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Luogo E Spazio, Place And Space: Gender Quotas And Democracy In Italy, Rachel A. Van Cleave

Publications

Space is power. Having a place, a seat, an ability to occupy a particular space can empower, in part by mere presence, but also by enabling a voice to be heard, to provide new perspectives, new ways of thinking and doing. Certainly, the recent Arab Uprisings' and the "Occupy" movement' took the forms they did, at least in part, because the participants understood the importance of physically occupying symbolically loaded spaces and places to promote political and social ideas and ideals. Conversely, exclusion from a place or "negative presence"' often has the effect of silencing and of marginalizing those who …