustices sociales. Plus encore, J. Dewey montre que seul un approfondissement de la participation démocratique peut permettre de produire la connaissance de la réalité sociale nécessaire à sa transformation. L’article montre en quoi la conception participative de la démocratie ainsi élaborée pose les jalons d’une critique épistémologique des tendances épistocratiques des sociétés modernes. Ce faisant, il identifie dans certains arguments pragmatistes une préfiguration des thèses d’épistémologie radicale qui articuleront, plusieurs décennies plus tard, philosophie du savoir, philosophie sociale et théorie de la démocratie.

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