Democratic innovations are a potential solution to the democratic recession and growing public cynicism towards traditional democratic institutions and practices (Elstub & Escobar 2019). Building on longstanding participatory and deliberative theories of democracy, democratic innovations are instruments aiming to increase lay citizens’ direct influence in collective decision-making. Some examples of democratic innovations, especially deliberative mini-publics, referendums, and participatory budgeting have achieved high degrees of institutionalization – they have been implemented and adapted to a myriad of decision-making contexts at different levels of government. Even more experimental varieties of democratic innovations are proliferating in various areas of public administration.
These innovative participatory instruments are expected to restore faith in democracy through their influence on collective decisions and the public sphere. This can be achieved through “designed coupling”, i.e. purposefully crafting links between democratic innovations and traditional sites of power and the wider public (Hendriks 2016; Mansbridge et al. 2012). Which mechanisms enable the transmission of participatory outputs to decision-making? How to scale up the effects of democratic innovations to wider publics? What are the prerequisites for designed coupling?
This workshop invites papers that reflect the linkages between democratic innovations and traditional sites of representative/bureaucratic power or the general public. We welcome both empirical studies investigating real-world participatory processes as well as theoretical papers discussing the preconditions, mechanisms or problems of designed coupling.
Workshop languages: Papers can be submitted in English, Swedish or Finnish. Discussion languages will depend on participants.
Workshop leaders:
Maija Jäske, Åbo Akademi University, maija.jaske@abo.fi
Mikko Värttö, Tampere University, mikko.vartto@tuni.fi