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AbstractThis paper advocates for an extension of citizens' participation and civic deliberation. It draws from recent experiences of participatory democracy at the municipal level, whether they are the product of public consultation or of citizens' mobilization. It also emphasizes the importance of developing a culture of public deliberation both to enlarge civic participation, including that of politically marginalized persons and groups, and as a politicization device. It then delineates some conditions to render public deliberation really inclusive. It concludes by evaluating the contribution of various experiences such as Montreal's Citizens Summits or the Forum social québécois to such a culture of public deliberation.

ABSTRACTIn Sweden, family policy is presented as a policy of prevention and social integration based on principles of equity and social justice. It prioritizes protection of the child, with the objective being not to encourage the birth of more children (although the decline in the fertility rate has been stemmed since 1990), but to provide favourable conditions for their blossoming and integration. This approach has prompted the development of child care facilities and measures enabling parents to reconcile work and family life. The growing use of parental leave by fathers is reinforcing, in both behaviours and attitudes, a more equal assumption of family responsibilities by men and women, in society and in the family. This trend has not been affected by the economic recession, which is increasingly underscoring how family policies are linked to employment policies and measures regulating the labour market.

The French law respecting the financing of the political life appeared for the first time in 1988. Step by step, it has become a complex and demanding law towards candidates, political parties, and public decision-makers. Transparency has become a reality. However, French reformers are simultaneously minimalist in some sectors. The external transparency (i.e. which benefits to citizens) is, in France, globally weak. This situation maintains a lack of transparency in certain areas that it is damaging the improvement of the relationships between citizens and statesmen.

Based on the results of a survey of volunteers involved in the organization Unis-Cité in 2008-2009, this article aims to analyze the contribution of French voluntary civil service on political socialization of young people. After presenting the outlines of their political experience prior to their civil service, it will present this public instrument and, in particular, identify factors that influence the volunteers' representations, knowledge, and citizen practices. Finally, it will measure the effects of this experience on these dimensions.

Through the case of English language teaching policies, this article seeks to identify factors that would explain how the same change in public policy produces diverging outcomes in different national contexts. Combining public policy and political sociology approaches, it shows how in the case of transsectorial policy issues, the political system's responsiveness to contradictory demands expressed by its publics may lead to the inefficiency of state action. Through the analysis of the limits of governing languages, the article thus raises the more general question of the link between democracy and public policy. The demonstration builds on a comparative framework replacing the French case in a European context before confronting it to the German case through a most similar research design.

Keywords: politique des langues, citoyenneté, France, effets de l'action publique, analyse comparée, language policy, citizenship, France, public policy effects, comparative analysis

Citizen audit is about investigating, as citizens, local public finances and holding elected officials and decision-makers to account. By studying the trajectories of activists engaging in this practice in France, Spain, and Belgium, this article contends that dissatisfaction with existing representative institutions does not necessarily lead to political apathy or to the delegitimisation of representative democracy. The aim of the paper is to contribute to the literature on critical political judgments. It highlights the critical dispositions of the activists, embedded in social trajectories, and how it gives rise to a yet unconsidered political imaginary: the will to democratise representative democracy through popular control over political representatives. Subsequently, such critical judgments are put into perspective with a repertoire of practices operationalising the control of citizens over powerholders and elected officials. It helps to overcome the idealistic bias of the literature on democratic imaginaries, while helping to shed light on modes of action and citizen participation that are little taken into account in scholarship on collective action.

Keywords: audit citoyen, citoyen-contrôleur, citoyenne-contrôleuse, contrôle citoyen, démocratisation, lien représentatif, action collective, militantisme, France, Espagne, Belgique, citizen audit, citizen-monitor, citizen monitoring, democratisation, representative democracy, collective action, France, Spain, Belgium

In 2003, the Québec Ministry of Education issued a policy on the assessment of learning in schools. It then became necessary to consider the pedagogical approaches underpinning the new curriculum (including social constructivism), the skill organization mode, the reorganization of the curriculum based on the cycle concept, and the redefinition of the roles of various actors. Ten years and many questions later, some inconsistencies have appeared between the policy's practices and guidelines. We observe that the policy was deployed with the support of complementary documents and amendments to the regulations that clarify it and sometimes reduce its scope.

In this study we examine citizen engagement in Mali. We begin by discussing the concept of civil society associated with such engagement. We then draw on two sources of data (the 2006 light integrated household survey [ELIM] and the national election administrative reports) to analyse involvement in political and community life. The results show that even if most Malians have already taken part in political activities, only a small minority has actually ever voted, which is a crucial form of political participation. Another finding that raises questions is that the advantaged social groups are those that participate more in political activities, whereas the less advantaged are more likely to become involved in community life through associations. Lastly, participation in associations seems to encourage political participation, most probably because community involvement can awaken political consciousness, but also no doubt because involvement in associations can help increase one's political influence.