ABSTRACT
Green political theory has recently taken what might be described as a ‘deliberative turn’. There has been a tendency for green theorists to endorse deliberative democracy (in one variety or another) as the form of democratic governance that is most likely, through its levelling of the discursive playing field, to offer environmental reasons the greatest scope to influence the outcomes of the political decision-making process. This claim is not the naïve one that deliberative democracy will deliver green outcomes, but a more realistic belief that deliberative democracy will give green reasons their best opportunity to wield influence, by comparison with forms of democracy that, for example, rely upon mere preference aggregation. 1
