Call for Papers: The Social Contract in Dispute: Discourse, Legitimacy and Transformation
Portugal
Organization: Centre for Social Studies, University of Coimbra; Universidade de Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro (UTAD)
28th International Meeting of Research and Investigation (EIRI) — The Social Contract in Dispute: Discourse, Legitimacy and Transformation
Living in a context of intense political tensions and polarisations that threaten the foundations of social organisation and democratic legitimacy, the 28th International Meeting of Research and Investigation (EIRI) is dedicated to reflecting on the social contract and its contemporary transformations. At a moment when democracy itself, human rights and international law are under threat, EIRI seeks to renew and motivate discussion on the reasons that political authority is legitimised by the interdependent relations between political subjects and governing authorities.
More than a static founding myth, the social contract can be understood as a dynamic, affective arrangement, continually renegotiated, contested and rewritten within political, legal, cultural, linguistic, literary and communicational practices. It is in and through discourse that the boundaries of inclusion and exclusion are produced, that narratives of legitimacy are constructed, and that the forms through which authority, protection and equality are conceived and reconfigured are established.
The meeting, organised by DLAC-UTAD, CES-UC and CEL-UTAD, is interdisciplinary in nature and welcomes individual paper proposals and closed panel proposals from the arts, humanities and social sciences, in Portuguese, Spanish and English.
Thematic areas: fictionality and the metaphor of the social contract; exclusions associated with gender, ethnicity, sexuality and class; affects and emotions in political legitimation; democracy, populism and radicalisation; media, disinformation and the digital public sphere; literature, cinema and the arts in the staging of the political bond; democratic constitutionalism and fundamental rights; among others.
Key dates:
Abstract submission: 20 June 2026
Notification of acceptance: 10 July 2026
Registration: 5 September 2026
Format: In person (ECHS, Polo I, UTAD, Vila Real) and Online. A hybrid format is not envisaged.
Registration fee: €50 (waived for DLAC, CES, CEL members and UTAD/CES students).
Submission: https://www.ces.uc.pt/ces/eventos/forms/eiri_2026/
Contact: eiri@utad.pt | www.eiri.pt
Manuel João Cruz