Democracy Beyond the Nation State

Practicing Equality
1. Auflage 2017
ISBN: 978-1-138-23584-7
Verlag: Routledge

Buch, Englisch, 292 Seiten, Format (B × H): 161 mm x 240 mm, Gewicht: 608 g

Reihe: Routledge Innovations in Political Theory

Democracy promises rule by all, not by the few. Yet, electoral democracies limit decision-making to representatives and have always had a weakness for inequality. How might democracy serve all rather than the few?

Democracy Beyond the Nation State: Practicing Equality examines communities that govern their own lives without elites or centralized structures through assemblies and consensus. Rather than claiming equality by abstract rights or citizenship, these groups put equality into practice by reducing wealth and health divides, or landlessness or homelessness, and equalizing workloads. These practices are found in rural India and Brazil, in Buenos Aires, London, and New York, and among the Iroquois, the Zapatistas, and the global networks of La Via Campesina farmers and the World Social Forum.

Readable accounts of these horizontal democracies document multiple political frames that prevent democracy from being frozen into entrenched electoral systems producing modern inequalities. Using practice to rewrite political theory, Parker draws on collective politics in Spivak and Derrida and embodied relations from Povinelli and Foucault to show that equal relations are not a utopian dream, not nostalgia, and not impossible.

This book provides many practical solutions to inequality. It will be useful to students and scholars of political theory and social movements and to those who are willing to work together for equality.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Parker, Joe

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Politische Systeme Demokratie
• Interdisziplinäres Wissenschaften Wissenschaften Interdisziplinär Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Preface

Abbreviations

Part I: Rethinking Democratic Practice

Introduction Democracy and Equality

1. Democracy Otherwise: Rethinking Democratic Practice

Part II: Specific Sites for Practicing Equality

2. Heritage Democracies: Indigenous Equality in Practice

3. Democracies from Below: Subaltern Equality in Practice

4. Popular Democracies: Popular Equality in Practice

5. Global Democracies: Global Equality in Practice

Part III: Concrete Outcomes of Equality in Practice

6. Everyday Democracies: Daily Equality in Practice

Conclusion: Equality in Practice

Appendix 1: Countermeasures against Inequality

Appendix 2: Resources for Equality in Practice

Index

Über Autor(innen)

Joe Parker is Professor of International and Intercultural Studies at Pitzer College and blogs at democracies2come.blogspot.com.