Contenu du sommaire : Photographie et film : antidotes à la domination politique ?

Photography and film : ambivalent power instruments
This article tackles the role of photography and film as mechanisms of redistribution of power, an important stake for experiences of institutionalized participation and social movements. It shows that these images can be used as power instruments but are ambivalent : in the hands of elites, they enhance their power ; when used by dominated social groups, they contribute to subvert social or political hierarchies. The article starts with a review of the literature, emphasizing two ways of using photography and film in participation processes : making the invisible visible and serving as means of identification. This allows discussing the use of these images in a scientific context.

Supporting political mobilization through images. Contentious photography in Yemen
Revisiting the initial period of the contentious mobilizations initiated in 2011 in Yemen, this contribution undertakes a visual narrative reconstruction of a « revolutionary » process of political change through the work of politically committed photographers. Analyzing contentious politics through the production of photographers who camp in an occupied space to protest, allows stressing the use of visual resources against domination. Studying the intersection between space, photography and contentious politics, this article questions the uses of photography as a support to the protest and as a device of political awareness.

When activists mobilize images in Moscow : communication or participation ?
Nowadays video cameras and other digital devices are widely used in Russia as it is elsewhere. Activists can shoot their actions and report the events on the Internet, although mainstream media don't provide any coverage or only a bad one. Analysing the production, the film grammar and the use of images produced by activists who campaigned against the project of a freeway passing through the nearby Khimki forest, in the Moscow outskirts, this article explores the advantages and limits of this digital visual voice for political action and protest groups in Russia.

Radical movies for the dominated of the social field in the post Mai‑68 era (1967‑1980)
A specific genre of activist movies was established after Mai‑68 in France. Dominated within the field of cinema, it focused on a wide range of struggles during the decade. It displayed those that TV and movies were keeping out of sight, those who were dominated within the social field : workers, peasants, women, homosexuals, migrants, etc. It gave them a face and the right to speak up, it supported and promoted their causes. Although it was deemed spontaneous and unachieved, it entailed a real esthetic based upon specific patterns, a radical style, and expressed in its very form the necessity of mobilization.

Making citizens' voice heard. An analysis based on two films about a citizen's panel on water management. This article investigates how an audiovisual tool can be used as an original feedback instrument for a participatory experience. It explores the use of two films during a citizens' panel on water management : an “institutional” film and a research film. Attention is drawn to what the process of “putting into film” does to the citizens' voice. The article also explores the use of film as a support for actors' reflexivity on their own practices. This analysis takes place in a broader reflection on the role of films in the (re)definition of the power relationships at work in participatory processes.

Photography and Film in urban participatory projects : editing and showing the image of an active resident ?Urban projects deal with a profusion of visual media representation to make people participate. If residents are firstly “expected” for and reckoned with their local knowledge, photo and video convey much more forms of knowledge. They therefore contribute to produce and show a different image of the residents. Both media aim at fostering the fairness of debates and contributing to an equal access to public speech. They show both the individual and collective nature of participatory processes. While residents are engaged as individuals, they are however rarely invited to share the “editing” of the collective (visual and social) representations produced by photo and video.

“Mini‑public” procedures and water: an undrinkable couple? Deliberation between spontaneity, concession, sliding and discussion“Mini‑public” procedures often result in the production of a “citizen recommendation”, supposed to enlighten public decisions. What is the manufacturing of such a recommendation ? Is deliberation really happening in such initiatives ? Based on the study of a mini‑public dealing with the governance of a drinking water administration, our ethnographic study questions the normative bases of deliberation. It describes the uncertain trajectory of recommendations registered in the final report in order to sketch the outlines of an operating criteriology of collective productions in such procedures.