‘Parliament Buildings’ is a virtual conference and book exploring the architecture of power, accountability and democracy in Europe. This is the second online event of the conference, following the first event in November 2020.
In the face of ongoing political change, confidence in democracy is threatened, calling upon us to rethink our institutions and the buildings in which they are accommodated. Parliament buildings are the symbols and instruments of political life. They shape political culture and the space where the government is held to account; their architecture, history and rituals say a lot about norms of governance and behaviour. With the wide adoption of television coverage and social media, these buildings project political culture outward, changing the scale and speed of communication between citizens and the parliament.
The conference brings together contributions from architecture as well as from political science and political theory, history, law, geography and associated disciplines in the humanities and social sciences. It is part of a wider research project, supported by UCL’s Grand Challenges of Cultural Understanding (GCCU), which will result in a publication and a short film.
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