ABSTRACT
Chapter 1 discusses the alternative forms of political participation literature, outlining the main concerns of the recent more critical literature. I begin by arguing that, while it is correct to posit that formal modes of political engagement have declined, such behaviour does not exhaust the political and that we must pay greater heed to alternative modes of political engagement. A discussion of ‘what is politics?’, its boundaries and what counts as ‘political’ provides the broader frame for this chapter, highlighting the importance of moving from ‘arena’ to ‘process’ definitions of politics. The discussion of the alternative forms of political participation literature emphasises two key distinctions which lay the ground for subsequent chapters in the book. First, how can we conceptualise the links between connective and collective action and online and offline ‘political’ activity; and, second, the relationship between duty norms and engagement norms and between project identities and opposition or legitimating identities. The chapter closes with a discussion of the putative rise of what Henrik Bang (2005, 2009, 2016; Bang and Sørensen, 2001) terms ‘the everyday maker’ (EM).
