Pub Sphere Web
Pub Sphere Web
The notion of the public sphere is at the center of participatory approaches to democracy. The public sphere
is the arena where citizens come together, exchange opinions regarding public affairs, discuss, deliberate,
and eventually form public opinion. This arena can be a specific place where citizens gather (for example,
a town hall meeting), but it can also be a communication infrastructure through which citizens send and
receive information and opinions. The public sphere is a central aspect of good governance. Without a func-
tioning and democratic public sphere, government officials cannot be held accountable for their actions, and
citizens will not be able to assert any influence over political decisions.
The idea of the public sphere is normative. It is an ideal of good and accountable governance. Its requisites
are free flows of information, free expression, and free debate. The ideal public sphere is truly participa-
tory and the best protection against abuse of power. In reality, we only find approximations to this ideal.
However, promoting good governance means striving toward the ideal of a truly inclusive public sphere.
• Ancient Greece—The most general understanding of the public sphere comes from the Ancient Greek
city-states, where citizens directly participated in political decisions.2 Public life was tied to a specific
locale, the agora, where citizens exchanged and discussed opinions.
• European Monarchies—In the non-democratic state-forms of later centuries, the Royal court was the
public sphere, and only the king determined what was public.
• Salons—Over the course of the late 17th and early 18th centuries, coffeehouses (England), salons
(France), and table societies (Germany) became places where aristocrats and members of the middle
class met to discuss art and politics. In these gatherings, “authority of argument supplanted the
authority of title,”3 social status became disregarded entirely.4 With the development of the first mass
medium, the newspaper, the groups that met in salons and coffee houses became truly public: “news-
papers made public affairs and discussions about such affairs accessible to individuals scattered across
space.”5 Technically, this denotes the advent of what is today understood as public sphere.
1 Splichal, S. (1999). Public opinion. Developments and controversies in the twentieth century. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
2 Habermas, J. (1962/1995). The structural transformation of the public sphere: An inquiry into a category of bourgeois society.
Cambridge: MIT Press.
3 Price, V. (1992). Public opinion. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. (p. 9).
4 Habermas (1962/1995).
5 Splichal (1999, p. 23).
• Church congregations—In periods of political struggle, the Church often provided a space for
members of oppressed or marginalized groups to gather and articulate their objectives.
• Today—Today, the public sphere is even more strongly tied to the media. It is “defined in relation to
the mass media, because the mass media permit the circulation of opinion and offer the conditions
in which the forum can function.”6 The term gained new prominence with the spread of new commu-
nication technologies in the 1990s. The Internet in particular is considered to provide unprecedented
opportunities for exchanging information and for deliberation among a large number of people of
different backgrounds. Access for minority voices and political outsiders is considered to be essential
to a well-functioning public sphere.7
6 Bentivegna, S. (2002). Politics and new media. In L. Lievrouw & S. Livingstone (Eds.), Handbook of new media: Social shapings and
consequences of ICTs (pp. 50–60). London: Sage. (p. 52).
7 Marx Ferree, M., Gamson, W. A., Gerhards, J., & Rucht, D. (2002). Four models of the public sphere in modern democracies. Theory
and society, 31(3), 289–324. (p. 299).
8 Habermas, J. (1962/1995).
9 Habermas, J. (1992/1997). Between facts and norms: Contributions to a discourse theory of law and democracy. Cambridge: Polity.
(p. 360).
10 Odugbemi, A. (2008). Public opinion, the public sphere, and quality of governance: An exploration. In S. Odugbemi & T. Jacobson
(Eds.), Governance reform under real-world conditions. Citizens, stakeholders, and voice (pp. 15–37). Washington, D.C.: The World
Bank. (p. 17).
11 Habermas, J. (1992). Further reflections on the public sphere. In C. Calhoun (Ed.), Habermas and the public sphere (pp.
421–461). Cambridge: MIT Press; Dahlgren, P. (1991). Introduction. In P. Dahlgren & C. Sparks (Eds.), Communication and
citizenship: Journalism and the public sphere (pp. 1–24). London: Routledge; Splichal, S. (1999). Public opinion. Developments and
controversies in the twentieth century. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield; Habermas (1992/1997).
12 Splichal (1999).
Constitutive Elements
A functioning democratic public sphere rests on five pillars:14
• Free, plural, and independent media system not under state control—The media system is
often seen as the main institution of the public sphere.15 As such, it can only guarantee equal access
and voice to citizens if it is independent of political and corporate interests.
• Civil society—A vibrant civil society supports citizens’ demand for accountability and participation in
the public sphere. Civil society organizations organize and promote the citizen agenda.
• Sites of everyday talk about public affairs—Everyday talk is an important factor in the formation
of public opinion. Sites of everyday talk are all places where people come together to discuss politics
(such as work place, coffee shops, schools).
The constitutive elements of the public sphere work together based on the underlying principle of
openness and publicity.16 The philosopher Immanuel Kant articulated the principle of publicity as a legal
maxim and as a fundamental principle of democracy. He stated that all actions that affect other people are
wrong if they do not hold up to public scrutiny.17 Kant also designated the public sphere to be the space
for “public use of reason.” The public use of reason is based on ethic principles of communication,18 such
as respect for opposing speakers and viewpoints, the ability to compromise, and other principles of fair
public debate.
13 This concept was invoked by U.S. Supreme Court Judge Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., in Abrams vs. United States, 250 U.S. 616
(1919). Holmes did not actually use this term but invoked the general ideal. See also Mill, J. S. (1859/1985). On liberty. London:
Penguin; Milton, J. (1644/1927). Areopagitica. New York: Payson & Clarke.
14 Odugbemi (2008).
15 McQuail, D. (2005). McQuail’s mass communication theory. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
16 Splichal, S. (2006). In search of a strong European public sphere: Some critical observations on conceptualizations of publicness and
the (European) public sphere. Media, culture & society, 28(5), 695–7147. See also Habermas (1962/1995); Odugbemi (2008).
17 Kant, I. (1795/1983). To perpetual peace. In Immanuel Kant: Perpetual peace and other essays on politics, history, and morals
(pp. 107–144). Indianapolis, IN: Hackett.
18 Habermas, J. (1981/1984). The theory of communicative action. Boston: Beacon Press.
19 Odugbemi (2008, p. 15).
Issue-Based
Information Flows
Firms Judiciary
PUBLIC OPINION
Source: Odugbemi (2008, p. 30).
over official authorities through public opinion.20 “It is in the free and open public sphere that social
movements acquire a public voice, fight for recognition, assert themselves, seek to shape public opinion,
influence leaders and policy makers, and bring about change.”21 Good and accountable governance builds
upon a free flow of information, free expression, and free discussion of matters of political concern.
• Civil society—Civil society and the public are closely related, but conceptually not synonymous. Civil
society is constituted by organizations and activities that have no primary political or commercial
character, and are not motivated by profit or power.23 Under certain circumstances they can become
part of the public sphere.24
20 Habermas (1992/1997).
21 Odugbemi (2008, p. 28).
22 Price, V. (2008). The public and public opinion in political theories. In W. Donsbach & M. W. Traugott (Eds.), The Sage handbook of
public opinion research (pp. 11–24). London: Sage.
23 Splichal (1999).
24 Habermas (1962/1995).
• The media—The mass media “have central significance in the creation of an institutional (infra)
structure enabling the organization of the general interest both nationally and internationally.”26 In
addition to providing communication channels, the mass media also introduce and shape topics of
public discussion.
• Private actors—When private citizens or corporations enter the public sphere, they usually do so to
promote private or public interests. In the latter case, they become part of the public.
Public Opinion
Public opinion is a product of the public sphere, and a crucial concept in governance and political decision
making. Public opinion refers to:
• Events, policies, or decisions that concern people that do not participate in them;27
• It tends to be transitory.
Public opinion is crucial for politics. As Scottish philosopher David Hume stated: “It is therefore, on opinion
only that government is founded.”29 Public opinion is the basis of political power and legitimacy, and any
government “is secure only to the extent that the relevant population willingly consents to the rule.”30
25 Odugbemi (2008).
26 Splichal (2006, p. 703).
27 Mill (1859/1985).
28 Price, V. & Neijens, P. (1997). Opinion quality in public opinion research. International Journal of Public Opinion Research, 9(4),
336–360.
29 Hume, D. (1994). Political essays. Ed. K. Haakonssen. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press. (p. 16).
30 Odugbemi (2008, p. 17).
Policy Implications
An open and democratic public sphere rests on legally guaranteed civil rights, most importantly freedom of
expression, opinion, and assembly, as well as access to information laws. Such laws will only be effective
in a culture of openness. That means that public officials should feel committed to the public’s right to
know, not the government’s right to secrecy. Media regulation should guarantee that the media can fulfill
its democratic roles without political or economic pressures. Literacy and education promote a citizenry
that is interested in public affairs and that is willing as well as able to participate in governance. Policies
should target these main factors to promote a public sphere that enables good, democratic, and account-
able government.
CommGAP is funded through a multi-donor trust fund. The founding donor of this trust fund
is the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID).