Inclusive Representation

International audienceThe standard opposition between political representation and participation is based on an exclusive conception of representation (excluding those represented). But a concept of representation that is inclusive can be understood, most notably through the history of representation before representative government succeeded in nineteenth-century France. Instead of preventing the direct participation of those represented, inclusive representation stimulates it. Inclusion through representation may first appear through the politicization of citizens, by their judging the action of representatives inside the institutions of representative government, or through the constructing of alternative representative devices outside these institutions. Inclusive representation may also specifically include dominated groups, inside or outside representative government institutions. Finally, inclusive representation may rest on processes of subjectivation, through which excluded social groups become political subjects