cfp - themed issue on “Rescuing Participation” in Comunicaç? ?o e Sociedade, edited by F. Ribeiro, A. Melo & N. Carpentier

((apologies for cross-posting))

reminder: submission deadline 30 September
Call for Papers for a themed issue on “Rescuing Participation” in 
Comunicação e Sociedade
Editors: Fábio Ribeiro (UTAD; CECS-UMinho); Ana Duarte Melo 
(CECS-UMinho); Nico Carpentier (Uppsala University, Sweden)

http://www.cecs.uminho.pt/en/call-for-papers-comunicacao-sociedade-36-rescuing-participation/

Participation has become a key concept in Communication and Media 
Studies, driven by the enthusiasm and hopes for democratic renewal, 
brought about in particular by the potentialities of digital 
technologies. These high expectations have not always been grounded in 
in-depth reflections about this desire for, and desirability of, 
participation. This themed issue of Comunicação e Sociedade wants to 
discuss why we want and need participation in our contemporary 
societies. It aims to raise questions about which participatory 
intensities are considered necessary and sufficient, and why? Why do we, 
as societies and/or as academics, desire for increased levels of 
participation? What are its societal benefits? Why is participation so 
important to us?

Submission: All abstracts (400-500 words) should be sent in .doc format 
before 30 September 2018 to the e-mail 
[email protected], CC to the editors: Fábio Ribeiro 
([email protected]); Ana Duarte Melo ([email protected]) and Nico 
Carpentier ([email protected]).

Important dates:
Deadline for abstracts – 30 September 2018
Editor decision (on basis of abstracts) – 15 October 2018
Full article submission deadline – 15 February 2019
Editor decision on full articles – 1 May 2019
Submissions final article – 1 July 2019
Issue Publication – December 2019

+++ Full Call +++



Comunicação e Sociedade
volume 36
Issue title:
Rescuing Participation
Editors:
Fábio Ribeiro, Ana Duarte Melo and Nico Carpentier
Publication date:
Winter 2019

Participation has become a key concept in Communication and Media 
Studies, driven by the enthusiasm and hopes for democratic renewal, 
brought about in particular by the potentialities of digital 
technologies. These high expectations have not always been grounded in 
in-depth reflections about this desire for, and desirability of, 
participation. This themed issue of Comunicação e Sociedade wants to 
discuss why we want and need participation in our contemporary 
societies. It aims to raise questions about which participatory 
intensities are considered necessary and sufficient, and why? Why do we, 
as societies and/or as academics, desire for increased levels of 
participation? What are its societal benefits? Why is participation so 
important to us?

These questions are becoming more and more relevant, now that the 
frustration, disillusion and disenchantment with participation is also 
becoming more visible, and the concept  of  participation  can 
simultaneously  benefit  less  from  being  novel  or fashionable. 
Different groups in society have started to problematize participation, 
for a variety of reasons. For instance, some media professionals feel 
pressured to interact with the public, without having the proper tools 
and resources to do so. Others are confronted with so-called 
participatory formats which turn out to be little more than “marketing”, 
programmed just to fill gaps in broadcasting schedules or to increase 
audience ratings.

Frustration also occurs when the outcome of participation becomes 
meaningless because it is incorporated by powerful elites (active, for 
instance, in the fields of economics, politics or communication) in 
order to legitimate their decisions. Media companies struggle with their 
online commenting sections, as they witness their web pages being 
flooded with hate and prejudice, disturbing and flaming speech, with 
users that  speak  more  than  they  listen,  frustrating  the  desire 
for  rational  consensus. Moreover, governments are confronted with 
troll farms and other organised forms of resistance to their 
representative democratic processes, which results in ‘the people’ to be 
positioned as a threat to democracy, and not as part of it. These 
problems should not be ignored. At the same time we should be careful 
not to throw out the baby with the bathwater, and acknowledge the social 
relevance of participation, and the need to have more (substantive and 
maximalist) participation, and not less. There is also a need for a much 
more developed legitimation why participation matters, and what kind of 
participation matters, so that the notion of participation is not buried 
under an avalanche of well-intended critiques. That’s why we now need 
academic work that protects, defends and rescues participation.

Proposals for articles should address one or more of the following topics:
> The social relevance of participation - why does participation matter?
> What kind of participation do we need? What kinds of participation 
are beneficial for society and why? Where, in what fields does 
participation matter?
> What are the conditions for socially beneficial forms of participation?
> What ethics of participation do we need? What are the relations of a 
more participatory culture with civility, respect for difference, 
tolerance, agonism, listening?
> What counter-strategies should be developed to deal with the abuses 
of participation? How do we address the problems with participation?

-- 


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Professor Nico Carpentier
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Web: http://nicocarpentier.net/
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Coming soon:
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RESPUBLIKA! catalogue
Experiments in the performance of participation and democracy
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COMMUNICATION AND DISCOURSE THEORY
Collected Works of the Brussels Discourse Theory Group
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To visit:
Iconoclastic controversies: A visual sociology of statues and 
commemoration sites in the southern regions of Cyprus
(17/9 to 5/10 in Brasilia)
http://nicocarpentier.net/icontroversies/
& https://vimeo.com/290606097
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Uppsala University, Department of Informatics and Media
Kyrkogårdsgatan 10, 753 13 Uppsala, Sweden
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Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) - Free University of Brussels
& Charles University in Prague
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The Commlist
http://commlist.org/
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International Association for Media and Communication Research
Participatory Communication Research Section
http://iamcr.org/s-wg/section/pcr-section
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Researching and Teaching Communication Book Series
http://www.researchingcommunication.eu/
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E-mail (UUppsala): [email protected]
E-mail (VUBrussels): [email protected]
T (UUppsala): +46 (0)18 471 6341
Room (UUppsala): Ekonomikum building E329
Web: http://nicocarpentier.net/
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