ABSTRACT
Not only is the information revolution transforming the international system as such. It also challenges our concepts of democracy, government, and governance. By enabling a transnational cyberspace, the information revolution blurs the distinction between the domestic and the international dimensions of classical categories in political science, such as decision-making and legitimacy. At the same time, democracy practised digitally need not remain confined to state-type political systems. Consequently, normative categories of domestic democratic discourse, such as deliberation, provide the potential to assess the intrinsic quality of debate in the international and transnational realm as well. However, despite the prevalence of communicative action, not all communication necessarily fosters action, however committed it may be to the best public argument, that is, however deliberative it may be. Investigating the linkage between deliberation in terms of communication and decision-making in terms of action is therefore a valuable contribution to assessing the impact of the information revolution on inter-and transnational relations. In aiming for such a contribution, this article starts by clarifying the concept of digital democracy on the theoretical and domestic scales. It continues by identifying trajectories that can lead us from cyber-deliberation, that is, arguing through internetbased communitation, to real-world decision-making.
