Counter-professionalization mechanisms: four procedures for social inclusion in participatory institutions

(Suitable for panel 11). Recently, scholars have focused on the social inclusion of participatory institutions. In many cases, people with technical occupations and academic credentials are the dominant profiles as in other areas of institutional politics. In this regard, some researchers have paid attention to the class background of participants and the mechanisms which hamper the disadvantaged groups’ involvement (Wampler, 2007; Jacquet, 2017; Pape & Lim, 2019). Other studies concentrate in the mechanisms for inclusion (Hernández-Medina, 2010). Here, we go further in this perspective and explore the performance of formal and informal devices for social inclusion. Our argument deals with "contra-professionalization mechanisms" as they are formal or informal procedures which make the involvement accessible to manual workers and farmers, who are not the "usual suspects" of institutional politics. This piece is based on an ethnographic study in the rural Basque Country (Spain) where more than 320 villages are governed by assemblies like town meetings. Despite the singularity of the case, it is extremely useful to examine how social inclusion mechanisms make participation accessible and significant for manual workers and farmers. Specifically, four inclusion mechanisms are described: a) official permissions for participation (work leaves); b) mix-occupational boards for the direction of assemblies; c) valorization devices for manual-work skills; and d) assistance bodies to manage complex bureaucratic tasks. These devices and their performance are theorized.