Drawing on developments in candidate selection across British political parties, Pierce Leslie argues that Britain’s representative disconnect begins long before election day. While it is local constituencies who elect MPs, party rules, vetting procedures and emergency panels increasingly decide who becomes a realistic parliamentary choice
Western democracies' responsiveness machinery has been quietly dismantled. To repair the representative disconnect, says Lorenzo De Sio, we must first understand precisely what is broken
We commonly hear EU leaders talk about the need to ‘defend democracy’. Yet, as Omran Shroufi shows, their discourse is often more about identifying and naming geopolitical threats than it is about tackling pervasive, home-grown structural problems of democratic disconnect and disillusionment
Young people in Europe and, by extension, the West, are increasingly disengaging from electoral politics. Academic studies are still trying to understand the phenomenon. But Kevin Meyvaert argues that without a moral narrative of justice and fairness, we will never succeed in reconnecting all citizens to democratic life
In countries experiencing democratic backsliding, opposition MPs must confront not only the crisis of political representation but also structural constraints that limit their influence. Drawing on research in Hungary, Annamária Sebestyén argues that in such circumstances opposition MPs develop innovative strategies to remain politically relevant, but these have clear limits
Valesca Lima argues that Irish local authorities tend to treat public participation as a formal administrative requirement. However, by moving beyond performative box-ticking and toward genuine co-design, we can bridge the trust gap. True engagement doesn't just legitimise decisions; it sparks the local innovation our cities desperately need
A pioneering new deliberative democracy project invites university students, faculty and administrative staff to develop transformative measures to future-proof their institution against social and environmental challenges. Reintroducing deliberation into education and beyond, argues Émilie Frenkiel, could bridge the representative disconnect between citizens and institutions
Elected politicians face rising mistrust, gridlock, and citizen disengagement. In their research, Şule Yaylaci, Edana Beauvais and Mark E. Warren show how democratic innovations can help elites tackle inclusion gaps, agenda-setting dilemmas, and decision-making deadlocks. The authors also highlight the risks of co-optation and 'democracy washing'
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