On February 23, Fundesplai presented “Citizenship and democratic quality. Recovering the dignity of politics”.
Sixth volume of the collection Documents per al debat
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| From left to right, Joaquim Brugué, Núria Valls, Enrique Arnanz, Carles Barba and Imma Mayol |
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| The event brought together about 70 people from different fields |
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| Jaume Lanaspa opened the event |
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| Bugué highlighted the link between values and politics |
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| Download the book by linking to the image |
On Monday, February 23, Fundesplai (Fundació Catalana de l’Esplai) presented the book “Citizenship and democratic quality. Recovering the dignity of politics”, the sixth volume in the collection Documents for Debate. The event took place at the Palau Macaya in Barcelona and brought together about 70 representatives of the Third Sector, political parties, unions and academia.
The starting point of the book is a reflection on the importance of protecting democratic coexistence in the current crisis (economic, social, institutional…).
The authors consider that the current political model that emerged in our country from the transition, which was launched in 1978, is exhausted and that new proposals must be formulated where democratic quality must be a central element and organized civil society and the Third Sector must play a leading role.
This document, which consists of 8 core ideas, has been prepared from contributions from people from different fields, who participated in various territorial debates.
Equality and democracy, ethics and politics
The presentation “Citizenship and democratic quality” began with Jaume Lanaspa, member of the Board of Trustees of the “la Caixa” Foundation, who focused his speech on one of the ideas that hovered throughout the event: democracy and iguatat must be vindulated. Later, Núria Valls, deputy director of Fundesplai, highlighted the reflection on the current moment of democracy that this work means and gave way to Joaquim Brugué, Professor of Political Science UAB, University of Girona and member of the IGOP (Institute of Government of Public Policies). Brugué gave a lecture where he marked different accents: the need for politics to recover values, the commitment to collective solutions over individual ones or the strengthening of active citizenship as an indispensable element for the construction of common projects.
In the second part of the roundtable, Enrique Arnanz, one of the writers of the book, opted for politics to put people back at the centre. “The priority of governments must be the people and not the risk premium,” he said, adding that consensus must be restored. Carles Barba, also editor of the book, closed the speeches of the round table by highlighting the conclusion of the document focused on calling for a great social pact to improve the quality of our democracy, especially in this year full of elections.
These interventions provoked a subsequent debate with different interventions, which agreed on the need to ask for changes in order to improve the quality of democracy.
Presentations also in Valencia, Bilbao, Madrid and Vigo
The book “Citizenship and democratic quality. Recovering the dignity of politics” will also be presented soon in Valencia (March 5), Bilbao (March 12), Madrid (March 17) and Vigo.
The collection Documents for Debate began in 2007 with the publication of the book “Education and Citizenship”, continued in 2008 with the second volume “Education, Citizenship and Immigration“, in 2010 with the third volume “Citizenship and globalization“, in 2011 with the fourth volume “Citizenship and Social Inclusion in 2013 with the fifth volume “Citizenship and NGOs” and culminates, so far, with this sixth title.