A revolution in representation? Insider perspectives on a failed democratic experiment

Résumé :

The Movimento Cinque Stelle (M5S) proposed an original vision of how the representative link could be redesigned. This vision had three key components: the direct, unmediated connection between representatives and their electoral basis; the popular approval and revocability of elected representatives; and the opening of the decision-making process to members of the movement. In this article, we take seriously the conceptions of the initiators and of the activists on the renovation of the representative link, before examining why they failed to materialize in practice. As such, it constitutes a real-life experiment allowing to understand the motivations and difficulties faced by movement parties aiming to renovate political representation With this exercise of grounded political theory, relying on interviews with M5S activists, we reach the conclusion that if one tries to get rid of the party form before having built an alternative structure capable of aggregating citizens' demands, maintaining a link with activists on the ground over time, while leaving room for a certain degree of internal pluralism, one risks ending up with something worse than traditional parties: a mere sound box, empty on the inside to amplify the voice of the leaders. But we also discover that an alternative, more emancipatory trajectory was possible.