[ecrea] International conference on "contested democracy"

Call for Papers - International conference
Contested Democracy: contestation and participation in the
English-speaking world. A critical evaluation

CREW (EA 4399), Institut du Monde Anglophone, Université Sorbonne
Nouvelle - Paris 3
20-22 September 2012


The dissent and uprisings that spread through the Arab world during
the Spring of 2011 occurred almost a quarter of a century after the
fall of East European political régimes that saw the rise of
"democracy" modeled on the Anglo-American representative system. This
specific context which has come to characterize the past quarter of
century calls for a renewed analysis of the models these political
systems represent and of the processes that triggered them and led to
their long-term establishment in the UK and the US. Since the 1990s,
as a response to the story of the inevitable emergence of democracy in
the aftermath of the Cold War, researchers on North-American politics
have provided an alternative reading of events: that of a "contested
democracy".

The CREW Paris-based research group is organising an international
conference in order to reflect on the notion of a "contested
democracy" and its role in the understanding of democracy as theory
and practice. In inviting to a critical evaluation of this now
commonly used phrase, the conference wishes to open up onto a
wide-range of approaches and discourses relating to democracy in the
English-speaking world, from individual expression to collective
action, from infra-political practices to more explicit forms of
dissent, from within political organisations or large-scale social
movements, including local democracy and debates on community-building
and social cohesion. This conference is aimed at specialists on the
Anglo-American world (and beyond, on the English-speaking world) who
are interested in these questions from either an historical or
contemporary perspective.

The purpose of this conference is to encourage comparative analysis on
participation, contest and contestation, as well as on phenomena such
as adaptation and self-appropriation which characterise the exchange
and transfer of ideas that can be observed in the different national
contexts of the English-speaking world.

The conference aims at providing an overview and assessment of current
research on new and innovative forms of participation in the
English-speaking world, both in the contemporary period and in
history, with an emphasis on alternative and critical approaches to
power.

In this exploration of the meaning and practice of ?contested
democracy?, possible fields to be addressed, from either a historical
or contemporary vantage point:

- local sphere, civil society
- political parties, social movements, associations
- communications, networks, new social media
- cultural diversity, identity politics and mobilisation
- governance, influence of public-private actors
- sources of social cohesion in pluralist democratic societies?


Please send a one-page proposal and a short bio-bibliography to:

Emmanuelle Avril & Naomi Wulf at: _Contested-democracy@univ-paris3.fr_
before December 10, 2011.

Confirmation will be given by February 15, 2012.

Conference organisers:

Emmanuelle AVRIL, Paul BAGGULEY, Yann BELIARD, Jacques-Henri COSTE,
Divina Frau-Meigs, Romain Garbaye, Hélène Le Dantec, Johann NEEM,
Valérie Peyronel, Sarah Pickard, Andrew ROBERTSON, Naomi Wulf.

For more details, visit the conference webpage:
www.univ-paris3.fr/contested-democracy


Secrétariat CREW et PRISMES - Université Sorbonne Nouvelle Paris 3
Institut du Monde Anglophone
5 rue de l'école-de-Médecine
75006 Paris
Tél : 01-40-51-33-01
Fax : 01-40-51-33-18

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