Extract

Why do some political projects to enhance participatory and inclusionary democracy succeed, while others fail? Which environments foster civil society organizations' ability to become protagonists in the governance of their own towns and cities? These important questions often draw researchers to focus on Latin America, as the centre stage of some of the most radical participatory governance projects in the world. In Democracy on the ground, Gabriel Hetland tackles these questions in a truly comparative fashion. Hetland carves out a new path and challenges many of our most commonly held assumptions. According to the author, the success (or failure) of participatory democracy projects in towns and cities may not hinge on the richness of civil society. It may not even be a wholly local phenomenon. Rather, Hetland showcases how local- and national-level politics interact and thereby affect inclusionary democracy. For Hetland, hegemony from above may induce democratization below, not only among politically aligned movements, but also between seemingly strange bedfellows.

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