Democracy Will Never be the Same Again: 21st Century Protest and the Transformation of Politics
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This paper looks at the current wave of protests and demonstrations and asks whether what we are witnessing is the emergence of a new movement against austerity and in favour of democracy, as many suggest. The wider context is the crisis of representative politics, which is in turn transforming the nature of mobilisation, contestation and politics more generally. In place of traditional organisational structures, we are seeing the emergence of cloud, swarm and connective initiatives with characteristics that challenge and supplant traditional organisational politics. We are seeing the emergence of a politics that is resistant to ‘politicians’ of whatever ideology, seeking to recuperate power and agency from representatives. This creates an interesting tension at the heart of democracy: whether and to what extent democracy needs to ‘reboot’ or whether new political parties and movements can ally the connective to representational styles of politics to provide a way in which democracy can evolve.
Este artículo examina la ola de protestas y manifestaciones, preguntándonos si, como muchos sugieren, lo que estamos presenciando es el surgimiento de un nuevo movimiento contra la austeridad y a favor de la democracia. El contexto político está marcado por una generalizada crisis de la política representativa, hecho que a su vez marca la transformación de la naturaleza de la movilización, de la contestación y de la política en general. Estamos presenciando el surgimiento de iniciativas con características cloud, swarm y conectivas que desafían y suplantan a las estructuras organizativas tradicionales. En la actualidad está emergiendo una forma de política que es resistente a los “políticos” de cualquier tipo de ideología y que trata de recuperar el poder de los representantes. Esto crea una tensión interesante en el corazón de la democracia: si, y en qué medida, la democracia necesita ‘resetearse’ o si los nuevos partidos y los nuevos movimientos políticos pueden aliar lo conectivo a estilos de representación política capaces de proporcionar una manera en la que la democracia pueda evolucionar.
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