Research theme: “Democratic strategies with respect to political challenges of the era of sudden changes of the planetary (eco)system”
Like no other challenge of the modern world, climate change combines a range of problems related to the social and political organisation of the world and societies on one hand, and the philosophical and ideological aspect of its justifications and criticism on the other. The recent decades witnessed a confrontation of two strategies of democratisation of decision-making processes: the agonistic perspective based on conflict and hegemonic fight vs. the deliberative perspective associated with rational consensus. In reality, those seemingly contradictory tendencies are frequently reflected in a single entity or activity, and one of the most prominent examples of the recent years involves the most popular one among the new climate movements Extinction Rebellion. On one hand, XR activists oppose corrupt elites, while on the other – they demand organisation of deliberative climate panels. The impact of this movement can be seen in the European Union’s climate programmes referring to collaborative governance, placing deliberatively developed climate contracts at the core of the transformation. Thus generated tensions give us a chance to analyse the theory and practice of various forms of democratic politics, but also to explore mutual relations and potential synergies of those paradigms – searching for new forms of democratic response to consequences of the climate crises.
By creating an interdisciplinary research team covering a range of themes from philosophical considerations to theory of politics to empirical study of societies, discourses and political systems, we focus on three objectives: integration, that is mutual exploration of our research areas and specialisations in order to commence cooperation and to apply one another’s research in their analysis and interpretation; synergy in mutual inspiration to discover and fill new research gaps in the subjects we explore; and implementation by striking international cooperation, development of grant applications, as well as encouraging scientific discussion about the Anthropocene I the entire scientific community of the Faculty. And even though this objective is listed last, it is not the least important! The research team’s work shall involve organisation of open seminars, cyclical reading groups, and in a longer perspective, also development of a proposition of elective courses or course packages. We realise that the significance of Anthropocene – its politics and political nature – will only grow. Our Faculty should be a leading in understanding of these problems and preparing future generations to cope with the upcoming challenges.
This is the purpose of establishment of the Team Researching the Political Nature of the Anthropocene, including: Anna Cichecka (Institute of Sociology), Katarzyna Domagała (Institute of Political Science), Urszula Lisowska (Institute of Philosophy), Karol Morawski (Institute of Philosophy), Julia Trzcińska (Institute of Political Science), Wojciech Ufel (Institute of Political Science), and Mateusz Zieliński (Institute of Political Science).
