Tag Archives for participation

How to Reconcile Participation and Representation

In On Revolution and other writings, Arendt advocates the form of political organization known as the council system. This aspect of her thought has been sharply criticized or — more often — simply ignored. How, both sympathizers and detractors wonder, could Arendt in all earnest propose the council system as an alternative to parliamentary democracy? The aim of the present paper is to defend Arendt’s position. I argue that her enthusiasm for the council system is an integral element of her thought and defend it against the criticisms it has provoked. Furthermore, I highlight the relevance of her arguments for the current debate about the idea of deliberative democracy. Her thesis that (top-down) party politics and (bottom-up) deliberative politics are antithetical and hence cannot coexist poses a serious challenge to the idea that parliamentary democracy can be made more deliberative while leaving its basic framework intact.

Totschnig, Wolfhart, How to Reconcile Participation and Representation: A Defense of Arendt’s Argument for the Council System (2012). APSA 2012 Annual Meeting Paper. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2105081

Who Participates? Local Participation and the Left Turn in Bolivia

Whereas studies of electoral participation abound, little attention has been paid to non-electoral and non-contentious participation. Latin American countries have recently promoted participatory institutions and become ideal contexts to probe participation questions. Since the mid 1990s, Bolivia has been at the forefront of institutional creation for participation. We analyze the determinants of local community participation through individual survey data spanning from 1998 to 2010. Our contribution is two-fold. First, we ask whether Bolivia’s new participatory regime reproduces the socioeconomic biases prevalent in developed societies. We find no evidence of a high social-class bias in Bolivia’s participatory regime. Second, we analyze whether Bolivia’s left turn has produced changes in the levels or predictors of participation, as expected in the “left turn” literature. Contrary to expectations, the levels of local community participation have not changed, albeit the participants are slightly younger, more indigenous, and rural than before the left turn.

Davies, Emmerich and Falleti, Tulia, Who Participates? Local Community Participation and the Left Turn in Bolivia (2012). APSA 2012 Annual Meeting Paper. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2104703

Participation is purposeful; it is intended to make a difference – to the participant, or to the world around them. People who take part in voluntary and community action are looking to fulfill this need. But local democracy has lost its sense of purpose. Politicians are seen as self-serving, local elections written off as a foregone conclusion and engagement is considered a cynical exercise in legitimising decisions already made.

It would be nice to think that social media could solve this problem, but I’m far from convinced. I do not dispute that it can be an excellent tool for engaging with certain groups, and making the business of government more open and transparent. But when people do not trust the messenger or the message, changing the medium is unlikely to make much difference.

Great discussion at the Guardian. Couldn’t agree more with the quote above.