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Contemporary theatre does often incorporate elements of participatory art, where spectators are usually participants or even co-creators of the performance. The theatremakers are freeing the spectator from his passive position and are delegating part of the responsibility of the pieces´s final form on him. It could look like the third theatre reform is coming: after the director and the space, the spectator is freed and activated. However Jacques Ranciére explains in the Emancipated Spectator why preserving the position of spectator is important. Claire Bishop states in Artificial Hells that the willingness to participate is just another level of passivity, because it requires submitting to artist´s will. Contemporary society desires authenticity and uses participation as a false substitute: voting in reality shows, liking on social networks, sharing subjective opinions with the whole world. These are signs of spectacularity which has replaced performativity: people are revealing their lives on social networks but are afraid to talk to strangers on the street. The limits of participation as means to activate spectator will be explored on specific examples of contemporary theatre performances from several European countries in the context of Nicolas Bourriaud´s Relational Aesthetics.