DECIDE DECIDIM: RECURSIVE PRACTICES FOR A PARTICIPATORY DEMOCRACY

Abstract

Decidim is a pioneering platform that can be defined as a digital infrastructure for participatory democracy. It is an initiative built entirely collaboratively with free and configurable software to be used as a political network for democratic participation. However, the characteristic that makes the study of the Decidim platform even more stimulating is that its governance is organized around MetaDecidim: a meeting space, a process, and a participatory community oriented toward collaboratively and democratically deciding, designing, and producing multiple aspects of the project’s future. In this article, I address the study of Decidim as an example of how currently widespread extractivist practices can be transcended through a free software-based tool for participatory democratic practices. First, I discuss issues such as its definition, how it emerged, how it works, and what possibilities it offers for stimulating our collective intelligence with the aim of overcoming those dead zones of imagination to which current bureaucratic mechanisms generally lead us.