Project description
Slow-motion democracy in a fast-moving world
The increasing speed of technological, social, and economic change is testing democracy. Citizens want quick policy solutions, but democratic institutions find it hard to keep up. This creates a dilemma: speed up decision-making and risk ignoring democratic procedures, or maintain democratic norms at the expense of effectiveness. Either option could weaken public trust. The ERC-funded SLOMODEMO project aims to study how social acceleration impacts democracy’s ability to solve problems. It will combine theory and real-world research across eight liberal democracies. The project measures social acceleration. It will also look at its disruptive effects and examine the trade-offs that citizens and politicians face. The findings are intended to help governments, institutions, and citizens build a more effective and legitimate democracy.
Objective
Social acceleration – the progressively faster rate of technological, social, and life-pace change – has created a challenge for democratic problem solving. The demand for rapid and effective policy solutions is ever-increasing, while democratic politics often fails to keep up with urgent calls for intervention. We live in a high-speed society that is governed by a slow-motion democracy. This poses a fundamental dilemma for democratic problem solving: speed up decision making by circumventing democratic procedures, or hold on to slow procedures at the cost of effective problem solving. Either option could further erode public trust in liberal democracy, whose legitimacy relies on its ability to solve problems democratically and effectively.
To address this challenge, SLOMODEMO advances a new theoretical and empirical research agenda to understand how and under what conditions social acceleration is negatively affecting liberal democracy’s capacity to legitimately solve problems. The project reconceptualizes liberal democracy as a problem-solving system, advances the theory and empirics of social acceleration, and offers cross-national and over-time studies of eight liberal democracies. This innovative approach enables key contributions on:
- the measurement of the extent of social acceleration
- social acceleration’s disruptive effects on liberal-democratic institutions and lawmaking
- when and why citizens and politicians prioritize fast problem solving over democratic processes and the trade-offs they make
- the strategies governments employ to cope with the dilemma for democratic problem solving and to what effect
SLOMODEMO provides new theoretical and empirical knowledge and offers valuable insights for policymakers, institutions, and citizens alike, offering a path forward in solving a critical challenge for our time: how to obtain a legitimate balance between democratic procedures and effective problem solving amidst rapid change.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- social sciences political sciences government systems democracy
- social sciences sociology social issues
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Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC)
MAIN PROGRAMME
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Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC Grants
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2024-ADG
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
8000 Aarhus C
Denmark
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.