These notes present and discuss the theoretical and research background of the articles included in this Section of the journal. The research carried out on the European activation policies being developed in Amartya Sen’s capability perspective (in the framework of the European project «Capright») provides the analytical field for exploring the knowledge and information bases of these policies, and for highlighting their normative dimension. The conceptual framework of the research on Sen’s «informational basis of judgment in justice» is sketched out, and several crucial questions on the connections between knowledge and democracy are raised and discussed. If and how the «capability for voice» of citizens – and particularly of recipients-citizens - counts in the processes of public knowledge building and enacting, proves to be a focal point to inquiring whether democracy is being nourished or endangered in these processes. only subscribers can see the full article