scholarly journals La batalla por la democracia

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
ERNESTO GANUZA ◽  
Heloise Nez ◽  
Ernesto Morales
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
The Political ◽  
Participatory Budgeting ◽  
Political Arena ◽  
Porto Alegre ◽  
Local Participation ◽  
Urban Social Movements ◽  
Political Subject ◽  
Set Up

The emergence of new participatory mechanisms, such as participatory budgeting, in towns and cities in recent years, has given rise to a conflict between the old protagonists of local participation and the new citizens invited to participate. These mechanisms offer a logic of collective action different to what has been the usual fare in the cities – one that is based on proposal rather than demand. As a result, it requires urban social movements to transform their own dynamics in order to make room for a new political subject (the citizenry and the non-organised participant) and to act upon a stage where deliberative dynamics now apply. The present article aims to analyse this conflict in three different cities that set up participatory budgeting at different times: Porto Alegre, Cordova and Paris. The associations in the three cities took up a position against the new participatory mechanism and demanded a bigger role in the political arena. Through a piece of ethnographic research, we shall see that the responses of the agents involved (politicians, associations and citizens) in the three cities share some arguments, although the conflict was resolved differently in each of them. The article concludes with reflections on the consequences this conflict could have for contemporary political theory, especially with respect to the role of associations in the processes of democratisation and the setting forth of a new way of doing politics by means of deliberative procedures.

Aristotle on the Concept of Shared Life

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sara Brill
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Character

Aristotle on the Concept of Shared Life studies Aristotle’s understanding of the political character of human intimacy via an examination of the zoological frame informing his political theory. It argues that the concept of shared life, i.e. the forms of intimacy that arise from the possession of logos and the capacity for choice, is central to human political partnership, and serves to locate that life within the broader context of living beings as such, where it emerges as an intensification of animal sociality. As such it challenges a long-standing approach to the role of the animal in Aristotle’s thought, and to the recent reception of Aristotle’s thinking about the political valence of life and living beings.

scholarly journals Bruno Leoni’s Concept of Law and Representation in The Cyber Age: A Cybernetic Model

2020 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 56-65
Author(s):  
Mario De Benedetti
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Information Society ◽  
The Political ◽  
Digital Information ◽  
Political Arena ◽  
Cybernetic Model ◽  
Norbert Wiener ◽  
Law And Politics ◽  
Concept Of Law

AbstractThe purpose of this article is to contextualize Bruno Leoni’s political theory within the Digital Information Society, a new dimension of public participation in the political arena and a sign of the democratic transition through new forms of involvement by public opinion. In particular, the evolution of the Information Society will be briefly examined starting from the studies of Fritz Machlup, considered its progenitor, to pass to the examination of the Leonian concept of law and politics in the technological society, with reference to Norbert Wiener and Karl Deutsch’s cybernetic theory. This paper will attempt to describe the evolutive process of political participation in democratic society by reinterpreting the thought of Bruno Leoni concerning Democracy, the State and the homo telematicus in the digital social order.

Umstrittene Expertise

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Global Dimension ◽  
The Political ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Political Consequences ◽  
Political Debates ◽  
Controversial Nature

The current political debates about climate change or the coronavirus pandemic reveal the fundamental controversial nature of expertise in politics and society. The contributions in this volume analyse various facets, actors and dynamics of the current conflicts about knowledge and expertise. In addition to examining the contradictions of expertise in politics, the book discusses the political consequences of its controversial nature, the forms and extent of policy advice, expert conflicts in civil society and culture, and the global dimension of expertise. This special issue also contains a forum including reflections on the role of expertise during the coronavirus pandemic. The volume includes perspectives from sociology, political theory, political science and law.

HOPE AND MEMORY IN THE THOUGHT OF JUDITH SHKLAR

2011 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 591-620 ◽  
Author(s):  
KATRINA FORRESTER
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
Harvard University ◽  
The Political ◽  
American Liberalism ◽  
Judith Shklar ◽  
Exclusive Focus

Current interpretations of the political theory of Judith Shklar focus to a disabling extent on her short, late article “The Liberalism of Fear” (1989); commentators take this late essay as representative of her work as a whole and thus characterize her as an anti-totalitarian, Cold War liberal. Other interpretations situate her political thought alongside followers of John Rawls and liberal political philosophy. Challenging the centrality of fear in Shklar's thought, this essay examines her writings on utopian and normative thought, the role of history in political thinking and her notions of ordinary cruelty and injustice. In particular, it shifts emphasis away from an exclusive focus on her late writings in order to consider works published throughout her long career at Harvard University, from 1950 until her death in 1992. By surveying the range of Shklar's critical standpoints and concerns, it suggests that postwar American liberalism was not as monolithic as many interpreters have assumed. Through an examination of her attitudes towards her forebears and contemporaries, it shows why the dominant interpretations of Shklar—as anti-totalitarian émigré thinker, or normative liberal theorist—are flawed. In fact, Shklar moved restlessly between these two categories, and drew from each tradition. By thinking about both hope and memory, she bridged the gap between two distinct strands of postwar American liberalism.

Education for Citizenship in a Changing Country

2021 ◽  
pp. 70-88
Author(s):  
Alexa Zellentin
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
Final Section ◽  
Basic Structure ◽  
Educational Institutions ◽  
The Political ◽  
Value Pluralism ◽  
Policy Choices ◽  
Theory Of Education ◽  
Role Of The State

This chapter discusses some questions regarding the political theory of education in Ireland: 1. Which value commitments and attitudes should be encouraged to prepare children for their roles in society? 2. Who should decide what children learn? How is the role of the state to be balanced against that of parents and educational institutions? 3. How should education respond to increasing diversity and value pluralism? 4. To what extent should public education promote equality of opportunities? It identifies the concerns relevant to policy choices on these issues. The first section presents the basic structure of the Irish educational system. The second discusses its implications for debates on the authority and responsibility to educate, the third debates dealing with diversity, the fourth value education. The final section considers the idea of equality of opportunity in view of the different resources available to different schools.

The Exile of Political Theory: The Lost Homeland of Legitimation

1995 ◽  
Vol 43 (4) ◽  
pp. 683-697 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jon Simons
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
The State ◽  
Political Order ◽  
The Political ◽  
Legitimation Crisis ◽  
Implicit Definitions ◽  
Recurrent Theme

A sense of distance or exile is a recurrent theme of the literature in which the state of the political theory is either lamented or acclaimed. A review of these tales suggests that implicit definitions of the homeland of the sub-discipline as philosophical, practical or interpretive are inadequate, leading to mistaken diagnoses of the reasons for the ills or recovery of political philosophy. This paper argues that political theory has been exiled from its previous role or homeland of legitimation of political orders. Under contemporary conditions in the advanced liberal capitalist political order, in which a media-generated imagology of society as a communicative system fills the role of a legitimating discourse, political theory faces a legitimation crisis.

Political Theory and Political Economy

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen L. Elkin
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Political Economy ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Political Life ◽  
The Political ◽  
Distribution Of Wealth ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
The Core ◽  
Democratic Societies

This article describes the connection between political theory and political economy. It argues that political theorists need to take account of political economy in theorizing about the contemporary world because capitalism is the most powerful force at work in shaping the modern sociopolitical world. It also explains that economic questions concerning economic growth, the distribution of wealth and income, and role of markets are at the core of the political life in democratic societies.

The Ubiquitous Role of the Mishu in Chinese Politics

1992 ◽  
Vol 132 ◽  
pp. 913-936 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wei Li ◽  
Lucian W. Pye
Keyword(s):  
Political Process ◽  
The Political ◽  
Chinese Politics ◽  
Political Arena ◽  
Distinctive Character ◽  
Political Relationships

Important and busy people in all societies rely upon aides, assistants, staff associates, factotums, lackeys and personal servants, and it is no different in China. What is distinctive is the diffuse and all-purpose character of the Chinese mishu, literally “secret book” but usually translated as “secretary.” A mishu, however, is actually someone with both far broader and more personally intimate responsibilities and powers than this term suggests. Any Chinese shouzhang (leader or head) of significance will have numerous mishus, personal and/or organizational, in his service. In China's political arena there are around one million people who claim the title of mishu, and who, in shielding, guiding and doing the bidding of their masters, give a distinctive character to the political process. Mishus operate with considerable authority not just at the pinnacles of power, as aides do in most countries, but from top to bottom of both the Party and state hierarchies. Therefore, to understand how political relationships operate, how communications flow and how authority is asserted in the ranks of Chinese officialdom it is necessary to appreciate the ubiquitous role of the mishu.

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