Quiénes somos y sobre qué vamos a trabajar: Yves Sintomer

Yves Sintomer es uno de los grandes estudiosos sobre la democracia participativa en general y el sorteo en particular. Sin sus grandes estudios sobre los fundamentos filosóficos, las raíces históricas y las aplicaciones concretas, el sorteo tendría un lugar inferior en la discusión intelectual y político. Dentro de nuestro equipo de trabajo se dedicará a evaluar qué puede rescatarse del sorteo. Éste fue tanto un mecanismo de designación de cargos como un modo de compartirlos y permitir que accedieran los más. Todo ello dentro de culturas políticas -en las más de 1.000 polis democráticas en Grecia, en la Florencia del final de la Edad Media y el Renacimiento- en las que cuales la realización personal era indisociable de la participación política. ¿Puede seguir asumiéndose, con el sorteo y la rotación, que la democracia, según Aristóteles, consiste en el aprendizaje de ser gobernado, ejerciendo el gobierno?  ¿Debe pensarse, por el contrario, que el sorteo debe centrarse en la producción de asambleas deliberativas de calidad? Tal será el centro de la aportación de Yves Sintomer a nuestro proyecto: "La herencia del sorteo político ateniense: democracia radical o democracia deliberativa?"

Yves Sintomer is Senior fellow at the Institut Universitaire de France, one of the French most prestigious institutions, and professor of political science at Paris 8 University. In addition, he is associated professor at Science Po Paris, Universidad del Pais Vasco (Spain), Neuchâtel and Lausanne Universities (Switzerland), and Marc Bloch Centre (Humboldt University Berlin/CNRS). He received a PhD of political and social sciences (European University Institute, Florence) and has a Habilitation to supervise research (Paris 5 University).

He has studied in various Universities in the world, among others: Paris 8, Paris 10, Harvard, Frankfurt/Main, European University Institute (Florence). He has also been invited scholar or professor in various universities: Harvard, Tsinghua University (Beijing), Institut für Sozialforschung (Frankfurt, Germany), Goethe University Frankfurt (Germany), Complutense-Madrid, UCL (Belgian), Catania (Italy). He has been deputy-director of the Marc Bloch Center (Berlin), director of the department of political science at Paris 8 university, and member of the direction board of this university.

He collaborates with various French and international journals. His main research topics include participatory and deliberative democracy; French and German political sociology; the history and contemporary transformation of political representation; a global comparison of politics in France, Germany, Brazil, India and China.

He is author among others of Participatory Budgeting in Europe; Democracy and Public Governance (with C. Herzberg and A. Röcke), Ashgate, London, 2015 (in print); Deliberation: values, processes, institutions (with S. Coleman and A. Przybylska), Peter Lang, Varsaw, 2016 (in print); Local participation in Southern Europe: Causes, Characteristics and Consequences (with J. Font and D. della Porta), Rowman & Littlefield, Washington D.C., 2014; Participatory Budgeting in Asia and Europe. Key Challenges of Participation (with R. Traub-Merz and J. Zhang), Palgrave, Houndmills, Basingstoke/New York, 2013; Participatory Budgeting Worldwide (with C. Herzberg and G. Allegretti), Engagement Global, Bonn, 2013; The Porto Alegre Experiment: Learning Lessons for a Better Democracy, Zed Books, New York, 2004; Petite histoire de l'expérimentation démocratique. Tirage au sort et politique d'Athènes à nos jours, La Découverte, Paris, 2011https://www.blogger.com/null; La démocratie impossible? Politique et modernité chez Weber et Habermas, La Découverte, Paris, 1999. He is also presently editing a new French translation of Max Weber’s Economy and society.

Among his last papers: “The Meanings of Political Representation: Uses and Misuses of a Notion”, Raisons politiques, English edition, 2014, p. 13-34; “Transnational Models of Citizen Participation: The Case of Participatory Budgeting” (with C. Herzberg, A. Röcke and G. Allegretti), Journal of Public Deliberation, vol. 8, 2, 30/12/2012; “Could Sortition Random Selection and Deliberative Democracy Revitalize Politics in the Twenty-first Century?”, www.booksandideas.net/, 05/06/2012; “Intellectual Critique and the Public Sphere: Between the Corporatism of the Universal and the Realpolitik of Reason”, in S. Susen, B.S. Turner (eds.), The Legacy of Pierre Bourdieu. Critical Essays, Anthem Press, London/New York, 2011, p. 329-246; “Random Selection, Republican Self-government, and Deliberative Democracy”, Constellations, 17/3, 2010, p. 472-487.

His writings have been published in 18 languages.