Share this page on
The Art of Civil Action Back

The Art of Civil Action

6 Nov 2017

A book in the Valiz Antenna-Arts in society series, edited by Pascal Gielen, professor Cultural Sociology at the University of Antwerp, and Philipp Dietachmaier, programme manager at ECF.

Civil society around the world increasingly deals with global questions and starts to assume transnational forms of organization. The arts can play a key role in addressing public and political problems, with their ability to project alternative realities and communicate ideas. Looking at different artistic platforms, activist groups and new forms of citizen initiatives, this book asks how cultural and art initiatives can question and strengthen the civil domain; how their approaches put the ‘art’ of civil action into practice? Which strategies and forms of organization can such initiatives use in order to sustain their activities and increase their local influence and global significance? Social scientists, cultural theorists, activists and artists explore how arts and culture can offer the building blocks for a locally rooted civil society in a globally connected context.

You can read the chapter “The civil potency of a singular experience” – a case study into the practises of Connected Action for the Commons hubs les Têtes de l’Art and Culture 2 Commons – by Pascal Gielen and Thijs Lijster online. Reviewed by Art Monthly.

Contributors: Andrew Barnett, Llorenç Bonet, llya Budraitskis, Giuliana Ciancio, Philipp Dietachmair, Milena Dragićević Šešić, Pascal Gielen, Max Haiven, Stefan Kaegi, Ivan Krastev, Thijs Lijster, Tomislav Medak, Borka Pavićević, Yudhishthir Raj Isar, Igor Stokfiszewski, Hakan Topal. Illustrations by Dan Perjovschi

Website by HOAX Amsterdam