Abstract
This introductory chapter justifies the need for an empirical study into the necessary circumstances for agonistic radical democratic politics. In doing so, it explains the theoretical bases of radical democratic thought and demonstrates how developments in the contemporary era both reflect and limit the radical democratic approach. Following from this, it details and defends the methodological approach utilized in the study and provides a rationale for the choice of cases and research methods.
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Notes
- 1.
Additional authors who have frequently been classified as radical democratic theorists yet have been less systematic or consistent in their presentation of radical democracy as a project include Claude Lefort, Etienne Balibar, Nancy Fraser, and Iris Marion Young.
- 2.
Throughout their respective works, the radical democratic thinkers present several dichotomous ideal types that reflect this central antagonism/agonism pairing including police/politics (Rancière ) and virtue/virtù (Honig).
- 3.
While some authors such as Adrian Little (2009) and Andrew Schaap (2009) have utilized empirical case studies to demonstrate both the real world manifestations of radical democratic politics as well as the theory’s prospects in resolving difficult political contests (in Northern Ireland and Australia respectively), there has yet to be a thorough case-based empirical study on what allows for radical democratic politics to be sustained.
Furthermore, while many theoretical interventions have pinpointed some of the inconsistencies and contradictions within radical democratic thought, these have not involved the analysis of cases that embody a radical democratic character. See Christian Volk (2018).
- 4.
- 5.
For a discussion of the “uncommon foundations” approach, see McAdam et al. (2001).
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Matijasevich, D. (2019). Radical Democracy and Its Antagonism Problem. In: Radical Democracy and Its Limits. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-23014-2_1
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