The CEU Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology invites you to a public lecture by
Donatella Della Porta
(European University Institute, Department of Political and Social Sciences)
Crises, Movements and Democracy: From the Global Justice
Movement to the Indignados
Date and time: January 30, Monday, 5:30 pm
Venue: Popper room
Abstract:
The Arab Spring can be read as yet another testimony that democracy is becoming “the
only game in town”. It has shown that, even in brutal dictatorship, citizens do mobilize,
and not only on material issues. In contrast with the expectations of much research on
democratization, that has focus on the elites, it also shows the importance of mobilization
from below in the various steps of the regime liberalization, transition, and—hopefullyconsolidation. As in the “colour revolutions” in Eastern Europe, in Tunisia, Egypt and,
now, Libya citizens have played an important role in the breakdown of authoritarian
regimes. And as in other waves of democratization, protest for democracy in one country
have rapidly spread into an whole region. Interpreting the Arab Spring as merely a call
for representative institutions would however be misleading. The protestors in the Tahir
Square were not only calling for freedom, but also practicing other conceptions of
democracy that, if not opposed, are certainly different from liberal representative
democracy, resonating instead with ideas of participatory and deliberative democracy.
Not by chance, when the ideas of the Arab Spring spread from the MENA region to
Europe, they were adopted and adapted by social movements that challenged indeed
representative democracy. Directly inspired by the Arab Spring, the Spanish and then the
Greek Indignados not only protested austerity measures in their respective, but also asked
for more, and a different democracy. Similarly, when the Occupy Wall Street started in
the United States, quickly spreading in thousands of American cities, the concern voiced
by the protestors addressed the financial crisis, but even more the failure of democratic
governments to live up to the expectation of their citizens. What is more, the occupations
represented not only occasions to protest but also experimentations with what political
theorists have discussed under the label of participatory and deliberative democracy. This
‘other-democracy’ is prefigured by the very same indignados that occupy squares,
transforming them into public spheres made up of “normal citizens”. Their aim is the
creation of free spaces for high quality debates, recognising the equal rights of all (not
only delegates and experts) to speak (and to respect) in public and plural spaces, open to
discussion and deliberation on themes that range from situations suffered to concrete
solutions to specific problems, from the elaboration of proposals on common goods to the
formation collective solidarity and emerging identities. They suggest that, even (all the
more) in times of crises, citizens should express their voice and be heard.
About Donatella Della Porta:
Donatella Della Porta is professor of sociology in the Department of Political and
Social Sciences at the European University Institute. She has directed the Demos
project, devoted to the analysis of conceptions and practices of democracy in social
movements in six European countries. She is now starting a major ERC project
Mobilizing for Democracy, on civil society participation in democratization processes
in Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Latin America. Her main fields of research are
social movements, the policing of public order, participatory democracy and political
corruption. Among her very recent publications are: Mobilizing on the Extreme Right
(with M. Caiani and C. Wagemann), Oxford University Press, 2012; Meeting
Democracy (ed. With D. Rucht), Cambridge University Press, 2012; Democrazie, Il
Mulino, 2011; The Hidden Order of Corruption (With A. Vannucci), Ashgate 2012;
L’intervista qualitativa, Laterza 2011; (with M. Caiani), Social Movements and
Europeanization, Oxford University Press, 2009; (ed.) Another Europe, Routledge,
2009; (ed.) Democracy in Social Movements, Palgrave, 2009; Approaches and
Methodologies in the Social Sciences (with M. Keating), Cambridge University Press;
(with Gianni Piazza), Voices from the Valley; Voices from the Streat Berghan, 2008;
The Global Justice Movement, Paradigm, 2007; (with M. Andretta, L. Mosca and H.
Reiter), Globalization from Below, The University of Minnesota Press; (with A.
Peterson and H. Reiter), The policing transnational protest, Ashgate 2006; (with M.
Diani), Social Movements: an introduction, 2nd edition, Blackwell, 2006; (with S.
Tarrow), Transnational Protest and Global Activism, Rowman and Littlefield, 2005.
In 2011, she was the recipient of the Mattei Dogan Prize for distinguished
achievements in the field of political sociology.