Short Abstract:

The workshop explores the political beyond state politics and focuses on how the political is cultivated in activism and everyday life. It aims to explore how alternative political forms can challenge existing political systems and offer us new ideas and tensions for thinking about the commons.

Long Abstract:

The concept of the political is often used by both researchers and activists to refer to the realm that extends beyond the politics of the modern state. From the feminist statement “the personal is political” to political activism that advocates the creation of self-organized communities independent of state structures, the political also seems to be wherever there is resistance to some form of injustice. In this way, the political refers not only to the various forms of organizing daily life and managing resources, but also to an attitude towards one's own way of life and coexistence with others.

The aim of this workshop is to deal empirically with the concept of the political and to examine the various forms of being political and acting politically. It seeks to answer the following questions: How do informal and established forms of governance interact? Where, when, and how does the political intertwine with the personal? What are the relationships and differences between the political as an external analytical category and as an emic and lived experience of the people we study? What methodological and theoretical approaches can expand or crystalize our understanding of the political? How can the political be thought beyond the human subject?

By approaching these questions through an examination of the different meanings and experiences people have of the political, the speakers will think analytically about the concept and show how different political forms and experiences bring new ideas and tensions in prefiguring new counter-hegemonic forms of commons.

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