A message from the Director
Citizenship and democracy need us
Dear members of the Centre for the Study of Democratic Citizenship,
Last September, I accepted the invitation from the members of the Centre’s Steering Committee to lead our great team for the next three years. I have been a member since its creation in 2008. It is an unparalleled research infrastructure in Quebec, whose research program, scientific collaborations, and student training actively contribute to our society. However, I come to the helm of the CSDC with a sense of urgency.
First and foremost, I am driven by the urgent need to ensure the sustainability of the CSDC’s activities and its central role in training the next generation of scholars. Over the past 18 years, our team has built a dynamic and diverse scientific community whose work investigates democratic vitality and the exercise of citizenship. Our alumni have become professors, political reporters, government administrators, and politicians. They enrich the political and scientific life of Quebec, Canada, and many other nations around the world. It is primarily to carry out this core mission of our Centre that I am assuming its leadership. We must continue to offer our students cutting-edge methodological training and expose them to the diversity of theoretical and disciplinary perspectives that underpin our research program and allow us to study all facets and realities of democratic citizenship. This is our strength! Interdisciplinarity and a multi-method approach are at the heart of my work as a researcher, and these two principles must continue to ground our scientific training program.
Furthermore, I am driven by the urgency of the challenges and setbacks that threaten democracy and citizenship in Quebec and around the world. The CSDC was born in a context where the values that form the foundation of liberal representative democracies and the exercise of citizenship were recognized and respected by those who participated in the governance of these democracies. Over the past 15 years, citizens of Western democracies have been exposed to a rise in populist, extremist, and polarizing political discourses that divide them and question democratic principles. Politics is a competitive arena where debate, sometimes vindictive, between adversaries and criticism of each other’s records should be expected. However, in recent years, competition, debate, and criticism have morphed into coordinated attacks, incivility, harassment, and the dehumanization of opponents. These now-frequent rhetorical excesses are compounded by an informational environment transformed by the power of digital social media platforms, their algorithms, and artificial intelligence. These new resources, whose use for political purposes is unregulated in Canada, are actively being used by political parties and interest groups to exert targeted pressure on various segments of citizens, too often unbeknownst to them. Furthermore, although citizens are overexposed to political information, its veracity, quality, and usefulness in political decision-making raise concerns. The combination of these factors creates a radically different political context that collectively requires us to act as watchdogs. I want to share with you, dear members of the CSDC, the urgency I feel on this issue.
Our fellow citizens are seeking explanations and guidance in the face of this troubled and complex political world. They need us, our knowledge, our insights. I will encourage us, over the next three years, to work together to reach out to them as often as possible to provide answers and explanations. Let us work together on this front.
As I take over the leadership of the Centre, I am thinking of Elisabeth Gidengil, Dietlind Stolle, and Frédérick Bastien, my three predecessors in this role. Elisabeth, Dietlind, and Frédérick have done tremendous work over the past 18 years to develop and lead our team. I thank them for stepping forward before me to guide us and ensure the vitality of our research and training program. We owe them a great deal. Their efforts have been crucial to the CSDC. A very big thank you to all three of you!
I would also like to extend my warmest thanks to our coordinator, Wim Wolfs, who will be retiring next March. Wim has been the heart, memory and key player of the Centre since 2018. In a few days, we will be recruiting a new person to take over from Wim as coordinator. Wim will train this person before his departure. Thank you, Wim, for all the energy and professionalism you have brought to our team. On behalf of all the members, I wish you a happy retirement!
The Centre is thriving. Our finances are healthy. Our students are engaged. We work actively together. Our membership is growing. The CSDC is at the heart of a research environment whose many components study all aspects of democratic citizenship. The GRCP, the CAPP, la Chaire de recherche sur la démocratie et les institutions parlementaires, le Centre d’études sur les médias, LACPOP, la Chaire de recherche du Canada en éducation aux médias et droits humains, the Québec Chair on Democracy, Social Cohesion and Shared Values, and FODEM, among others, are partners of the CSDC or emerged from collaborations between CSDC members. I will ensure that our collaborations endure and multiply.
My arrival as Director of the Centre is, in a way, a homecoming for me. I’m returning to my roots. Our family has many new members whom I haven’t yet met. When I finish my term as Director of the Department of Political Science at Université Laval on July 1st, I will connect with you via videoconference, as well as in person at your departments and universities, to get to know you and catch up. Until then, I will try to join you as often as possible at Centre events in Montreal, Quebec City, and elsewhere. I look forward to your invitations.
I look forward to meeting and discussing this with you soon. If you have any questions, please feel free to email me at thierry.giasson@pol.ulaval.ca.
I wish you a very happy new year and a wonderful start to the winter!
Thierry Giasson