BALLOT ABSTENTEEISM AND PARTICIPATION TO PROTESTS: A NEW WAY OF POLITICAL PARTICIPATION IN ROMANIA.

Despite the progress registered by the Romanian political culture, the democratic balance remains fragile due to the low participation of citizens to the associative life and political decision, and in the same time, one can't yet rely on the fact that political actors position themselves impersonally towards the formal institutional practice. Romanian democracy frequently encounters challenges coming from the political actors - who tend to adjust the functioning mode of the consecrated democratic institutions and to treat rather personally the institutional processes. Nevertheless, during the past years, the Romanian democracy consumes itself on redefining the mode in which individuals exercise their citizen quality through political participation. Considering all the above, in the last two years, in Romania, we witnessed an increase of the citizens' political participation in the form of protests and ballot absenteeism, in the detriment of other forms of political participation. The protests, as social happenings, are already turning into social practice, although quite late in time, 24 years after the anticommunist Romanian revolution. In addition, the absenteeism is promoted with the occasion of electoral processes both by political and nongovernmental actors and by opinion leaders. Is Romania subscribing to a new European trend in what ballot absenteeism is concerned, while participating to protests? Are these the newest and the most notable elements in the grid of a consolidated democracy? Under what circumstances is the ballot absenteeism corroborated with the participation to protests contributing to the quality of democracy? Are there also other forms of political participation which could determine politicians to accept that the only legitimate preferences within the democratic institutional system are the citizens' and that consequently the governing should be tailored to their interests? The present paper analyses, in a first stage, the nature of political participation, its forms and instruments as well as the efficiency of their relation. Secondly, it aims at presenting a more substantial model for political participation, which could contribute to the change of perception in reference to the success of democracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]