ABSTRACT

Legitimate political decision-making is underpinned by well-ordered political deliberation, including by the decision-makers themselves, their advisory bodies, and the public at large. But what constitutes well-ordered political deliberation? The short answer to this question is that it’s political deliberation that is governed by relevant norms. In this chapter, I first discuss different types of norms that might govern well-ordered political deliberation. I then focus on one particular type of norms: epistemic norms. My aim in this chapter is to shed light on how the validity of contributions to political deliberation depends, inter alia, on the epistemic status of the claims made.