Uma revolução tranquila
( Orçamentos participativos numa perspectiva portuguesa )

Pierre Stoeber
2014 - 42 min - HDV - France

The documentary by Pierre Stoeber and Giovanni Allegretti relates to the "Optar" project, an action-research that the Centre of Social Studies of Coimbra University conducted between 2010 and 2013. Its aim is to give the floor to politicians, civil servants, researchers and citizens involved in co-deciding on municipal resources, so to help to define the concept of Participatory Budgeting, clarify its positive challenges and some contradictions or fragilities detected during the last decade of experiments travelling around the world.
Portugal - the country in Europe with the higher rate of experiments - is taken as a metaphoric place to test some of these challenges and fragilities, using data and outcomes of the project, although voices and images from different continents mix in the documentary. The ambition of this medium-length film is to show how much important emotions are in making PB functioning, and how much these small experiments, although often limited to local contexts, are important to qualify and intensify our democratic regimes.