ONLINE | Democratic Breakdown and Collective Deliberations in Times of Emergency

The talk would argue that the deliberative assemblies that have been taking place in different parts of the world in the last few years (Ireland, Argentina, Chile, amongst others) suggest that it is possible to institutionalize the ideal of a “conversation among equals”, which for so long, too many theorists depicted as an abstract and rather absurd utopia. These experiences refer to the importance of establishing democratic procedures and – more significantly – the attractive results that derive from processes of informed, transparent, collective debates and other instances of popular intervention in politics.

Roberto Gargarella is the Professor of Constitutional Theory and Political Philosophy at the Universidad de Buenos Aires and at the Universidad Torcuato Di Tella. He is the author of numerous books including “The Legal Foundations of Inequality” (Cambridge U.P., 2010) and “Latin American Constitutionalism” (Oxford U.P., 2013).