Abstrakt
The intersection of participation and advertising can be considered one of the more difficult areas for participatory research, as it cannot benefit from the luxury of taken-for-grantedness that, for instance, political participation has. Research into this intersection exists but has not always used strongly developed theoretical frameworks on participatory intensities.
This text is grounded in extensive theoretical reflections about participation, using the so-called political studies approach towards participation, which defines participation as the redistribution of power in formal and informal decisionmaking processes. Moreover, also the distinction between participation in and participation through is used, in order to analyse a series of examples from the field of professional advertising and subvertising.
The text points, on the one hand, to the emphasis on interaction and minimalist participation in the subfield of professional advertising, and, on the other hand, to the more developed participatory intensities outside this subfield, when, for instance, activists make use of the repertoires of advertising to participate in other societal fields.