John Keane

Este archivo solo abarca los artículos del autor incorporados a este sitio a partir del 1 de diciembre de 2006. Para fechas anteriores realice una búsqueda entrecomillando su nombre.

With the likes of Pablo Iglesias and Ada Colau coming to power in Spain, we are witnessing the rise of the ‘post-representatives’. Barcelona En Comú/flickr, CC BY-SA

EspañaAspectos Generales

This article is part of the Democracy Futures series, a joint global initiative with the Sydney Democracy Network. The project aims to stimulate fresh thinking about the many challenges facing democracies in the 21st century.

On May 15, 2011, Spain was convulsed by one of the most spectacular popular uprisings in its history, and in the history of the modern democratic world. Eight million Spanish citizens took part in the occupation of public squares and buildings in at least 60 towns and cities across the country. The movement of Los Indignados (“the outraged”) was born.

At the time Spanish citizens had plenty to be disgruntled about: economic recession, high unemployment, endemic corruption, cronyism, wasteful and reckless mega-projects, mounting central and local government debt and much else.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia

James Madison famously remarked that a popular government without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a prologue to a farce or a tragedy. The present government of the People’s Republic of China has set out to disprove this rule.

Rejecting talk of farce and tragedy, its rulers claim their authority is rooted within a new and higher form of popular government, a “post-democratic” way of handling power which delivers goods and services, promotes social harmony and roots out “harmful behavior” using state-of-the-art information-control methods more complex and much craftier than Madison could ever have imagined.

Information flows in China are not simply blocked, firewalled or censored.…  Seguir leyendo »