Presentation
The symptoms of social tension and democratic crisis are now glaringly apparent in many Western countries, which are also facing major challenges (ecological crisis, digital revolution, ageing population, etc.). But the unsustainability of social models, which has been widely identified and expressed, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic, seems to be running up against the impossibility of change. Under what conditions could this renegotiation of our social contract take place and unfold, and what processes could contribute to it? IDDRI is launching an investigation on this topic.
Extract
IDDRI has planned to conduct a two-fold exploration: (1) asking whether new democratic mechanisms would enable citizens to influence the political and social orientation of the country–in a context of democratic crisis and mistrust, of distance between citizens and decision-makers, and of a representative model deemed insufficient; (2) and identifying, at the level of decision-makers and institutions, the conditions that favour negotiation processes within our democracy, i.e. the factors that make this negotiation necessary in the eyes of the actors with the power to bring about change, as well as the forms that such negotiation takes. These conditions favourable to negotiation may be tools (legislation, public policies, local experiments, institutional reforms, etc.) or contextual elements (strong public confidence, consolidated dialogue between actors and institutions, emergence of a crisis, etc.).
