TY - BOOK ID - 78437866 TI - Democracy's voices: social ties and the quality of public life in Spain PY - 2004 SN - 1501727176 9781501727177 0801442265 9780801442261 PB - Ithaca (N.Y.) Cornell University Press DB - UniCat KW - Social networks KW - Labor leaders KW - Intellectuals KW - Democracy KW - Political participation KW - Intelligentsia KW - Persons KW - Social classes KW - Specialists KW - Networking, Social KW - Networks, Social KW - Social networking KW - Social support systems KW - Support systems, Social KW - Interpersonal relations KW - Cliques (Sociology) KW - Microblogs KW - Labor movement leaders KW - Leaders, Labor KW - Social reformers KW - Participation politique KW - Démocratie KW - Intellectuels KW - Dirigeants syndicaux KW - Réseaux sociaux UR - https://www.unicat.be/uniCat?func=search&query=sysid:78437866 AB - Building on one of sociology's core ideas-that social ties can shape collective outcomes-Democracy's Voices shows that connections across class boundaries can remake public rhetoric and thus the quality of democratic life. Robert M. Fishman takes up a question of enduring significance to people concerned with the quality of democratic public life, focusing on why political rhetoric proves engaging and broadly relevant, or disengaging and narrow. The answer to that question, he argues, is to be found not only in the deeds of prominent politicians and the nature of official institutions but also in the existence and the character of social connections among ordinary citizens. Fishman's book, based on long-term fieldwork and systematic survey research in Spain, identifies the special contribution to democratic quality made by conversations between intellectuals and workers. Fishman focuses on what he calls the "discursive horizons" of local leaders and communities: the actual location of the problems and proposed remedies articulated in political rhetorics. Democracy's Voices shows how the subcultural context of social ties may accentuate or diminish their power to reshape rhetorics. Fishman argues that conversations are able to remake public rhetorics whereas ties that take the form of brokerage lack that ability. The book also offers a general critique of social capital theory and argues that the full ability of social ties to shape collective outcomes can only be observed when one distinguishes in useful ways among types of ties. ER -