Natural Rate of Apathy

Pateman's outline of the modern democratic theorists highlights what we would classify as shortcomings in modern participation as positive aspects of a working structure. Schumpeter, Berelson, Dahl, Sartori and Echstein cast aside any lofty democratic ideals and identify democratic theory as a "theory of ends and means...a method for legislative and administrative decisions".
In essence the extent to which even affluent individuals are expected to participate is through voting and discussion. Citizen apathy and incompetence is built in as a necessary requirement of a healthy democracy, acting as a buffer that softens the blow disagreement or change. This raises the question of whether there is an optimal level of apathy required for the success of a democracy. Economists will normatively attest to a natural rate of unemployment that is healthy in our economy, but would we say there is a normative level of apathy? Rejectors of the classical theory would suggest so.
Dahl discusses a tipping point between political participation as a prerequisite for his polyarchy. Social responsibility and individual participation in the form of voting and informed debate can only be embraced to the point where a set of universal norms are held in tact.
What frustrates me is chapter two is almost an implicit defense of the modern theory through classical philosophers. Bentham wrote heavily on the importance of public opinion, Mill on social responsibility and Rousseau on the general will. With the exception of Rousseau, the idea of basic participation (voting/discussion) is proposed as an illusionary protective device to "ensure good government". Whereas Berleson raises a paradox in which the pieces don't add up to the whole (paralleled by the react, not act idea), I always got the impression that Mill, Bentham and other classicists believed that the pieces added to something greater than the whole.