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Democratic practices and ideals are facing stern tests around the world in the 21st century. Democratic Design argues that to respond effectively and creatively, democrats will need to work with a new and versatile toolkit of concepts and institutions. Existing dominant approaches, such as the deliberative democracy model, offer forms of "silo thinking" at a time when systemic and joined-up perspectives are at a premium. The book builds this new toolkit - the democratic design framework - through an original blend of design thinking and democratic theory and practice. It shows why we need this framework, and how its use can renew and enliven democracy's potential across a range of countries ...
Representation is more than a matter of elections and parties. This book offers a radical new perspective on the subject. Representation, it argues, is all around us, a dynamic practise across societies rather than simply a fixed feature of government. At the heart of the argument is the straightforward but versatile notion of the representative claim. People claim to speak or stand for others in multiple, shifting, and surprising patterns. At the same time they offer images of their constituents and audiences as artists paint portraits. Who can speak for and about us in this volatile world of representations? Which representative claims can have democratic legitimacy? The Representative Claim is set to transform our core assumptions about what representation is and can be. At a time when political representation is widely believed to be in crisis, the book provides a timely and critical corrective to conventional wisdom on the present and potential future of representative democracy.
While political scientists and political theorists have long been interested in social and political performance, and theatre and performance researchers have often focused on the political dimensions of the live arts, the interdisciplinary nature of this labor has typically been assumed rather than rigorously explored. This volume brings together leading scholars in the fields of Politics and Performance--drawing on experts across the fields of literature, law, anthropology, sociology, psychology, and media and communiction, as well as politics and theatre and performance--to map out and deepen the evolving interdisciplinary engagement. Organized into seven thematic sections, the volume investigates the relationship between politics and performance to show that certain features of political transactions shared by performances are fundamental to both disciplines--and that to a large extent they also share a common communicational base and language.
This book examines the changing character of European citizenship, focusing on 'acts' of citizenship.
The Terms of Democracy shows how democracy makes radical demands upon political leaders and citizens alike. By setting out the terms of democracy in a fresh and systematic way, Michael Saward provides compelling responses to many troubling questions in democratic theory. In a tightly-argued analysis, the book offers innovative accounts of the value of democracy, the links between direct and representative institutions, the question of political community, and trade-offs between democracy and competing values. Building on a justification for democracy which embraces scepticism, Saward argues that democracy means the responsiveness of government to citizens' wishes. He shows why direct democracy and an array of constitutionally guaranteed rights are crucial to democracy. A comprehensive framework for analysing trade-offs of democracy illuminates the interplay between democratic idealism and political realism. The discussion of political community cuts through conventional pessimism to show how democrats can respond positively to sub-group demands for autonomy. The Terms of Democracy will be welcomed by all those engaged in debates about democracy's present and future.
Democratic Innovation is an original look at the political future of democracy, exploring the latest ideas aimed at renewing popular power. Featuring new writings by leading European, American and Australian democratic theorists, this book explores the following themes: * the importance of public deliberation in democracies * how effective representation for all might be acheived * the role that voluntary associations can play in democratic governance
An Anthology of Writings from 1483 to 1999 Firmly I Believe and Truly celebrates the depth and breadth of the spiritual, literary, and intellectual heritage of the Post-Reformation English Roman Catholic tradition in an anthology of writings that span a five hundred year period between William Caxton and Cardinal Hume. Intended as a rich resource for all with an interest in Roman Catholicism, the writings have been carefully selected and edited by a team of scholars with historical, theological, and literary expertise. Each author is introduced to provide context for the included extracts and the chronological arrangement of the anthology makes the volume easy to use whilst creating a fascin...
The Future of Representative Democracy poses important questions about representation, representative democracy and their future. Inspired by the last major investigation of the subject by Hanna Pitkin over four decades ago, this ambitious volume fills a major gap in the literature by examining the future of representative forms of democracy in terms of present-day trends and past theories of representative democracy. Aware of the pressing need for clarifying key concepts and institutional trends, the volume aims to break down barriers among disciplines and to establish an interdisciplinary dialogue among scholars. The contributors emphasise that representative democracy and its future is a subject of pressing scholarly concern and public importance. Paying close attention to the unfinished, two-centuries-old relationship between democracy and representation, this book offers a fresh perspective on current problems and dilemmas of representative democracy and the possible future development of new forms of democratic representation.
This work examines in straightforward terms the truest of all true facts, the basics of Christianity which form the foundation of everything else in life. In characteristically blunt style, Michael Saward sets out to answer such questions as: how can we discover something of God's character?