Power and Democracy

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The European state - the national state, the democratic state, or the welfare state - is being challenged, both by antidemocratic forces from within as well as by new forms of supranational governance. How can democracy be defined and how is it related to the fundamental question of power and authority? This course is meant as a theoretical introduction into this question and invites to a critical self-reflexion. The course also aims at an interdisciplinary understanding of politics and democracy. Finally, Western theories and notions will be contrasted with non-Western experiences of politics and democracy.