Schools of Democracy: How Ordinary Citizens (Sometimes) Become Competent in Participatory Budgeting Institutions

Julien Talpin is a research fellow at the French National Scientific Research Center (CNRS), professor of politics at the University of Lille 2. His research deals with the study of deliberative democracy from below, aiming at understanding how participatory experiences are lived by actors and shape their political and personal careers. He is currently investigating the conditions of inclusion of poor people and minorities in participatory processes in Europe and the US. He is co-editor of the French-speaking journal Participations. He has recently published Schools of Democracy: How Ordinary Citizens (Sometimes) Become Competent in Participatory Budgeting Institutions, Colchester, ECPR Press, 2011; ’What can ethnography bring to the study of deliberative democracy? Evidence from the study on the impact of participation on actors’, Revista International de Sociologia, 70 (2), 2012; ’When deliberation happens. Evaluating discursive interactions among ordinary citizens’, in B. Geißel, M. Joas, (eds.) Participatory Democratic Innovations in Europe: Improving the Quality of Democracy? Berlin/Toronto, Burdeish Publishers, 2013.