Our understanding of public deliberation is rooted in theories of deliberative democracy and moral philosophy. These schools of thought place public justification at the heart of the modern governance. Decision making is supposedly about the public reasoning about choices. A deliberative process begins with a government proposal which is justified by its relevance to public (rather than private) interests.

Such a justification must be regarded as reasonable (rooted in plausible reasons) even when others disagree, and must be subject to change through debate. These ideas emanate from the works of philosophers such as John Rawls and Amartya Sen, who defined reasonableness as what we believe when we put our own interests aside, or what an impartial observer with no stake in a decision would find reasonable

This school of thought suggests that leaders are not tasked with making "good" choices, but they are responsible for the quality of the reasons they propose.  The public must also rule on these reasons in an open minded manner and offer alternative reasons, and not just alternative choices, where they disagree.

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