On Friday 8 March 2024, Insurgent Spatial Practices researcher Dalia Milián Bernal will be participating on a panel discussion regarding current forms of citizen activism! Welcome. The panel discussion is organised by the Democracy Research Network within the framework of the Tampere Film Festival.
Citizen activism can be understood as part of civil action. Activism, however, is about action, which does not require institutional frameworks, but can organise itself around issues that are considered important. What begins as experience and observing one’s surroundings, can change into willingness to affect what one sees around themselves. In different times and places different types of issues raise people’s attention and stir them into action.
Some themes of citizen activism feel relatively permanent; student activism, feminist movements and movements around the issues of indigenous peoples and ethnic minorities have established their positions during decades of action. Today the LGBTQ movement and climate activism have also established their own positions. Some forms of activism are more strongly tied to particular time and place, such as demonstrations about regional politics and those opposing wars.
In the Citizen Activism Panel Discussion, we will talk about what drives people today to take action in the field of citizen activism. What does modern day activism look like? Has the megaphone activism that takes over the streets been replaced by the effective activism of the new age, that utilises visual and digital media?
Moderator: Matias Heikkilä, University of Tampere
Panel:
- Jouko Aaltonen, documentarist
- Vilma Rimpelä, CEO of RARE Media
- Lauri Lahikainen, postdoctoral researcher
- Dalia Milián Bernal, doctoral researcher
Note also the screening attached to the discussion: Democrazy in Danger 2: Citizens in action