Research

Research projects on democratic innovations and on bottom-up citizens’ mobilizations have often been separately conducted, and the two phenomena have rarely been juxtaposed. The two modes of political action conceive differently of the principles of inclusion. While democratic innovations are based on institutionalized deliberation, the collective mobilization relies on protest and negotiation. The bottom-up citizens’ mobilizations in the WB states offer diverse insights into these issues and call for further analysis. Through bringing together international researchers and civil society actors from the EU and the WB, this Jean Monnet Network initiative aims at enabling sustainable and institutionally supported knowledge exchange regarding the interplay between the mentioned modes of citizens’ participation. It relies on qualitative and quantitative data as well as gathering of new creative practices, experimentation and practices of democratic innovation and bottom up mobilization.