Imagined democracies2012
necessary political fictions
by Yaron Ezrahi
"In our era of mass electronic communications, political realities are produced by believable fictions that echo popular desires. Hence the pressing question facing contemporary democracies is how to privilege the performance of political fictions that promote peace and welfare rather than violence and poverty"--
"This book proposes a revisionist approach to democratic politics. Yaron Ezrahi focuses on the creative unconscious collective imagination that generates ever-changing visions of legitimate power and authority, which compete for enactment and institutionalization in the political arena. If, in the past, political authority was grounded in fictions such as the divine right of kings, the laws of nature, historical determinism, and scientism, today the space of democratic politics...