Democracy "from below": Elections and citizen participation in the political imaginary

The discussion about the democratic itinerary in Argentina is a central topic in political science. As a case in point, beginning with the 2001 political debacle, citizenry participation recovered its importance vis-a-vis the conversations being carried on with regards to democratic quality. Theoretical reconstructions on this topic, as well as historical ones, open up new alternatives and questions. Our goal has been to compare and contrast those constructions as samples of the political imaginary, reconstructed through an analysis of the electoral process. Using social psychology categories, we have reconstructed the principles of the citizens' electoral practices, the events on which those practices depend, tracing a line for interpreting the current condition of the citizenry. We have conclude that it is possible to observe a strengthening of the tendency to privilege civil society as a space for citizen participation, as well as the paradoxical continuation of the delegation of political responsibility in the governing class. The processes of atomization of old party and ideological identities have opened up the space for discussion and for personal options, expressed through possible civil actions, but they do not yet reflect the possibility of the citizens thinking of themselves as political subjects with communal projects.