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Democratic Politics (democratic + politics)
Selected AbstractsPointers on Pierre Bourdieu and Democratic PoliticsCONSTELLATIONS: AN INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF CRITICAL AND DEMOCRATIC THEORY, Issue 1 2004Loïc Wacquant First page of article [source] On the Spatial Dynamics of Democratic Politics: Analysing the Bolivian CaseDEVELOPMENT AND CHANGE, Issue 4 2003David Slater After an initial discussion of the ,diverse spaces of democracy', which sets out the main points of the author's approach to democratic politics, this article considers three perspectives on the relations between governmental decentralization and territorial democracy in Latin America. These two interrelated sections provide a thematic and conceptual background to a more specific treatment of the development and dynamics of decentralization in the Bolivian case. In examining the decentralization process in Bolivia, the article highlights the two spatial modes of this process , the regional and the local , and includes an appraisal of the relation between both modes and the nature of democratic politics. [source] "Singing for Our Lives": Women's Music and Democratic PoliticsHYPATIA, Issue 4 2002NANCY S. LOVE Although democratic theorists often employ musical metaphors to describe their politics, musical practices are seldom analyzed as forms of political communication. In this article, I explore how the music of social movements, what is called "movement music," supplements deliberative democrats' concept of public discourse as rational argument. Invoking energies, motions, and voices beyond established identities and institutions anticipates a different, more musical democracy. I argue that the "women's music" of Holly Near, founder of Redwood Records and Redwood Cultural Work, exemplifies this transformative power of musical sound. [source] The Antinomies of the Postpolitical City: In Search of a Democratic Politics of Environmental ProductionINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF URBAN AND REGIONAL RESEARCH, Issue 3 2009ERIK SWYNGEDOUW Abstract In recent years, urban research has become increasingly concerned with the social, political and economic implications of the techno-political and socio-scientific consensus that the present unsustainable and unjust environmental conditions require a transformation of the way urban life is organized. In the article, I shall argue that the present consensual vision of the urban environment presenting a clear and present danger annuls the properly political moment and contributes to what a number of authors have defined as the emergence and consolidation of a postpolitical and postdemocratic condition. This will be the key theme developed in this contribution. First, I shall attempt to theorize and re-centre the political as a pivotal moment in urban political-ecological processes. Second, I shall argue that the particular staging of the environmental problem and its modes of management signals and helps to consolidate a postpolitical condition, one that evacuates the properly political from the plane of immanence that underpins any political intervention. The consolidation of an urban postpolitical condition runs, so I argue, parallel to the formation of a postdemocratic arrangement that has replaced debate, disagreement and dissensus with a series of technologies of governing that fuse around consensus, agreement, accountancy metrics and technocratic environmental management. In the third part, I maintain that this postpolitical consensual police order revolves decidedly around embracing a populist gesture. However, the disappearance of the political in a postpolitical arrangement leaves all manner of traces that allow for the resurfacing of the properly political. This will be the theme of the final section. I shall conclude that re-centring the political is a necessary condition for tackling questions of urban environmental justice and for creating egalibertarian socio-ecological urban assemblages. Résumé Récemment, la recherche urbaine a montré un intérêt croissant pour les implications sociales, politiques et économiques du consensus techno-politique et socio-scientifique selon lequel les conditions environnementales actuelles, non viables et injustes, exigent que soit transformé le mode d'organisation de la vie urbaine. Or, cette perspective consensuelle de l'environnement urbain soumis à un danger manifeste et réel annihile le moment véritablement politique et contribue à ce que de nombreux auteurs ont défini comme l'apparition et la consolidation d'une situation post-politique et post-démocratique. Traitant ce thème essentiel, l'article tente d'abord de conceptualiser et de recentrer le politique en tant que moment critique dans les processus politico-écologiques urbains. Ensuite, il montrera que la mise en scène particulière du problème environnemental et de ses modes de gestion indique, et aide à consolider, un état post-politique, dans lequel le véritablement politique est évacué du plan de l'immanence sous-jacent à toute intervention politique. La consolidation d'une situation post-politique urbaine se fait en parallèle à la formation d'un dispositif post-démocratique qui a remplacé débat, désaccord et dissension par une panoplie de technologies gouvernementales gravitant autour de mesures de consensus, d'accord et de responsabilité, associées à une gestion technocratique de l'environnement. Une troisième partie soutient que cet ordre policé consensuel post-politique se rapproche nettement du geste populiste. Toutefois, la disparition du politique d'un dispositif post-politique laisse toutes sortes de traces permettant la réémergence du véritablement politique. Cet aspect est au c,ur de la dernière partie. Pour conclure, le recentrage du politique est un préalable au traitement des questions de justice en matière d'environnement urbain et à la création d'assemblages urbains socio-écologiques d'égaliberté. [source] Preventive War and Democratic PoliticsINTERNATIONAL STUDIES QUARTERLY, Issue 1 2008Chicago, Presidential Address to the International Studies Association March I define the concept of preventive war, distinguish it from preemption and other sources of better-now-than-later logic, and examine numerous conceptual issues that confound theoretical and empirical analyses of prevention. I then consider the argument that democracies rarely if ever adopt preventive war strategies because such strategies are contrary to the preferences of democratic publics and to the values and identities of democratic states. I examine a number of historical cases of anticipated power shifts by democratic states, and analyze the motivations for war and the mobilization of public support for war. The evidence contradicts both the descriptive proposition that democracies do not adopt preventive war strategies and causal propositions about the constraining effects of democratic institutions and democratic political cultures. [source] State-led Democratic Politics and Emerging Forms of Indigenous Leadership Among the Ye'kwana of the Upper OrinocoJOURNAL OF LATIN AMERICAN & CARIBBEAN ANTHROPOLOGY, Issue 1 2006Matthew LauerArticle first published online: 28 JUN 200 En este artículo analizo la política Ye'kwana del Alto Orinoco para revelar como sus nociones de liderazgo, autoridad, y comunidad han sido transformadas con la intrusión política nacional de Venezuela. Comparo las respuestas de indigenistas, misioneros, políticos regionales, e indígenas Ye'kwana sobre la ascensión al poder político de Jaime Turón, un líder polémico Ye'kwana y alcalde del municipio Alto Orinoco. Sostengo que la política de descentralización y democratización conducida por muchos estados de América Latina son procesos que simultáneamente excluyen e incorporan a líderes indígenas y plantean desafíos complicados para aquellos que buscan legitimidad entre los pueblos indígenas y organizaciones indigenistas. Ésta situación es especialmente pertinente al caso de Venezuela, un país petrolero donde líderes indígenas entran a la esfera política nacional como políticos elegidos con presupuestos municipales relativamente grandes bajo su control y no como lideres asociados a federaciones interétnicas. Este estudio revela los aspectos emergentes del liderazgo indígena contemporáneo y los criterios híbridos necesarios para la legitimidad política entre indígenas Amazónicas. Además, agrega a una comprensión más plural y multi-vocal de la política indígena en América Latina. PALABRAS CLAVES: indígenas Amazónicas, política de etnicidad, liderazgo, cambio política,Venezuela. KEYWORDS: Amazonian Indians, cultural politics, leadership, political change,Venezuela. [source] Philip Corboy and the Construction of the Plaintiffs' Personal Injury BarLAW & SOCIAL INQUIRY, Issue 2 2005Sara Parikh Drawing on the career of Philip Corboy, this article examines the construction of the plaintiffs' personal injury bar in the second half of the 20th century. Through a relational biography based on Mr. Corboy's career, we look at the development of this subprofession in the context of the sociopolitical environment within which Mr. Corboy and his peers operated, the social capital they possessed, and the particular strategies they used as they worked to establish both a professional and market niche. This analysis shows how and why Mr. Corboy and his peers constructed a thriving subprofession that is characterized by a unique blend of working-class ideology, trial craft, professional bar leadership, Democratic politics, local philanthropy, and a market referral system,all of which reinforce the dominance and prestige of its own elite. [source] On the Spatial Dynamics of Democratic Politics: Analysing the Bolivian CaseDEVELOPMENT AND CHANGE, Issue 4 2003David Slater After an initial discussion of the ,diverse spaces of democracy', which sets out the main points of the author's approach to democratic politics, this article considers three perspectives on the relations between governmental decentralization and territorial democracy in Latin America. These two interrelated sections provide a thematic and conceptual background to a more specific treatment of the development and dynamics of decentralization in the Bolivian case. In examining the decentralization process in Bolivia, the article highlights the two spatial modes of this process , the regional and the local , and includes an appraisal of the relation between both modes and the nature of democratic politics. [source] European Union Constitution-Making, Political Identity and Central European ReflectionsEUROPEAN LAW JOURNAL, Issue 2 2005It analyses both the temporal and spatial dimensions of constitution-making and addresses the problems of political identity related to ethnic divisions and civic demos. It starts by summarising the major arguments supporting the Union's constitution-making project and emphasises the Union's symbolic power as a polity built on the principles of civil society and parliamentary democracy. The EU's official rejection of ethnically based political identity played an important symbolic role in post-Communist constitutional and legal transformations in Central Europe in the 1990s. In the following part, the text analyses the temporal dimension of the EU's identity-building and constitution-making and emphasises its profoundly future-oriented structure. The concept of identity as the ,future in process' is the only option of how to deal with the absence of the European demos. Furthermore, it initiates the politically much-needed constitution-making process. The following spatial analysis of this process emphasises positive aspects of the horizontal model of constitution-making, its elements in the Convention's deliberation and their positive effect on the Central European accession states. The article concludes by understanding the emerging European identity as a multi-level identity of civil political virtues surrounded by old loyalties and traditions, which supports the conversational model of liberal democratic politics, reflects the continent's heterogeneity and leads to the beneficial combination of universal principles and political realism. [source] Political Representation in Leader Democracy1GOVERNMENT AND OPPOSITION, Issue 3 2005András Körösényi The essay focuses on the neglected problem of democratic politics, i.e. on the role of leadership. Although in democracies public office holders are controlled to a certain extent, leaders still have wide room for political manoeuvre and decide without any ,instruction' of the citizens. Re-working Weber's and Schumpeter's theory, the author aims to build the model of leader democracy. He highlights the major traits of it in a comparison with the deliberative and the aggregative,utilitarian concepts of democratic theory. The theory of leader democracy is applied to the problem of representation, which, in contrast to mechanical mirroring, gains a new, dynamic and qualitative meaning. [source] The Russian Revolution: Broadening Understandings of 1917HISTORY COMPASS (ELECTRONIC), Issue 1 2008Sarah Badcock The rich historiography of the revolution has tended to focus around urban and political elites, labour history and events in Petrograd and to a lesser extent Moscow. The collapse of the Soviet Union opened previously inaccessible archives and shifted the ideological battlegrounds ranged over by scholars of the Russian revolution. New archivally based research is shifting its focus away from the capitals and political elites, and draws together social and political approaches to the revolution. By investigating revolutionary events outside the capitals, and lived experiences of revolution for Russia's ordinary people, most of whom were rural, not urban dwellers, current research draws a complex and multifaceted picture of revolutionary events. Explanations for the failure of democratic politics in Russia can now be found not only in the ineptitudes of Nicholas II, the failings of Kerensky, or the machinations of Lenin and his cohort. Instead, ordinary people, outside the capitals and in the countryside, defined and determined revolutionary events. [source] The Indian Movement and Political Democracy in EcuadorLATIN AMERICAN POLITICS AND SOCIETY, Issue 3 2007Leon Zamosc ABSTRACT This article examines the implications of the Ecuadorian Indian movement for democratic politics. During the 1990s, the movement successfully fostered indigenous and popular participation in public life, influenced government policies, and became a contender in power struggles. But in the institutional domain, the participatory breakthrough had mixed effects. While the movement fulfilled functions of interest representation and control of state power, its involvement in a coup attempt demonstrated that its political socialization had not nurtured a sense of commitment to democracy. The evidence is discussed by reference to the proposition that civil society actors may or may not contribute to democracy. The article argues that the study of the democratic spinoffs of civil activism requires a context-specific approach that considers the particularistic orientations of civil associations and pays attention to their definition of means and ends, the institutional responses evoked by their initiatives, and the unintended consequences of their actions. [source] Solving a classic dilemma of democratic politics: Who will guard the guardians?NATIONAL CIVIC REVIEW, Issue 4 2005J. H. Snider First page of article [source] Trust Your Compatriots, but Count Your Change: The Roles of Trust, Mistrust and Distrust in DemocracyPOLITICAL STUDIES, Issue 2 2008Patti Tamara Lenard Although trust is clearly central to human relations of all kinds, it is less clear whether there is a role for trust in democratic politics. In this article, I argue that trust is central to democratic institutions as well as to democratic political participation, and that arguments which make distrust the central element of democracy fail. First, I argue for the centrality of trust to the democratic process. The voluntary compliance that is central to democracies relies on trust, along two dimensions: citizens must trust their legislators to have the national interest in mind and citizens must trust each other to abide by democratically established laws. Second, I refute arguments that place distrust at the centre of democratic institutions. I argue, instead, that citizens must be vigilant with respect to their legislators and fellow citizens; that is, they must be willing to ensure that the institutions are working fairly and that people continue to abide by shared regulations. This vigilance , which is reflected both in a set of institutions as well as an active citizenry , is motivated by an attitude termed ,mistrust'. Mistrust is a cautious attitude that propels citizens to maintain a watchful eye on the political and social happenings within their communities. Moreover, mistrust depends on trust: we trust fellow citizens to monitor for abuses of our own rights and privileges just as we monitor for abuses of their rights and privileges. Finally, I argue that distrust is inimical to democracy. We are, consequently, right to worry about widespread reports of trust's decline. Just as distrust is harmful to human relations of all kinds, and just as trust is central to positive human relations of all kinds, so is distrust inimical to democracy and trust central to its flourishing. [source] Neo-liberalism and the Decline of Democratic Governance in Australia: A Problem of Institutional Design?POLITICAL STUDIES, Issue 1 2005Ian Marsh This paper is a preliminary attempt to evaluate changing patterns of democratic governance, at least in Westminster-style parliamentary settings, and possibly more generally. It has two specific purposes: first, to propose a paradigm for evaluating the empirical evolution of democratic governance; and second, to illustrate the explanatory potential of this paradigm through a mini-case study of changing patterns of governance in one particular polity. The conceptual framework is drawn from March and Olsen's eponymous study (1995) from which polar (,thick' and ,thin') forms of democratic governance are derived. Four conjectures about its evolution are then explored. First, in its mass party phase, the pattern of democratic governance approximated the ,thick' pole. Second, the subsequent evolution of democratic politics has been in the direction of the ,thin' (minimalist or populist) pole. Third, the cause of this shift was a failure to adapt political institutions to changing citizen identities, which was masked by the ascendancy amongst political elites of the neo-liberal account of governance. Fourth, the paper considers the means by which democratic governance might be renewed. The approach is applied to explain changes in Australian politics over recent decades. [source] The Lost Legitimacy: Property, Business Power and the ConstitutionPUBLIC ADMINISTRATION, Issue 2 2001Michael Moran After nearly a quarter of a century of business friendly government in Britain, the business community nevertheless finds itself more unpopular than for three decades and is increasingly beset by demands for regulation. The sources of its problems lie in the regulatory structures historically created for the business community. These structures have been unable to cope with regulation in the world of large-scale privatization, global economic competition and the demands of democratic politics for public accountability. Business is therefore struggling to create new sources of legitimacy. [source] Memory in the Construction of ConstitutionsRATIO JURIS, Issue 4 2002Michael Schäfer In connection with the contemporary debates in political philosophy between liberal, republican and proceduralist,deliberative views of democratic politics, I deal with the question of how the different concepts in these debates can be related to the particular national history, memories and expectations of a polity. I shall concentrate on one German example of the relationship between constitutionalism and democracy, in order to show that political philosophy must pay more attention to the different shared practices and understandings within each liberal society. [source] | ||||||||||||||||