Representative democracy is nowadays the most spread and legitimated political system in the world. In the last decades a wide consensus was created about representative democracy (free elections, universal suffrage, freedom of thought, etc.) as the best and most perfect form of government, this ideological vision becoming an almost absolute and unquestionable value. This thematic area includes the study of alternative forms of democracy, in which voting is neither the beginning nor the final goal of democracy: participative, deliberative and communitarian forms enacted both at local and national levels that directly interpellate representative democracy. The aim of the thematic area is to reveal the democratic diversity of the world, and explore the potential of these participative and deliberative experiences in the creation of new and more demanding forms of political articulation and decision.
Below, some contributions to expand the discussion.
Boaventura de Sousa Santos Lecture at Leverhulme, London 25 April 2012. Audio file in English. Topic: Seven threats and seven challenges
In the view of Boaventura de Sousa Santos there are seven major threats facing the popular classes around the world. They take different forms in different regions and have...
Advanced seminar, in Portuguese. University of Coimbra School of Economics, 17.04.2012.
Boaventura de Sousa Santos analyses how struggles to extend democracy can be linked to law as a tool for social emancipation. This involves examining how emancipatory practices mobilise legality and institutional innovation beyo...
Boaventura de Sousa Santos Lecture at Leverhulme, London 21 March 2012. Audio file in English. Topic: Development or self-determination?
Boaventura de Sousa Santos explores the economic alternatives to the endless accumulation of capitalism and the destruction of the environment. The study of non-capitalist f...
