IDM Democracy Talks - Session I: Participation & Representation

In the course of the Jean Monnet project "From Fictional to Functioning Democracy. Developing Concepts and Strategies for an Inclusive and Participatory Europe (FIFUDEM)", with the support of the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union, the Institute for the Danube Region and Central Europe (IDM) has launched a new series, the "IDM Democracy Talks", that is addressing current democratic developments within and outside the European Union.

In this first edition of IDM Democracy Talks "Participation & Representation" we are discussing #participation and #representation as two fundamental elements and principles of democracy. Democracy requires citizens' participation for its functionality and legitimacy just as citizens must be  appropriately  represented by elected decision-makers and their policies.

However, various factors such as migration, political apathy or immanent system critique regarding nepotism and state capture have led to the  fact that existing governments do not entirely represent the local population of a city or country.

In Austria, the migrant population has increased in the last decades, while naturalisation - similar to many other immigrant countries - is by law the pre-condition for the right to vote. As a result, nearly one third of the Viennese population did not have the right to vote in the recent local elections. In Serbia, where most of the immigrants to Austria come from, the last parliamentary election boycott illustrated a deep mistrust in and disappointment with the façade democracy under Aleksandar Vučić that shows a clientilistic state capture, instead of a successful EU accession of this country. In Montenegro, for the first time during the Milo Đukanović regime, a new party with a clear liberal-democratic and civil society approach - the United Reform Action under Dritan Abazović - passed the census and is now part of the Montenegrin parliament. Against the background of rising nepotism, stabilocracy and the "eternal EU waiting room" without any clear EU accession perspective for the Western Balkans, this Montenigrin success story is discussed as a good example for the whole region.

Questions that arise are therefore to what extent have democratic participation and representation changed in the last 20 years? What has to be done to guarantee participation and representation, or to make non-voting voices heard? What can be expected for the future regarding liberal democracy in Austria, Montenegro and Serbia? What has to be done to strengthen participation and representation and, finally, the European inclusiveness?

Guests of the panel discussion, chaired by Silvia Nadjivan (IDM), are:

Snezana ĐAPIĆ, Project Manager, Bureau for Social Research (BIRODI), Belgrade
Dr. Monika MOKRE, Head of Research at the Austrian Academy of Science, Vienna
Marko PEJOVIĆ, Programme Manager, Centre for Democracy and Human Rights - CEDEM, Podgorica

0:00 Introduction - Silvia NADJIVAN

5:34 Dr. Monika MOKRE

19:58 Snezana ĐAPIĆ

31:31 Marko PEJOVIĆ

39:54 Discussion

55:08 Closing Remarks - Silvia NADJIVAN