Description
My doctoral research examines crisis of democracy and democracy facing crises. Starting point of my research interest lies in academic and public discussions concerning crisis of democracy: particularly polarization is depicted as contemporary threat to democratic societies. I study critically, in which ways globally circulating concepts displaying era of divisions could (not) be adapted to Finnish context. I follow pragmatist understanding of democracy and politics in my work: democracy is continuously (re)constructed in multilevel political practices, and crises are points of realization that something is wrong. Thus, crises work as tools or driving force for political processes.I argue that to understand what is happening to democracy, it is fruitful to examine political practices during times of crises. Corona pandemic has been unexpected and dramatic period which has demanded several changes in how citizens and politicians act. My empirical case study examines what kind of implications covid has had in Finnish politics: whether pandemic has advanced polarization or been rather politically unifying. I study conversations in Finnish parliament regarding face masks and covid passes as novel political topics during the corona pandemic. I hypothesize that in severely polarized society emerging political topics would tend to become quickly politicized and polarized following already existing divides.
I propose that polarization consists of political, moral, epistemic, and affective dimensions. Methodologically I rely on political discourse analysis and follow understanding that political discourses are practical reasoning: making claims for action to reach certain goals, while representations of circumstances and values are premises of these claims. I suggest that taking closer look into practical reasoning can be valuable tool to examine domains of polarization taking place in different premises of argumentation and thus to generate rich qualitative understanding of polarization.
| Period | 24 Nov 2022 |
|---|---|
| Event title | Power, future and agency: 8th international Power Conference |
| Event type | Conference |
| Location | Helsinki, FinlandShow on map |
| Degree of Recognition | International |