The deliberative democracy community celebrates the work and life of Professor James Bohman, a pillar of deliberative democratic theory.

James Francis “Jim” Bohman died in January 2021, after struggling with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease for several years. He was professor emeritus at Saint Louis University, where he taught since 1986. Jim was a highly influential scholar with broad interests that range across many different areas, topics and disciplines: from democratic theory to critical theory, the philosophy of the social sciences, Jürgen Habermas’s philosophy, American pragmatism, republican cosmopolitanism and international law.

Undoubtedly, his pioneering work in the area of deliberative democracy is one of his most important legacies. Jim belonged to the second generation of deliberative democrats who fruitfully challenged, expanded and transformed the narrow conception of the deliberative ideal that the first generation of deliberative democrats (such as Habermas and Joshua Cohen) had articulated in the 1980s and 1990s. In a series of articles that culminated in the publication of his influential book, Public Deliberation: Pluralism, Complexity and Democracy, Jim defended a conception of the deliberative ideal that was based on a pluralistic view of public reason. His pluralistic approach could incorporate forms of deliberation such as fair compromises and mutual accommodations in the face of deep disagreements—forms that did not aim primarily at reaching a “consensus for the same reasons.” In showing that pluralism and complexity could actually be a resource, rather than a threat, to deliberative democracy, his work helped to assuage critics who thought of deliberative democracy as exclusionary or elitist while simultaneously making a case for why normative democratic theory needs to (and feasibly can) be connected to both the practices in actual democracies and the possibilities for future democratic reforms.

His book, Democracy Across Borders: From Demos to Demoi, was equally groundbreaking and influential. In it, Jim applies his conception of deliberative democracy that he articulated and defended in his previous work to address the vexing problem of how to extend democracies across national borders. He offers an ambitious political proposal for a future international order that could enable a global democracy without a world government—a form of self-rule composed of many disparate demoi instead of any single demos. Jim was working on a book that would elaborate these ideas further within the framework of republican political theory. Sadly, this fascinating work was interrupted by his illness and premature death.

For all his brilliance, intellectual skills and sensibilities, Jim’s most enduring impact on everyone he interacted with was that of his sheer kindness and humanity. He was a wonderful, generous, witty and decent human being—a true “Mensch.” Like all other scholars, colleagues, family and friends who had the privilege of knowing Jim, deliberative democrats will sorely miss him.

About the Author

Cristina Lafont is professor of philosophy at Northwestern University.