Altman Book on Direct Democracy to Launch in Santiago
Direct Democracy Worldwide, a new book by former Kellogg Institute graduate student and guest scholar David Altman, will be launched on Tuesday, September 13 at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile in Santiago. A distinguished panel of scholars will comment on the work.
Published by Cambridge University Press, the book challenges the common assumption that models of direct democracy and representative democracy are necessarily at odds. According to Altman, direct democracy, properly designed, can empower citizens, breaking through some of the institutionalized barriers to accountability that arise in representative systems.
Altman received his PhD in political science from the University of Notre Dame and is associate professor of political science at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. Born in Uruguay, he works on comparative politics with an emphasis on the quality of democratic institutions, mechanisms of direct democracy, and executive-legislative relations.
“Without all my years at Notre Dame, I would not have been able to write this book,” he says. “Both Notre Dame and the Kellogg Institute serve as an inspiration of how to make an institution of real human beings.”
Presenting at the book launch will be Lucas Sierra, Centro de Estudios Públicos, and Carlos Peña, Universidad Diego Portales, Chile, and Daniel Buquet, Universidad de la Republica, Uruguay. Friends of the Kellogg Institute in Chile are welcome to attend.
