Research and projects
Our research group studies ways to improve democracy by way of citizen participation in a changing world. The strengthening of social antagonism and polarisation makes traditional representative democracy fragile, and the rapidly fragmented information environment makes it difficult for citizens to form opinions. Additionally, digitalisation and crisis such as climate change highlight the need to reform democratic systems.
We study democratic innovations — that is, new practices of citizen participation. Examples of these are deliberative citizen discussions and citizens’ initiatives. We are interested in how digital tools can be utilised to improve the quality of civic participation and increase its impact. We also study the effect of citizen participation on decision-making.
Our research sheds light on how democratic innovations work. It produces concrete suggestions for how new ways of citizen participation can be realised to strengthen democracy. We produce information that can be used to reform democratic dialogue, critical thinking, civic competence, and the culture of decision-making.
Our research group is currently working on multiple active projects, which are related to the topics described above.
Learn more about active projects and concluded projects below.
