The Democratic Legitimacy of Self-Appointed Representatives

How should we theorize and normatively assess those individual and collective actors who claim to represent others for political purposes, but do so without the electoral authorization and accountability usually thought to be at the heart of democratic representation? In this article, I offer conceptual tools for assessing the democratic legitimacy of such “self-appointed” representatives. I argue that these kinds of political actors bring two constituencies into being: the authorizing—that group empowered by the claim to exercise authorization and demand accountability—and the affected—that group affected, or potentially affected, by collective decisions. Self-appointed representation provides democratically legitimate representation when it provides political presence for affected constituencies and is authorized by and held accountable to them. I develop the critical tools to assess the democratic credentials of self-appointed representatives by identifying nonelectoral mechanisms of authorization and accountability that may empower affected constituencies to exercise authorization and demand accountability.