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Vitalizing Democracy Through Partizipation
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Book Synopsis Vitalizing Democracy Through Partizipation by : Bertelsmann Stiftung
Download or read book Vitalizing Democracy Through Partizipation written by Bertelsmann Stiftung and published by Verlag Bertelsmann Stiftung. This book was released on 2011-06-27 with total page 174 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fewer and fewer people in Germany are casting their votes or taking part in politics. At the same time, Germans want to have their say and are lending their voices to a growing number of debates such as education reform or anti-smoking regulations. Throughout the world, there are several government institutions involving their citizens in processes of political decision-making. This publication introduces seven promising examples of democracy in action-the finalists for the 2011 Reinhard Mohn Prize and their approaches to "Vitalizing Democracy Through Participation." Whether involving the use of modern technologies such as SMS to facilitate participatory budgeting in La Plata (Argentina) or establishing a citizens' assembly for electoral reform in British Columbia (Canada), these projects attest to the power of civic engagement in solving problems-democratically. The projects presented here are therefore a source of inspiration for civic participation in Germany. The Bertelsmann Stiftung awards the Reinhard Mohn Prize to commemorate Reinhard Mohn the citizen, entrepreneur and founder by nurturing his ideas, beliefs and vision. In the spirit of these goals, the Bertelsmann Stiftung seeks out effective strategies worldwide from which we all can learn.
Book Synopsis Vitalizing Democracy Through Participation by : Bertelsmann Stiftung (Gütersloh, Germany)
Download or read book Vitalizing Democracy Through Participation written by Bertelsmann Stiftung (Gütersloh, Germany) and published by . This book was released on 2011 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Preserving and strengthening democracy is one of the most important issues of our time. Democratic societies face many pressing challenges, including * Social inequality and exclusion Migration and the growing gap between rich and poor mean that fewer citizens are able to participate in political decisionmaking processes and represent their own interests. * New expectations for political participation Citizens feel increasingly alienated from the political process due to the fact that traditional forms of political participation are insufficiently relevant to actual needs. Thus there is a growing preference for more direct forms of participation that address specific issues. * Insufficient problem-solving capacities Society is becoming more diverse and complex, while the pace of life is accelerating. This makes it harder to react to changes appropriately and in a timely manner, to implement effective reforms, and to inform the public about current issues.
Book Synopsis Citizen Participation in Multi-level Democracies by : Cristina Fraenkel-Haeberle
Download or read book Citizen Participation in Multi-level Democracies written by Cristina Fraenkel-Haeberle and published by Hotei Publishing. This book was released on 2015-03-27 with total page 390 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Citizen Participation in Multi-level Democracies offers an overview of new forms of participatory democracy in federally and regionally organised multi-level states. Its four sections focus on the conceptual foundations of participation, the implementation and instruments of democracy, examples from federal and regional States, and the emergence of participation on the European level. There is today a growing disaffection amongst the citizens of many states towards the traditional models of representative democracy. This book highlights the various functional and structural problems with which contemporary democracies are confronted and which lie at the root of their peoples’ discontent. Within multi-level systems in particular, the fragmentation of state authority generates feelings of powerlessness among citizens. In this context, citizens’ participation can in many cases be a useful complement to the representative and direct forms of democracy.
Download or read book The Paradox of Openness written by and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2014-11-13 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The ‘open society’ has become a watchword of liberal democracy and the market system in the modern globalized world. Openness stands for individual opportunity and collective reason, as well as bottom-up empowerment and top-down transparency. It has become a cherished value, despite its vagueness and the connotation of vulnerability that surrounds it. Scandinavia has long considered itself a model of openness, citing traditions of freedom of information and inclusive policy making. This collection of essays traces the conceptual origins, development, and diverse challenges of openness in the Nordic countries and Austria. It examines some of the many paradoxes that openness encounters and the tensions it arouses when it addresses such divergent ends as democratic deliberation and market transactions, freedom of speech and sensitive information, compliant decision making and political and administrative transparency, and consensual procedures and the toleration of dissent. Contributors are: Ainur Elmgren, Tero Erkkilä, Norbert Götz, Ann-Cathrine Jungar, Johannes Kananen, Lotta Lounasmeri, Carl Marklund, Peter Parycek, Johanna Rainio-Niemi, Judith Schossböck, Ylva Waldemarson, and Tuomas Ylä-Anttila.
Book Synopsis Making Politics Work for Development by : World Bank
Download or read book Making Politics Work for Development written by World Bank and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2016-07-14 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Governments fail to provide the public goods needed for development when its leaders knowingly and deliberately ignore sound technical advice or are unable to follow it, despite the best of intentions, because of political constraints. This report focuses on two forces—citizen engagement and transparency—that hold the key to solving government failures by shaping how political markets function. Citizens are not only queueing at voting booths, but are also taking to the streets and using diverse media to pressure, sanction and select the leaders who wield power within government, including by entering as contenders for leadership. This political engagement can function in highly nuanced ways within the same formal institutional context and across the political spectrum, from autocracies to democracies. Unhealthy political engagement, when leaders are selected and sanctioned on the basis of their provision of private benefits rather than public goods, gives rise to government failures. The solutions to these failures lie in fostering healthy political engagement within any institutional context, and not in circumventing or suppressing it. Transparency, which is citizen access to publicly available information about the actions of those in government, and the consequences of these actions, can play a crucial role by nourishing political engagement.
Book Synopsis Regression of Democracy? by : Gero Erdmann
Download or read book Regression of Democracy? written by Gero Erdmann and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-06-21 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Democratization since the implosion of the communist bloc displays a mixed balance. While the neo-democracies in Central Eastern European Countries can be seen as largely consolidated, many other processes of democratization in other parts of the world such as Africa, Asia and Latin America got stuck as unconsolidated or became defective democracies, some ‘regressed’ into hybrid regimes or were even turned into autocracies. While transitology dealt with the transition from authoritarian rule, the reverse process, the transition from democratic rule, remained almost completely outside the scholarly attention. This special issue will address the problems of the regression of democracy and aims at closing the gap between research on democracy and democratization on one side and the emergence of authoritarian regimes on the other. The contributions of this volume analyse the different phenomena in which decline of democracy fans out: the loss of quality, which means a silent regression; the backslide into hybrid regimes (hybridization); and the breakdown of democracy.
Book Synopsis The Quality of Democracy by : Guillermo O'Donnell
Download or read book The Quality of Democracy written by Guillermo O'Donnell and published by University of Notre Dame Pess. This book was released on 2016-12-15 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1996, Guillermo O’Donnell taught a seminar at the University of Notre Dame on democratic theory. One of the questions explored in this class was whether it is possible to define and determine the “quality” of democracy. Jorge Vargas Cullell, a student in this course, returned to his native country of Costa Rica, formed a small research team, and secured funding for undertaking a “citizen audit” of the quality of democracy in Costa Rica. This pathbreaking volume contains O’Donnell’s qualitative theoretical study of the quality of democracy and Vargas Cullell’s description and analysis of the empirical data he gathered on the quality of democracy in Costa Rica. It also includes twelve short, scholarly reflections on the O’Donnell and Cullell essays. The primary goal of this collection is to present the rationale and methodology for implementing a citizen audit of democracy. This book is an expression of a growing concern among policy experts and academics that the recent emergence of numerous democratic regimes, particularly in Latin America, cannot conceal the sobering fact that the efficacy and impact of these new governments vary widely. These variations, which range from acceptable to dismal, have serious consequences for the people of Latin America, many of whom have received few if any benefits from democratization. Attempts to gauge the quality of particular democracies are therefore not only fascinating intellectual exercises but may also be useful practical guides for improving both old and new democracies. This book will make important strides in addressing the increasing practical and academic concerns about the quality of democracy. It will be required reading for political scientists, policy analysts, and Latin Americanists.
Download or read book Event Policy written by Malcolm Foley and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-06-12 with total page 203 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As the event management field expands, there has been an emergence of a distinctive ‘events’ policy field of study and a need for more advanced texts that look at this subject with a multidisciplinary research and theoretical orientation. Events Policy: From Theory to Strategy is the first text to embrace this new direction in the field of events management. Its main aim is to locate the phenomena of events (and festivity) within a theoretical and strategic framework and, in doing so, demonstrate the links between the development of events in policy-making and the theoretical exploration of the role of events as policy. Building on a strong coherent framework, the book explores the conceptual terrain in which events and festivities are located, evaluates the range of theoretical perspectives pertinent to the study of events policy, appraises the socio-economic and socio-cultural implications of event-led policies internationally and draws together the main theoretical and event policy issues for the future. It utilizes a good range of international cases, from Dubai, Singapore, New Orleans and Glasgow, to help demonstrate the relationships between theory and strategy, and includes useful features to help students understand the subject and deepen their knowledge of the events policy terrain. This groundbreaking volume will be essential reading for students, researchers and academics of events and other related disciplines.
Book Synopsis The History and Logic of Modern Chinese Politics by : Mingsheng Wang
Download or read book The History and Logic of Modern Chinese Politics written by Mingsheng Wang and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2021-08-24 with total page 414 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores the history and development of modern Chinese politics. Written by Dr. Mingsheng Wang, a renowned Chinese political scientist, it presents a truly groundbreaking and thought-provoking study of the sociopolitical forces behind China’s gradual emergence as a new global power in the 20th century and its rapid rise as the world’s second-largest economy over the past 40 years. The author’s argument, illuminated by comparative theoretical analyses based on meticulously detailed empirical research, functions as a lens through which readers can better understand China’s remarkable accomplishments as well as consider broader issues that have perplexed many: Is there a China Path to sociopolitical progress? What is “socialism with Chinese characteristics”? Can China redefine its niche and maintain its growing momentum in an increasingly multilateral world? And finally, what lessons can we draw from China’s continuing progress in the post-COVID era? As the author argues eloquently and with persuasive evidence, China’s ongoing progress has followed neither the mode of Russian-style socialism nor that of Western prototypical capitalism. Rather, it represents a distinctively different model of progress and a continuous search for a viable alternative route to modernity that is permeated with Chinese realities. By identifying an alternative system described as the “China Path,” the author demonstrates convincingly that there exist ample options for different types of modernity and that economic growth means not only industrialization, but also the development of political democratization and the realization of the rule of law. In this sense, this book significantly enriches our understanding of modern China. The 33 carefully selected essays in the anthology provide a much-needed opportunity for scholars, policy makers and all interested readers to obtain an insider’s view of the history and prospect of China’s political development.
Book Synopsis Normative Theories of the Media by : Clifford G Christians
Download or read book Normative Theories of the Media written by Clifford G Christians and published by University of Illinois Press. This book was released on 2010-10-01 with total page 298 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this book, five leading scholars of media and communication take on the difficult but important task of explicating the role of journalism in democratic societies. Using Fred S. Siebert, Theodore Peterson, and Wilbur Schramm's classic Four Theories of the Press as their point of departure, the authors explore the philosophical underpinnings and the political realities that inform a normative approach to questions about the relationship between journalism and democracy, investigating not just what journalism is but what it ought to be. The authors identify four distinct yet overlapping roles for the media: the monitorial role of a vigilant informer collecting and publishing information of potential interest to the public; the facilitative role that not only reports on but also seeks to support and strengthen civil society; the radical role that challenges authority and voices support for reform; and the collaborative role that creates partnerships between journalists and centers of power in society, notably the state, to advance mutually acceptable interests. Demonstrating the value of a reconsideration of media roles, Normative Theories of the Media provides a sturdy foundation for subsequent discussions of the changing media landscape and what it portends for democratic ideals.
Book Synopsis Handbook of European Societies by : Stefan Immerfall
Download or read book Handbook of European Societies written by Stefan Immerfall and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2009-12-01 with total page 698 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: European integration is one of the most ambitious and socially far-reaching developments in world politics and in world economics. Against growing opposition and despite increasing social heterogeneity, the European Union continues to expand and to acquire new competences. But to what extent is the self-proclaimed "ever closer union among the peoples of Europe" a social reality? In which ways is the political European project anchored in social developments? How does social change impinge upon political integration? Societal trends in multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, multi-lingual and socially diverse Europe have never been studied systematically. Handbook of European Societies: Social Transformations in the 21st Century sets to rectify this neglect of societal developments in Europe, providing a groundwork for the sociology of European integration. The book portrays social life and social relations in the enlarged Europe, and gives a perspective on the European Union as an evolving social entity. Handbook of European Societies is a pioneering source book analyzing the current social patterns on the continent. It covers a representative selection of major topics of social concern and sociological relevance, such as Collective Action, Consumption, Identity, Power Structure, Sexuality, Stratification and Well-being. Each contribution probes key developments in a strictly comparative manner. The Handbook thus offers a detailed look into the intricacies of the national societies of Europe and into the prospect of an emerging European society. The Editors have enlisted leading researchers to synthesize existing knowledge and to make use of many different data sources in a straight-forward style. The contributions stay away from jargon, simple labeling and sweeping assertions. Instead, they provide solid and accessible information on a wide variety of social trends and processes within and across European societies.
Book Synopsis The Oxford Handbook of Environmental and Conservation Psychology by : Susan D. Clayton
Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Environmental and Conservation Psychology written by Susan D. Clayton and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2012-10-18 with total page 722 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First handbook to integrate environmental psychology and conservation psychology.
Book Synopsis The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) by : David J. Galbreath
Download or read book The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) written by David J. Galbreath and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2007-05-03 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: During the Cold War, the two global superpowers were able to come together to resolve many issues of transparency and common challenges, leading to a change in European and global security. The OSCE covered the area formerly occupied by NATO and the Warsaw Pact, championing the Helsinki Final Act, which became a key international instrument to encourage peace and security. Following the end of the Cold War, the OSCE became a key institution positioned between the European Union and NATO, focusing on furthering democracy, protecting human and minority rights, and encouraging military reform in a drastically dynamic region. David J. Galbreath sheds light on an institution that changed the face of global security during the Cold War and championed the rise of democratization in Central and Eastern Europe as well as the former Soviet republics following the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Book Synopsis The Mild Voice of Reason by : Joseph M. Bessette
Download or read book The Mild Voice of Reason written by Joseph M. Bessette and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 1994 with total page 316 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In recent years, many Americans and more than a few political scientists have come to believe that democratic deliberation in Congress—whereby judgments are made on the merits of policies reflecting the interests and desires of American citizens—is more myth than reality. Rather, pressure from special interest groups, legislative bargaining, and the desire of incumbents to be reelected are thought to originate in American legislative politics. While not denying such influences, Joseph M. Bessette argues that the institutional framework created by the founding fathers continues to foster a government that is both democratic and deliberative, at least to some important degree. Drawing on original research, case studies of policymaking in Congress, and portraits of American lawmakers, Bessette demonstrates not only the limitations of nondeliberative explanations for how laws are made but also the continued vitality of genuine reasoning on the merits of public policy. Bessette discusses the contributions of the executive branch to policy deliberation, and looks at the controversial issue of the proper relationship of public opinion to policymaking. Informed by Bessette's nine years of public service in city and federal government, The Mild Voice of Reason offers important insights into the real workings of American democracy, articulates a set of standards by which to assess the workings of our governing institutions, and clarifies the forces that promote or inhibit the collective reasoning about common goals so necessary to the success of American democracy. "No doubt the best-publicized recent book-length work on Congress is columnist George Will's diatribe in praise of term limits in which the core of his complaint is that Congress does not deliberate in its decision-making. Readers who are inclined to share that fantasy would do well to consult the work of Joseph M. Bessette. He turns up massive amounts of material attesting to the centrality of deliberation in congressional life."—Nelson W. Polsby, Presidential Studies Quarterly
Book Synopsis Disaffected Democracies by : Susan J. Pharr
Download or read book Disaffected Democracies written by Susan J. Pharr and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2018-06-05 with total page 389 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It is a notable irony that as democracy replaces other forms of governing throughout the world, citizens of the most established and prosperous democracies (the United States and Canada, Western European nations, and Japan) increasingly report dissatisfaction and frustration with their governments. Here, some of the most influential political scientists at work today examine why this is so in a volume unique in both its publication of original data and its conclusion that low public confidence in democratic leaders and institutions is a function of actual performance, changing expectations, and the role of information. The culmination of research projects directed by Robert Putnam through the Trilateral Commission and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, these papers present new data that allow more direct comparisons across national borders and more detailed pictures of trends within countries than previously possible. They show that citizen disaffection in the Trilateral democracies is not the result of frayed social fabric, economic insecurity, the end of the Cold War, or public cynicism. Rather, the contributors conclude, the trouble lies with governments and politics themselves. The sources of the problem include governments' diminished capacity to act in an interdependent world and a decline in institutional performance, in combination with new public expectations and uses of information that have altered the criteria by which people judge their governments. Although the authors diverge in approach, ideological affinity, and interpretation, they adhere to a unified framework and confine themselves to the last quarter of the twentieth century. This focus--together with the wealth of original research results and the uniform strength of the individual chapters--sets the volume above other efforts to address the important and increasingly international question of public dissatisfaction with democratic governance. This book will have obvious appeal for a broad audience of political scientists, politicians, policy wonks, and that still sizable group of politically minded citizens on both sides of the Atlantic and Pacific.
Book Synopsis Citizen Participation and Political Communication in a Digital World by : Alex Frame
Download or read book Citizen Participation and Political Communication in a Digital World written by Alex Frame and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2015-11-06 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The arrival of the participatory web 2.0 has been hailed by many as a media revolution, bringing with it new tools and possibilities for direct political action. Through specialised online platforms, mainstream social media or blogs, citizens in many countries are increasingly seeking to have their voices heard online, whether it is to lobby, to support or to complain about their elected representatives. Politicians, too, are adopting "new media" in specific ways, though they are often criticised for failing to seize the full potential of online tools to enter into dialogue with their electorates. Bringing together perspectives from around the world, this volume examines emerging forms of citizen participation in the face of the evolving logics of political communication, and provides a unique and original focus on the gap which exists between political uses of digital media by the politicians and by the people they represent.
Book Synopsis Public Participation in Planning in India by : Ashok Kumar
Download or read book Public Participation in Planning in India written by Ashok Kumar and published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. This book was released on 2016-12-14 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mirroring the complexities of cities and neighborhoods, this volume makes a conscious departure from consensus-oriented public participation to conflict-resolving public participation. In India, planning practice generally involves citizens at different stages of plan-making with a clear purpose of securing a consensus aimed at legitimizing the policy content of a development plan. This book contests and challenges this consensus-oriented view of citizen participation in planning, arguing against the assertion that cities can be represented by a single public interest, for which consensus is sought by planners and policy makers. As such, it replaces consensus-centered rational planning models with Foucauldian and Lacanian models of planning to show that planning is riddled with a variety of spatial conflicts, most of which are resolvable. The book does not downplay differences of class and social and cultural identities of various kinds built on arbitrarily assumed public interest created erroneously by further assuming that the professionally trained planner is unbiased. It moves from theory to practice through case studies, which widens and deepens opportunities for public participation as new arenas beyond the processes of preparation of development plans are highlighted. The book also argues that spaces of public participation in planning are shrinking. For example, city development plans promoted under the erstwhile JNNUM programme and several other neoliberal policy regime initiatives have reduced the quality, as well as the extent of participatory practices in planning. The end result of this is that legally mandated participatory spaces are being used by powerful interests to pursue the neoliberal agenda. The volume is divided into three main parts. The first part deals with the theory and history of public participation and governance in planning in India, and the second presents real-life case studies related to planning at a regional level in order to describe and empirically explore some of the theoretical arguments made in the first. The third section provides analyses of selected case studies at a local level. An introduction and conclusions, along with insights for the future, provide a coherent envelope to the book.
