En Clave Democrática, Teve Ciudad
En Clave Democrática was a 12-part television series produced by Florencia Melgar for Tevé Ciudad in collaboration with the Organization of American States (OAS/OEA). Created in 2005, the program brought some of the major democratic, political and social debates taking place across the Americas to Uruguayan public television.
The series was based on the OAS Cátedras de las Américas, a program of lectures by prominent international political figures, academics and thinkers examining the challenges confronting democracy across the region.
Rather than simply broadcasting those lectures, En Clave Democrática used them as the starting point for a locally produced television discussion. Each episode selected key sections from an international lecture and brought together two Uruguayan specialists with presenter and journalist Joel Rosenberg to interrogate the ideas, provide context and examine their relevance to Uruguay and the wider region.
Across its 12 episodes, the program explored questions including democracy and democratic institutions, human rights, freedom of expression, poverty and marginalisation, regional and hemispheric integration, international justice and the strengthening of democracy.
The inaugural program was built around former US President Jimmy Carter's lecture, The Promise and Perils of Democracy, with historian Carlos Demasi and political scientist Gerardo Caetano joining the studio discussion. Other episodes continued the format of connecting international ideas and debates with Uruguayan expertise and perspectives.
At its core, En Clave Democrática was an exercise in public-interest television and democratic dialogue: taking complex international debates beyond institutional and academic settings and translating them into an accessible television format in which different perspectives could be examined, challenged and discussed.
The series was broadcast on Tevé Ciudad, Montevideo's public television channel, throughout the final months of 2005, with programs also made available online — at a time when distributing television content digitally was still at an early stage.
Presenter: Joel Rosenberg
Producer: Florencia Melgar
12 television programs · Tevé Ciudad · Montevideo, Uruguay · 2005
In collaboration with the Organization of American States (OAS/OEA)