This article invites a rethinking of political subjectivity in democracy as fluid and transformative through engagement with queer theory and practice. Liberal democratic theory conceptualizes participants’ identities as stable and unitary, enabling representation and identity politics. However, this conceptualization inhibits individual democratic subjects from self-determining their identities, exploring their multiple selves, and engaging in self-transformation. Drawing on queer theory and practice, the article confronts this problem by foregrounding the collective and flexible dimensions of democratic subjectivity. By reviewing literature at the intersection of queer and democratic theory and substantiating its theoretical interpretation with interviews with queer activists and artists in urban Finland, the study reconceptualizes the democratic subject as constantly transforming. Through an abductive exchange between queer democratic theory and queer activist practice, it proposes two strategies: identity blurring through improper names and identity abolition through [ ]. The unspeakable concept of [ ] demarcates a space void of identity that is yet full of democratic freedom, challenging the contention that identity is a prerequisite for democratic engagement.
