What Grounds for Representing the People? An Analysis of Post-Communist Romania through the Lens of Discourse Theory
What Grounds for Representing the People? An Analysis of Post-Communist Romania through the Lens of Discourse Theory

Summary/Abstract: Using the methodology of discourse theory, this chapter aims to analyse how Romanian society evolved after 1989 with special regard to the tension between direct and representative democracy. The author’s main hypothesis is that in time the absence of the demos from the actual decision-making process fuelled a rhetoric based on direct democracy, and that beginning in 2004 that rhetoric succeeded in establishing itself as a hegemonic discourse. To test the hypothesis, the author uses the logical framework of discourse theory, analysing the constitutive modalities of the rhetoric about democracy and the people, paying close attention to the tensions that have arisen between direct and representative democracy and charting the sociocultural background of those tensions. He uses the methodological arsenal of discourse theory, focusing on its five key arguments. Finally, he suggests a series of preliminary conclusions derived from his analysis.

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