Civic Engagement and Popular Self-Rule
Thursday, April 13, 2023 7:30 pm – 9:00 pm CET/GMT+1Online
The ideal of “government of the people, by the people, and for the people” suggests that democracy entails participation by the governed in the acts of governing. What forms this participation can--and should--take may be viewed as the central question of democracy.
This event brings together an international panel of scholars from a variety of perspectives to explore the relationship between civil society and popular self-government. How can grassroots organizing and civic engagement help to enhance and legitimize democratic institutions? When and why might they deepen social polarization and distrust? Is there a relationship between national identity, civic participation, and democratic resilience? And what is the role of higher education in promoting best practices and collective self-understanding?
The event will also serve as a book launch for When the People Rule: Popular Sovereignty in Theory and Practice, forthcoming from Cambridge University Press. The epilogue from this book is attached to this event as a PDF.
This event is made possible through the cooperation of Bard College Berlin, Bard College in Annandale, the Open Society University Network, OSUN’s Smolny Beyond Borders, and the Consortium on Forced Migration, Displacement, and Education.
Speakers:
Ewa Atanassow is Professor of Politics at Bard College Berlin. She is co-editor, with Thomas Bartscherer and David Bateman, of When the People Rule: Popular Sovereignty in Theory and Practice (Cambridge, 2023).
Thomas Bartscherer is Peter Sourian Senior Lecturer in the Humanities at Bard College. He is co-editor, with Ewa Atanassow and David Bateman, of When the People Rule: Popular Sovereignty in Theory and Practice (Cambridge, 2023).
Kerry Bystrom is an Associate Professor of English and Human Rights, and an associate Dean of Bard College Berlin. She has published widely on South African literary and cultural studies, and comparative literature.
Berit Ebert specializes in European Union law with a focus on the intersection of gender equity, democracy, and the rule of law, as well as the judicial reform in Poland, and subnational influence on supranational policymaking.
Mie Inouye is Assistant Professor of Political Studies at Bard College. Her scholarship investigates the ways that institutions shape people’s understandings of themselves and the social world, and the practices that allow oppressed people to develop and exercise agency.
Ekaterina Schulmann is a political scientist specializing in the legislative process in modern Russia, and in parliamentarism and decision-making mechanisms in hybrid political regimes. This academic year she is a Fellow at the Robert Bosch Academy in Berlin.