Tom Hayden posted on his website, http://www.tomhayden.com, an article he coauthored with Dick Flacks to commemorate the fortieth anniversary of the Port Huron Statement. The two SDS founders concluded, “Perhaps the most important legacy of the Port Huron Statement is the fact that it introduced the concept of participatory democracy to popular discourse and practice.” The concept of participatory democracy encompassed values such as equality, decentralization, and consensus decision-making. It provided direction for “all those trying to create a world where each person has a voice in the decisions affecting his or her life.” 1 In this article, I suggest that Port Huron’s concept of participatory democracy included some ideas that were potentially antithetical to democracy and that potential, unfortunately, is being fulfilled in contemporary theories of digital democracy.
Mark E. Kann (Tue,) studied this question.