ABSTRACT
Contemporary liberal democratic institutions are charged with lacking sensitivity to the plurality of values we associate with the non-human world, and with employing techniques to guide decision making, in particular cost-benefi t analysis (CBA), that misrepresent and distort the nature of environmental values. How might we begin to reform and restructure political institutions so that they are more sensitive to environmental considerations? Theories of deliberative democracy offer an interesting theoretical response to this question: they promise institutions that promote democratic deliberation (inclusive and reasoned political dialogue), which will be sensitive to the plurality of environmental values and which will promote political judgement that takes into consideration different perspectives on the non-human world.
