echoing the call

Call for Papers -- Contretemps 6: Democratic Futures

Calls for democracy today come from various quarters—national, subnational, and supranational. Never before has the idea of democracy been so popular. Yet as the current attempts to impose democracy at gunpoint in the Middle East bear out, a functional democracy requires more than just the formal presence of institutions—it requires a liberated citizenry inspired by the dream of democratic futures. This issue of Contretemps invites provocative submissions on the theme of democratic futures. What are the futural dimensions of democratic experience, and how does this temporality affect political life in general? If the call for democracy is traversed by dynamics of hope and becoming, how well are these served by current political-economic institutions? Does the future of democracy require a rethinking of modern forms of political representation? How does the futural dimension of democratic experience indicate a horizon for other forms of democracy to come? How might we imagine a democracy that transcends nations, borders,
even the limits of the possible? How might the dream of democracy enable us to renegotiate our familiar institutions, public and private spaces, things and experiences, allowing for a rethinking of the "we" that is shared? Today, the politics of fear works to smother the utopian impulses that fired the democratic movements of the later twentieth century. What might be the spark that reignites the passion for the event of democracy, inspiring the reinvention of democratic futures?

Deadline for submissions: 20th March 2005

Please direct all enquiries and submissions to contretemps@mail.usyd.edu.au
For more information (including submission guidelines), visit Contretemps
at http://www.usyd.edu.au/contretemps

(Not that anyone here works for these people, wish as we might.)