O objetivo desta dissertação é analisar a implantação das Subprefeituras na cidade de São Paulo no governo de Marta Suplicy (2001-2004) como mecanismo para descentralizar atividades e recursos para serem geridos nos territórios. A pesquisa buscou compreender como esse processo adotou sua configuração política e administrativa em face da forma como o Executivo transformou esse tema no principal recurso político para construir sua coalizão de apoio junto aos vereadores. Ao mesmo tempo, essa escolha política resultou num afastamento do governo do PT da tese que vinculava descentralização com poder local e democracia participativa nos territórios. A despeito de o Orçamento Participativo ter existido, seu peso na estratégia política do governo foi secundário, ademais de ter havido um recuo na implantação dos Conselhos de Representante para não por em risco a política de alianças, visto que os vereadores eram contrários a uma instância que fiscalizaria sua atuação. Administrativamente, a descentralização tomou um curso errático, pois as Secretarias municipais temerosas de perderem poder para as Subprefeituras, o que constrangeu a forma, o ritmo e o escopo da descentralização. Desse modo, ao invés de ocorrer um processo uniforme e geral, a implantação das Subprefeituras foi irregular, já que dependeu da dinâmica de cada política setorial e seus desdobramentos nas regiões. Para tratar essas duas questões, a pesquisa realiza uma análise geral desse projeto de governo e seleciona dois casos (Freguesia do Ó e Capela do Socorro) visando discutir como tais impasses e escolhas políticas se expressaram nos territórios. / The goal of this dissertation is to analyze the implementation of the Subdistricts in the city of São Paulo in the Marta Suplicys government (2001-2004) as a mechanism to decentralize activities and resources to be managed in the territories. The research sought understanding how this process took its political and administrative configuration inface of how the Executive transformed this issue in the main political resource to build his support coalition along with the aldermen. At the same time, this political choice resulted in a departure from the PT government\'s argument that linked local decentralization with participatory democracy in the territories. Despite of the existence of the Participatory Budget, its weight in thegovernments political strategy was secondary, furthermore there has been a retreat in the implementation of the Councils of Representatives to not endanger the policy of alliances, because the aldermen were opposed to a body that would supervise their work. Administratively, the decentralization took an erratic course, because the municipal Departments were fearful of losing power to the Subdistricts, which constrained the way, the pace and scope of decentralization. Thus, instead of incurring a general and uniform process, the implementation of the Subdistricts was uneven, since it depended on the dynamics of each of the sectors and its development in the territories. To analyze this issues, the research conducts a general analysis of this government project and selects two cases (Freguesia do Ó and Capela do Socorro) addressing to discuss how such deadlocks and political choices were expressed in the territories.

This dissertation seeks to understand how issue publics contribute to citizen competence and the functioning of democracy. In the first part of the dissertation, a new measurement was constructed by theoretically and empirically analyzing the attributes of issue public members. Through the hypotheses testing, the new measure was more reliable in identifying issue public members compared to previous measurement strategies. Employing the new measure, results show that issue public members with concern about a specific issue, exercised their issue-specificity in seeking information (i.e., issue-based selectivity) with exposure to both attitude-consistent and counter-attitudinal perspectives. Issue public membership also had significant effects on issue-specific knowledge, and generating rationales for their own and other's oppositional viewpoints. These direct effects were mediated by issue-based selectivity. The relationships highlight the importance of issue publics in contributing to the deliberative democracy. In addition, issue publics play a significant role in contributing to the participatory democracy in that issue public members have greater intentions to participate in issue-related activities than nonmembers. However, while issue publics come close to solve the deliberative-participatory paradox, it was found that their information selectivity and argument generation were unbalanced in a way of favoring pro-attitudinal perspectives over counter-attitudinal perspectives. The second part of the dissertation examined conditional factors--accuracy and directional goals in affecting information selectivity and processing. The findings show that directional goals influenced participants to apply either the strategies of selective approach or selective avoidance to seek information depending on the issue. Accuracy goals exerted a main effect on the issue that is relatively less controversial and less obtrusive. They also interacted with issue public membership in influencing the less controversial and less obtrusive issue. Argument generation was not affected by accuracy or directional goals. Overall, through conceptualizing citizens as members of different issue publics, individuals are more competent then we thought. Their intrinsic interest in an issue serves as a strong factor affecting their information selectivity, information processing, and political actions. Despite finding an optimistic role for issue publics in the democratic process, their limitations also should be recognized. The implications for the deliberative and participatory democracy are discussed.

The Constitution of South Africa, 1996, requires local government to be democratic and accountable to local communities. Municipalities are also constitutionally bound to encourage the involvement of the communities in the affairs of local government. Section 152 of the Constitution of South Africa, 1996, sets out the rights of communities to be involved in the affairs of local government.Participation is not only about communicating information and addressing the needs of the community. Participation is also about building partnerships with the community, being accountable to the community, allowing the community to take part in policy decisions, capacitating the community to understand their rights and obligations as citizens, and allowing the community to participate actively in social, political and economic affairs. Local government as a sphere of government closest to the peopleplays a critical role in advancing the participation of the community. Chapter 4 of the Municipal Structures Act of 1998 requires that municipalities should establish ward committees in order to enhance participatory democracy. Ward committees were therefore established, as community structures, to play a role in advocating needs, aspirations, potentials and problems of the community. However, studies appear to be critical on the functionality of ward committees and argue that most ward committees are not functioning as intended. The purpose of the study is to establish whether MatlosanaLocal Municipality has created the environment for active participation through the ward committee system in order to enhance participatory democracy. Thestudy further investigates whether the ward committees are functioning as intended and according to what the law requires. The researcher used a qualitative method to determine how Matlosana Local Municipality uses the ward committee system to enhance participatory democracy. The investigation revealed a number of challenges facing the ward committees which hinder their effectiveness. However, recommendations are recommended to assist the management of the municipality in making the system more effective. / Thesis (M. Development and Management)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2012

The Constitution of South Africa, 1996, requires local government to be democratic and accountable to local communities. Municipalities are also constitutionally bound to encourage the involvement of the communities in the affairs of local government. Section 152 of the Constitution of South Africa, 1996, sets out the rights of communities to be involved in the affairs of local government.Participation is not only about communicating information and addressing the needs of the community. Participation is also about building partnerships with the community, being accountable to the community, allowing the community to take part in policy decisions, capacitating the community to understand their rights and obligations as citizens, and allowing the community to participate actively in social, political and economic affairs. Local government as a sphere of government closest to the peopleplays a critical role in advancing the participation of the community. Chapter 4 of the Municipal Structures Act of 1998 requires that municipalities should establish ward committees in order to enhance participatory democracy. Ward committees were therefore established, as community structures, to play a role in advocating needs, aspirations, potentials and problems of the community. However, studies appear to be critical on the functionality of ward committees and argue that most ward committees are not functioning as intended. The purpose of the study is to establish whether MatlosanaLocal Municipality has created the environment for active participation through the ward committee system in order to enhance participatory democracy. Thestudy further investigates whether the ward committees are functioning as intended and according to what the law requires. The researcher used a qualitative method to determine how Matlosana Local Municipality uses the ward committee system to enhance participatory democracy. The investigation revealed a number of challenges facing the ward committees which hinder their effectiveness. However, recommendations are recommended to assist the management of the municipality in making the system more effective. / Thesis (M. Development and Management)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2012

This study uses the concepts of everyday politics and cultural resistance to explore how young people are experimenting with ‘free spaces’ in which to develop alternative ideas and practices within the food justice movement. Through a case study of the Spring Ridge Commons – a youth-generated free space – this research describes how youth are redefining relationships to place and to people by practicing alternative foodways like urban foraging; creating decommodified food sources; sharing skills and knowledge through peer-to-peer networks; building community through relationships of mutual support; and experimenting with non-hierarchical governance. Such practices have potential implications for child and youth care such as: reconnecting youth and adults through shared practice and meaningful work in “real life” politics and community building, reconceptualizing 'youth' and 'adult' such that both have greater access to acts of cultural production, and creating experiences of democracy in everyday life. / Graduate

In the mid-20th century the assignment of nurturing democratic citizens in Swedish schools, was first proposed and implemented. Since then, the democratic assignment has been put aside by the schools´ second assignment: communicating knowledge. The aim of this essay is to once again bring light on this forgotten assignment. I have gathered the material for this essay by interviewing five teachers of upper secondary school. By the use of three ideal types of democratic theory I then analyze the material to determine the teachers´ views on school democracy and their ways of using it in their teaching. The ideal types are participatory democracy, discursive democracy and representative democracy. The results show that the interviewed teachers share very similar views on school democracy, close to the ideal type participatory democracy. In their use of school democracy in teaching traces of both participatory and discursive democracy, can be found.

O presente trabalho tem o objetivo de discutir os fundamentos que possibilitam um novo relacionamento entre Estado e Cidadão em torno da tributação, superando um ambiente de litigiosidade necessária. Para tanto, em uma perspectiva instrumental, se vale da democracia participativa e deliberativa para fundamentar maior participação do cidadão em torno da tributação e criação e reinvenção de novos espaços em que se possa realizar um diálogo entre ambos, antes de se procurar uma via litigiosa. O trabalho se vale, também, da descrição de fenômenos da realidade que possibilitam o relacionamento baseado na cooperação. Finaliza por reconhecer que a participação do cidadão na tributação ainda é incipiente, embora já dê sinais de seu surgimento.

Le Venezuela d’H. Chávez et la Bolivie d’E. Morales sont les nouvelles terres d’élection du populisme et de la démocratie participative. Si ces deux formes politiques ont tendance à s’y hybrider et à témoigner d’un certain nombre d’affinités électives, les analystes ne se penchent jamais sur les expériences sociales spécifiques auxquelles elles donnent lieu. À travers une ethnographie des pratiques participatives dans des comités de décentralisation des politiques publiques situés dans les barrios - Conseils communaux vénézuéliens et Juntas vecinales boliviennes - cette thèse se propose de problématiser la relation entre pouvoir populiste et politique populaire. Son but est celui d’étudier le champ de pertinence d’un concept largement discrédité dans les sciences sociales, le populisme, à l’aune des politiques du peuple qu’il produit chez les exclus. À la confluence de sociologie des rapports ordinaires au politique et d’histoire « from below », notre thèse propose ainsi une nouvelle conceptualisation du populisme à l’aune des régimes d’identité, d’action et de rupture qu’il ouvre chez les dominés, et qui tournent autour du peuple comme opérateur. / Either as two exemplary democracies or two democracies of excesses, H. Chávez’s Venezuela and E. Morales’s Bolivia seem to attract nowadays more the ideological interpretations operating a rhetorical manipulation than informed social analyses. Far from wanting to discuss Chávez's ou Morales’s “exemplary” skills, the author proposes a policy ethnography focusing on the two radical populisms dynamics that can be observed in township assemblies for public planning (Consejos comunales and Juntas vecinales). These hybrid institutions are true political laboratories where lower classe people living in the country neighbourhoods can meet. Combining decentralization, deliberative democracy and populism, such institutions keep alive the treasure of the social construction of revolutionary policy in Venezuela and Bolivia. The participatory experience of ordinary people, which implies a community to integrate, an interest to defend and a collective identity to build, permits to track down the paradoxes and contradictions of a revolution in progress, and to reveal a sociology of action hidden by stereotyped concepts of faulty democracy or excessive democracy.

O presente trabalho tem o objetivo de discutir os fundamentos que possibilitam um novo relacionamento entre Estado e Cidadão em torno da tributação, superando um ambiente de litigiosidade necessária. Para tanto, em uma perspectiva instrumental, se vale da democracia participativa e deliberativa para fundamentar maior participação do cidadão em torno da tributação e criação e reinvenção de novos espaços em que se possa realizar um diálogo entre ambos, antes de se procurar uma via litigiosa. O trabalho se vale, também, da descrição de fenômenos da realidade que possibilitam o relacionamento baseado na cooperação. Finaliza por reconhecer que a participação do cidadão na tributação ainda é incipiente, embora já dê sinais de seu surgimento.

Os conselhos comunitários de segurança pública do Rio de Janeiro representam uma mudança institucional na área das políticas públicas de segurança. Trata-se de um canal de abertura que permite a participação no plano local, caracterizado pela busca da instauração de diferentes padrões de interação entre governo e sociedade em torno do tema segurança. Baseado nas recentes análises acerca da sociedade civil, em que esta vem sendo tratada cada vez mais como instância aproximada da esfera governamental. O trabalho propõe expor uma análise político-social do conselho comunitário do bairro Méier e suas adjacências, localizados na Zona Norte do Rio de Janeiro. Esta região é conhecida pelos contrastes sociais e elevados índices de violência, por concentrar, de uma só vez, um comércio próspero, grande número de habitantes e diversas comunidades carentes dominadas pelo tráfico de drogas e de armas. A experiência deste conselho permite conhecer que a consolidação desta arena depende não só da presença de organizações e representantes sociais aptos a reivindicar múltiplos interesses, mas também do comprometimento do governo em reconhecer essas arenas como canais privilegiados na relação entre poder público e sociedade. O conselho caracteriza-se como uma ferramenta inovadora à medida que trata de um tema conflituoso como a segurança pública. Esta arena permite a aproximação entre comunidade e instituições historicamente fechadas como as polícias militar e civil. O exercício dos conselhos comunitários de segurança pública pode colaborar para o aprofundamento de uma democracia brasileira mais participativa e de um Estado mais poroso, na medida em que aposta no envolvimento de uma sociedade civil mais organizada e atuante, de um Poder Executivo e órgãos governamentais mais dispostos ao diálogo. / The community councils of public security in Rio de Janeiro represent an institutional change in the area of public safety policies. This is an open channel that allows the participation at the local level, characterized by the pursuit of the establishment of different patterns of interaction between government and society around the theme of security. Based on the recent analysis of civil society, in which it is being treated increasingly as approximate instance of government. The paper proposes an analysis exposing political and social community council Meier neighborhood and its environs, located in the northern zone of Rio de Janeiro. This region is known for social contrasts and high levels of violence, by concentrating, at once, a prosperous trade, large numbers of people and various disadvantaged communities dominated by drug trafficking and weapons. The experience of this council will be known that the consolidation of this arena depends not only on the presence of social organizations and representatives are able to claim multiple interests, but also the commitment of the government to recognize these arenas as privileged channels in the relationship between government and society. The board is characterized as an innovative tool as it is a contentious issue as public safety. This arena allows closer ties between community and institutions historically closed as the military and civil police. The exercise of the community councils of public safety can contribute to furthering a more participatory democracy in Brazil and a more porous state, as it bets on the involvement of civil society a more organized and active, an Executive Branch and government agencies more willing to dialogue.