Linnaeus Knowledge Environment: A Questioned Democracy

The free world is facing its greatest challenge since the fall of the Berlin wall: the questioning of liberal democracy. The purpose of the knowledge environment A Questioned Democracy is to tackle this societal challenge – to make sure that one of humanity’s greatest achievements, democracy, lives on.

Societal challenge: A questioned democracy

What is a Linnaeus Knowledge Environment?

Addressing today’s societal challenges requires broad knowledge and interdisciplinary collaboration. This is why Linnaeus University brings together prominent and innovative research, education, and collaboration in what we call knowledge environments.

Our Linnaeus Knowledge Environments work across disciplines to take a multifaceted approach to the societal challenges in their respective fields.

Read more about Linnaeus Knowledge Environments

Liberal democracy is a common foundation for many countries. However, its ability to handle problems in society challenges is being increasingly questioned. More and more countries are moving in an undemocratic direction. Authoritarian values and parties are gaining ground. Alternative news outlets are challenging journalism of quality. Technology open ups for democratic interaction, but also makes it easy to spread fake news.

The vision for the knowledge environment A Questioned Democracy is to contribute with ideas, meeting places, and new knowledge to meet the challenges the Swedish democracy is facing today, with the aim to make democratic values more well-anchored among the citizens.

Learn more about our research, courses and programmes, and collaboration below.

Current

Call for chapter proposals: The book Everyday Democracy – building resilience against polarization and radicalization

Two hands, each holding a megaphone pointing to each other

Everyday Democracy is a book that invites researchers and practitioners to explore various aspects of the everyday doing of democracy, especially in relation to being able to detect and prevent polarisation and radicalisation. Deadline for extended abstracts is 22 November 2024. Learn more about the book and the time plan at the project's website.

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Research

The knowledge environment A Questioned Democracy departs its extensive research from three central perspectives: representation, media, and citizen.

  • The representation perspective: Increased polarization and support for authoritarian values; problems of representation, for example antagonism between decision-makers and citizens and corruption.
  • The media perspective: The conditions for public dialogue and the reporting of political news.
  • The citizen perspective: Alienation and economic vulnerability as obstacles to inclusion in society and participation in the democracy.

Education

The researchers that take part in A questioned democracy are active teachers who integrate their research in their teaching at Linnaeus University. On all academic levels, the teachers from the knowledge environment have developed new and revised established courses that problematise a questioned democracy. In connection to our students’ internships we collaborate with authorities and companies.

Collaboration

The knowledge environment A questioned democracy has a strong tradition of collaboration with the surrounding society in the form of civil society, authorities and companies.

Management team

Magnus Hagevi is manager for A Questioned Democracy.