New Approaches to Political Cohesion in Democratic Processes

This workshop places an emphasis on the relationship between democratic processes and political cohesion that goes beyond the simplistic formula of competitive democrats. Political cohesion, or the commitment to a common political project, is a matter of degree and processes leading to the peaceful resolution of conflict are just one way of contributing to this phenomenon. Indeed, political processes can embody values and produce norms that may legitimate the political system in one way or another and lead to much deeper forms of political cohesion among members of a political community than that which is allowed for by the mere avoidance of violent conflict. On the one hand, we consider the circumstances under which competitive elections can do more than peacefully resolve conflict by contributing in a deeper sense to citizens’ commitment to democratic values. On the other hand, as procedural and substantive democrats recognise, there is much more to democracy than free and fair elections. We therefore expand our inquiry beyond election to understand how other democratic values and activities may contribute towards political cohesion.