Democracy and agonism in the face of the climate crisis: in search of irruptive collaborative governancen

Abstract

The challenges of the new millennium make it essential to establish synergies between the instituting and institutional spaces that are trying to further democracy. From this standpoint, it is necessary to analyse the improvement of democracy made by the irruptive contributions of social movements. This article presents and exemplifies a new model of governance, that of irruptive governance, which aspires to enable protestors and institutional spaces to feed into each other in fuller democracy. Based on a specific example, it shows that environmental movements in the French Basque Country are managing to determine, oversee and improve municipal strategies aimed at mitigating the climate crisis. It concludes by suggesting that the collaboration of universities promoting participatory action research strategies can bring about synergies between irruptive and institutional actors, supporting the search for a choreography that allows agonism and democracy to work in harmony.