Anti-Politics and Civic Identity: How to Revitalize the Public Sphere in a Democracy?

Authors

  • Marcin Tobiasz University of Warsaw

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.12797/Politeja.17.2020.68.08

Keywords:

Democracy, anti-politics, citizen, participation, identity, deliberation

Abstract

Contemporary democracy requires rethinking on the normative level and certain changes in the institutional and cultural dimensions. To this end, we should start by revising our perception of the public sphere and the role that citizens have to play in it. First of all, it should be emphasized that the public sphere is composed of various citizens’ forums, which should be effectively included in the political decision-making process. New institutional solutions must ensure the free flow of information between citizens and take into account different, even minority points of view, because democracy, if it is not to be exclusive, cannot be limited only to formal representation and closed, top-defined forms of discourse. In fact, people are unequal in terms of their civic competences, both in terms of their individual characteristics, as well as their social position, and democracy should neutralize these inequalities. These problems cannot be solved on purely theoretical grounds. Indeed, the clash of different views and arguments in the political debate is a constitutive element of politics, and therefore they have to be negotiated in practice by actual citizens. The lack of such solutions and, consequently, the experiences enabling the development of civic competences, not only result in a crisis of democracy, but also lead to the negation of the very essence of politics.

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Author Biography

Marcin Tobiasz, University of Warsaw

PhD in political science (2008), a research and teaching fellow at the Faculty of Political Science and International Studies of the University of Warsaw. From 2016 to 2019 Deputy Director of the Institute of Political Science. In the years 2012-2016 Manager of undergraduate studies in Political Science. Member of the Audit Committee of the Mazovian Branch of PTNP. Contractor in NCN grant Political representation in modern democracies: limitations and challenges under the direction of prof. dr hab. Tomasz Żyro. Participant of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie project, Research and Innovation Staff Exchange – RISE, implemented under Horizon 2020 programme. Research interests: democratic theory, political pluralism, political participation, deliberative democracy.

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Published

2020-11-19

How to Cite

Tobiasz, Marcin. 2020. “Anti-Politics and Civic Identity: How to Revitalize the Public Sphere in a Democracy?”. Politeja 17 (5(68):157-69. https://doi.org/10.12797/Politeja.17.2020.68.08.

Issue

Section

COLLECTIVE IDENTITIES AS/IN POLITICS