Conference Report: democracy and dissent

From Madrid to Cairo, Tel Aviv, Rome and New York, protests have erupted across the globe against economic instability, political unaccountability and corruption. Characterized by a prevailing sense of disillusionment, these move- ments are calling for a rethinking of representative democracy and greater citi- zen involvement in public governance. As part of the La Pietra Dialogues1 – a long-running series of events in which some of world’s foremost scholars, poli- cy makers, practitioners, business leaders, public intellectuals and artists discuss publicly relevant issues – a day-long international round table was organized by New York University Florence on April 17, 2012 to discuss these issues. Among the main questions that the event aimed at debating were the defining characteristics of contemporary dissenting movements, the sources and modes of expression of their ideas, their potential direction, outcomes, and impact on national and transnational policy agendas, the influence of social media in their structure and philosophy, and whether these movements are developing new models of horizontal organization and democratic engagement.