Call for papers

IPSA | International Political Science Association
General Conference
Lisbon, Portugal | 25-29 July 2020

07 AUG 2019Call for Papers Opens
10 OCT 2019Deadline to submit paper proposals

Digital Platforms, Political Parties and New Forms of Re-politicisation

https://wc2020.ipsa.org/wc/panel/digital-platforms-political-parties-and-new-forms-re-politicisation

The presumed crisis of legitimacy of the traditional political parties and, in particular, of the socialist and social-democratic political parties would derive – according to many scholars – from many factors, not least the progressive marginalization of themes such as social justice, equality, environment and democratization of society from their own agendas. At the same time, their organizational structure seems unfitting for the new request of involvement coming from fragmented and impoverished societies.
The linkage between social classes and the political parties born from the twentieth-century cleavages seems to be overtaken by the possibilities offered by the Internet and by the development of the so-called platform-parties or digital parties.
In many cases, they implicitly support the shifting towards depoliticisation. At the same time, new political aggregations – even in the left-wing area – favour new organizational forms, capable of combining the “physical” link with territorial experiences with the adoption of digital participation platforms. The merging of online and offline involvement can create a virtuous circle of participation that may be intermittent but not occasional. In this perspective, digital platforms can offer tools for mobilization, can act as spaces for facilitating policy making and, finally, they can favour the adoption of more democratic decision-making mechanisms. They can also contribute to offer spaces of political legitimation in the many and diversified experiences of democratic innovation.
This panel aims at discussing the interactions between digital participation platforms and the parties of the socialist tradition, identifying exemplary cases, problems, and opportunities. At the same time, the panel aims at understanding if and how new forms of party organization can represent instances of re-politicisation.
In order to discuss these topics, papers that focus on the linkages between political participation and digital platforms, as well as on multidisciplinary and comparative approaches are very welcome.

Session RC22 Political Communication

Further information
https://wc2020.ipsa.org/wc/submit-paper