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political theory

May 18, 2022

🦋 Reimagining democracy, one word at a time

Andreas Avgousti Andreas Avgousti asserts that collecting democracy’s words gives us a window into the democratic imagination. He reads Jean-Paul Gagnon’s expanding database as an illustration of democratic virtues Read more
May 13, 2022

🦋 Recovering democratic possibilities in complex political systems

Antonin Lacelle-Webster Jean-Paul Gagnon’s ambitious project expands our democratic imaginaries. While inspiring, Antonin Lacelle-Webster argues that making sense of democracy requires more than a lexicon. Resisting the prevailing sense of disrepair in today’s democratic politics asks us to pay more attention to democracy's appropriation, design, and normative value Read more
May 12, 2022

St Augustine in the Anthropocene

Ruairidh Brown In our contemporary world, dangers frequently come not from external enemies but from our own behaviour. To provide moral guidance on these dangers and help overcome the externalisation of threat, Ruairidh Brown looks back through time to St Augustine Read more
May 11, 2022

♟️ Why we must understand civilian participation in military rule

Salah Ben Hammou Researchers of authoritarian politics and civil-military relations have long examined military rule. However, our understanding of civilian participation in military regimes remains limited and requires greater analytical attention, argues Salah Ben Hammou. Amid last year’s coup resurgence, researchers must move to appreciate the subtle but salient differences among military dictatorships Read more
May 6, 2022

♟️ Autocracies with adjectives: we need better typologies of authoritarian regimes

Hager Ali The study of regime types, Hager Ali argues, is imbalanced. Theories and concepts of democracy have received attention for decades. But amid the resurgence of autocracies, scholars of authoritarianism still do not have the luxury of nuanced typologies to dissect the broad spectrum of non-democratic regimes Read more
May 3, 2022

🦋 I classify, therefore I know?

Leonardo Fiorespino Leonardo Fiorespino finds Jean-Paul Gagnon’s proposed lexicon of democracy wanting in its base assumptions around knowledge and arbitrariness. Moreover, he wonders, can we really trust 'democracy's words'? Read more
April 11, 2022

🦋 Beyond words: rescuing the democratic ideal

Viktor Orri Valgarðsson Viktor Valgarðsson argues that words are not enough to understand the concept of democracy. 'Democracy' denotes an important ideal that we must not sacrifice on a mountain of words. Read more
April 7, 2022

🦋 Who determines the practical meanings of democracy?

Friedel Marquardt Jean-Paul Gagnon’s endeavour has great potential for bringing unknown or ignored definitions to the fore. However, Friedel Marquardt argues, we hinder understanding and cut its empowering potential short if the communities these definitions are about do not get a chance to speak about their democracies Read more

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Advancing Political Science
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