Keynote speakers
Mónica Brito Vieira
Professor at the Department of Politics and International Relations, University of York
Professor Brito Viera‘s research covers the history of political thought, contemporary political theory and intellectual history. In recent years, her research has focused on the history and theory of political representation. Besides many book chapters and journal papers, she is the author or co-author of several books, including The Elements of Representation in Hobbes: Aesthetics, Theatre, Law, and Theology in the Construction of Hobbes’s Theory of the State (Brill 2009); O Momento Constituinte: Os Direitos Sociais na Constituição (Edições Almedina 2010); Representation (Polity 2013); The Politics of the Book: A Study on the Materiality of Ideas (Penn State University Press 2019), and her latest work Democracy and the Politics of Silence (forthcoming from Penn State University Press 2024). She is also editor of the Reclaiming Representation: Contemporary Advances in the Theory of Political Representation (Routledge 2019).
Professor Brito Vieira’s keynote speech is entitled Representing Silence.
Paula Diehl
Professor of Political Theory, History of Ideas and Political Culture, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel
Professor Diehl’s research interests cover a wide area ranging from the history of ideas to political representation and populism. Besides many journal papers and book chapters, Professor Diehl is the author of the book Macht – Mythos – Utopie. Die Körperbilder der SS-Männer (Akademie Verlag 2005) and editor of Das Symbolische, das Imaginäre und die Demokratie. Eine Theorie politischer Repräsentation (Nomos Verlag 2015). She is also a co-editor of The Complexity of Populism: New Approaches and Methods (Routledge 2023).
Professor Diehl will present a keynote lecture When the Populist Far Right Plays with Politainment: Reflecting on political performances today.
Lisa Jane Disch
Professor at the Department of Political Science, University of Michigan
Professor Disch’s research interests include contemporary continental political thought, feminist theory, political ecology, theories of democracy, and theories of political representation. Apart from many papers published by the leading journals, Professor Disch is the author of three books: Hannah Arendt and the Limits of Philosophy (Cornell University Press, 1994); The Tyranny of the Two Party System (Columbia University 2002); and most recently Making Constituencies: Representation as Mobilization in Mass Democracy (University of Chicago Press 2021). She is also a co-editor of The Constructivist Turn in Political Representation (Edinburgh University Press, 2019) and The Oxford Handbook of Feminist Theory (Oxford University Press 2016).
Professor Disch’s keynote lecture is entitled Political Representation: Cause or cure for democracy’s discontent.
Sofia Näsström
Professor at the Department of Government, Uppsala Universitet
Professor Näsström is a political theorist mainly concerned with democratic theory and understanding democracy as a political lifeform. Aside from many journal studies, she is author of two books: The Spirit of Democracy: Corruption, Disintegration, Renewal (Oxford University Press 2021) and Demokrati. En liten bok om en stor sak (Historiska Media 2021), which received the Disa Prize for popular science writing. Currently, she is working on her new book entitled Democracy and the Social Question: Sharing Uncertainty in Uncertain Times (forthcoming from Cambridge University Press).
Professor Näsström will present a keynote speech entitled Democracy vs. Autocracy: Representation in a new key.