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There have been long-standing discussions of “participation” in political theory. So, what ideas from this literature do we think might be useful for discussing the “participatory turn” in contemporary culture? To what degree has the rise of networked computing encouraged us to reimagine the public sphere? If we can move this discussion beyond established frames, such as “Twitter revolutions” or “slactivism,” what meaningful claims can we make about the ways that expanding access to the means of media production and circulation has impacted the available political identities, tactics, and discourses? Has the expansion of communicative capacity impacted the range of political options available to groups that have historically been disenfranchised from political elites and institutionalized politics? What obstacles have blocked the full achievement of the promises of a more participatory culture?