On Sep 07, 2024, an international workshop on Critical Reflections on Western Democracy organized by the Fudan Institute for Advanced Study in Social Sciences (Fudan IAS) and the Editorial Board of Chinese Political Chinese Review, was held in Fudan University. More than 20 scholars from China, the USA, UK, France, Australia, Austria etc. attended the workshop.

Prof. Sujian Guo, Dean and Distinguished Professor of Fudan IAS and Editor-in-Chief of Chinese Political Chinese Review (CPSR), delivered an opening speech. He first warmly welcomed all the scholars and introduced the organizer of the conference, Fudan IAS, and the co-sponsored journal CPSR. CPSR is one of the top journals in political science, with an impact factor of 3.4 in 2023, ranking Q1, and the papers of this conference will be published in a special issue of CPSR. The Global Justice Index research project, organized by Fudan IAS, has published the reports for five consecutive years. Prof. Guo further introduced the visiting scholars, full-time researchers and post-doctoral fellows of Fudan IAS, and expressed his expectation for in-depth and long-term academic exchanges with the participating scholars in the future.

The first session of the conference “Democracy in Crisis or to Be Reborn” chaired by Prof. Baogang He from Deakin University then started. Prof. John Dunn from the University of Cambridge talked on Crisis of Democracy or Crises in Democracies. Prof. Stephen Macedo from Princeton University spoke on Noble Lies? Elite Misinformation Under Covid.

The second session “One Democracy, Many Forms” chaired by Dr. Jean-Paul Gagnon from University of Canberra included two presentations: The Logic of Randomness: Can Lottery Democracy Truly Replace Electoral Democracy?）of Prof. Baogang He from Deakin University, and Liberal Consociationalism: An Oxymoron? of Prof. Matthijs Bogaards from Central European University.

Prof. Bogaards then chaired the third session “To Equal or Not to Equal, That Is the Question”. Dr. Jean-Paul Gagnon from the University of Canberra talked on A Democratic Polity Should Not Be Racist. Prof. Yascha Mounk from Johns Hopkins University spoke on The End of Equality.

In the fourth session “Democracy’s Failure and Fix” chaired by Prof. Yascha Mounk, Prof. Yves Schemeil from University of Grenoble made a presentation entitled When Democracy Bugs: Reset or Neglect?, and Dr. Weizhan Meng from Fudan IAS talked on The Depolarization in American Politics.

The last session of the conference is wrap-up roundtable discussions of the topic “Crises and Critics of Western Democracy: From Representation to Reflection”. Prof. Schemeil moderated this session, and participants discussed the major challenges facing Western-style democracy in today's international order, e. g. the privilege of the right to wealth, the rights of minorities, and the social conflicts arising from various socio-political infighting, and how we should respond to them.

After the roundtable discussions, Prof. Schemeil summarized the workshop. He thanked all the scholars for their reports, and said he was inspired by the presentations and discussions. The theme of the workshop is rich and profound, and it is worthwhile for all scholars to further explore the related areas. Finally, Prof. Sujian Guo, chair of the conference, thanked all the scholars again for their participation, and looked forward to the papers of all the scholars to be published soon after the review and revision. The conference ended with a warm applause from all the participants.