Citizen participation matters. Bureaucratic discretion matters more

New Public Governance theory increases citizen participation and expands bureaucrats' roles in the work of government. Citizen participation creates new mechanisms for citizens to influence the policy process. Bureaucrats' expanded roles allow for broader bureaucratic discretion over policy implementation. When citizens' and bureaucrats' views on public management decisions collide, whose views prevail? Do citizen volunteers or bureaucrats have greater influence over public decisions? We answer this question by studying the U.S. Department of Energy's initiative to engage citizens in environmental clean-up decisions. We assess 10 years of meeting records and administrative decisions using a three-step, mixed-method analysis to identify, weigh, and test the influence of citizen participation and bureaucratic discretion. The results indicate that while citizen participation matters, bureaucratic discretion has a more significant influence over administrative decision-making. The findings expose holes in New Public Governance theory, which has implications for democracy and demands deeper thought into structuring citizen participation.     

Examining Citizen Participation: Local Participatory Policy Making and Democracy

Citizen participation is usually seen as a vital aspect of democracy. Many theorists claim that citizen participation has positive effects on the quality of democracy. This article examines the probability of these claims for local participatory policymaking projects in two municipalities in the Netherlands. The article focuses on the relations between citizens and government from a citizens' perspective. The findings show that the role of citizens in these projects is limited, serving mainly to provide information on the basis of which the government then makes decisions. Nevertheless, the article argues that citizen involvement has a number of positive effects on democracy: not only do people consequently feel more responsibility for public matters, it increases public engagement, encourages people to listen to a diversity of opinions, and contributes to a higher degree of legitimacy of decisions. One negative effect is that not all relevant groups and interests are represented. The article concludes that for a healthy democracy at the local level, aspects of democratic citizenship are more important than having a direct say in decision-making.     

From Innovation to Convention: Legitimate Citizen Participation in Local Governance

In governance structure legitimacy is required not only of the governing system, local authorities or public organisations but also of other participants, including citizens. The legitimacy cannot be judged either by traditions of representative democracy or by innovative theories of deliberative or participatory democracy. The article analyses scientific publications on citizen participation in local governance. It asks how empirical studies on local sustainable development planning (SDP) and New Public Management (NPM) practices construct legitimate citizen participation. In general, studies on citizen participation have not conceptualised the relations between citizens and power holders as questions of legitimacy. However, the studies approaching citizen participation in the local processes of SDP and NPM include various empirical, theoretical and normative arguments for citizen participation. These arguments recognise, accept and support particular activities, arguments and outcomes of citizen participation, and include and exclude agents and issues. They construct and reflect the definition of legitimacy in the local governance. As constructed by scientific texts, justifications for citizen participation reproduce a discursive structure in which citizen participation becomes marginalised and citizens’ views excluded. The results illustrate that discursive structures of legitimate citizen participation support conventional governing practices and hinder innovative practices in local governance.     

Citizen participation and the redistribution of public goods

This study investigates whether citizen participation in public budgeting resulted in increased redistributive outcomes when compared with bureaucratic decision‐making. We focused on a specific budget item (i.e., the installation of surveillance cameras for crime prevention) and examined whether participatory budgeting yielded larger budget allocations to low‐income neighbourhoods. Results indicate that such participatory budgeting results in larger budget allocations for low‐income neighbourhoods when compared with allocations produced by bureaucratic budgeting practices. The results also indicate that budgets allocated through citizen participation may be no more or even less effective for advancing public goals. These findings suggest a potential trade‐off between equity and public service effectiveness. Citizen participation improves budget equity, but may be less effective for achieving public goals than bureaucratic decision‐making. To explain this, we offer the ‘social pressure hypothesis’, which posits that social pressure during public‐forum discussions can influence participating citizens to make redistributive decisions.     

Deconstructing the multi-layered nature of citizen participation in Vietnam: conceptual connotations,discourses of international development,and the country’s institutional context

ABSTRACT

Citizen participation is challenging to define in terms of meaning and application. This article begins with setting out the multi-dimensional nature of citizen participation in development. Through conceptual and contextual explorations, this article deconstructs the layers in the following ways: First, citizen participation is embedded with several conceptual connotations, therefore it is manifested to varying degrees and in different scopes of opportunity for citizens to affect policy decisions. Varieties of participation become more diverse when it comes to the power dynamics of different stakeholders, ranging from the government to citizens. Furthermore, its substantive presentation is intimately linked with the variables of citizen empowerment and government responsiveness. The second layer concerns the participatory development approaches of external development agencies. This article articulates how development discourses have integrated and developed the concept of participation, exploring the trajectory and critical concerns raised. The final layer concerns context, particularly Vietnam’s legal and policy frameworks, which explores consistencies and discrepancies between institutional settings and the presentation of citizen participation.     

Citizen Participation in Public Administration: Views from Lebanon

This article examines citizen participation in Lebanon. Specifically, we apply the International Association for Public Participation Spectrum of Public Participation (2007) and use survey, interview, and archival data to understand how and why Lebanese government agencies use citizen participation. In addition to reviewing survey data, we present short cases about citizen participation in the three Lebanese agencies. Our findings indicate that the majority of public agencies in Lebanon use basic forms of citizen participation that span the inform-consult categories on the IAP2 spectrum. The article concludes with a discussion about the challenges of and prospects for citizen participation in the Lebanese public sector.     

Implementing Electronic Notification in Los Angeles: Citizen Participation Politics by Other Means

Abstract

This paper considers whether new information and communication technologies have significant effects on citizen participation by evaluating the development of a major innovation in electronic governance. We analyze the creation of an electronic system in Los Angeles to provide stakeholders a warning of upcoming political decisions and an opportunity to furnish feedback. We evaluate this innovation not only as a technological innovation that affects citizens’ capacity and motivation for participation but also as an alternative institutional means for involving citizens in policy making and public administration. To place this experiment within this larger institutional perspective, we draw upon the lessons of historical reforms aimed to expand citizen participation. We find that although technology does positively affect individuals’ capacity and motivations, technology, by itself, does not overcome the political, institutional, and behavioral impediments that have limited previous participatory reforms.     

The Contradictory Effects in Efficiency and Citizens’ Participation when Employing Geo-ICT Apps within Local Government

Abstract

With the increasing use of web-based mapping applications, inter-mediation between public planning agencies and citizens is changing. This article investigates how one form of inter-mediation, geo-ICT-enabled apps (applications on mobile phones and/or internet that use maps or locations as basic references for any functional analysis), influences the degree of efficiency and participation in managing public space. The theoretical assumption here is that such apps encourage information disclosure and therefore have the potential to make a local government more responsive and transparent. Drawing on observation, interviews, and document and web content analysis conducted as part of a case study, this article suggests that the apps have indeed enhanced one municipality’s response and have made citizens more active in uploading their complaints. However, unexpected and contradictory effects include an increase in trivial complaints, which has made the handling of reports less efficient, and the emergence of opportunistic behaviour by third parties on the basis of the complaints, which has made the services less effective. Consequently, the assumed causal relation between enhanced citizen participation and increased transparency and information disclosure requires an adaptation that incorporates such wicked effects.     

Re-Engaging Citizens and Councils: The Importance of the Councillor to Enhanced Citizen Involvement

This article results from a number of research projects exploring councillor attitudes towards citizen participation and the role of the party group in local democracy. It considers how the cornerstone of the local government modernisation agenda – reengaging citizens and communities with the councils that represent them – rests on councillors' responses to an increased participatory element in local representative democracy. Citizens wishing to influence local political decision-making have a number of methods available to them. It is not whether citizens see these tools as effective methods of influencing their councillors that matters; rather that councillors, as holders of power, view them as providing citizens with a clear and legitimate ability to influence the political processes and are thus willing to be influenced by their use. The article shows that the councillors political affiliation is an indicator of attitudes towards citizen participation in local political decision-making.     

Exploring the Relationship between Trust in Government and Citizen Participation

Theories of deliberative and stealth democracy offer different predictions on the relationship between trust in government and citizen participation. To help resolve the contradictory predictions, this study used the World Values Survey to examine the influence of trust in government on citizen participation. Regression analyses yielded mixed results. As deliberative democracy theory predicts, the findings showed that people who trust governmental institutions are more likely to vote and sign a petition. However, the data provided limited support for stealth democracy in that trust in government negatively affects the frequency of attending a demonstration.     

Citizen Participation in Governance Through Representation: Issue of Gender in East Asia

Abstract

In the modern age, although East Asia represents some of the most successful economies such as Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea, and (now) China, the level of political and administrative development in the region remains controversial. One of the major indicators of such politico‐administrative development is the extent of citizen participation in governance through various democratic means, including the formation and expression of public opinion, people's involvement in government decisions and deliberations, and direct representation of citizens in governing institutions. However, the direct representation of citizens is considered one of the most effective modes of participation in institutions such as legislature, cabinet, and bureaucracy. In this regard, although the representation of women in these governing institutions has gained global significance, it still remains relatively weak in most East Asian cases. This article evaluates the extent of such women's participation in governance through representation in East Asia, examines the major factors constraining this representation, and suggests remedial alternatives to improve the situation.     

Citizen aid,social media and brokerage after disaster

Abstract

In a crisis, aid providers deliver humanitarian relief across a hierarchy of organisations where influence and capacity map to their scale of operations. On the front lines of crises, ‘citizen aid’ is what small, local and informal groups offer to fellow citizens. These citizen aid groups are well-networked in place and tend to work through longstanding personal relationships. In the Philippines, citizen aid groups frequently support their activities by documenting their work with photos of beneficiaries to solicit donations from within the country and around the world across social media platforms. This paper builds on recent debates on brokerage through a case study of citizen aid in the relief effort after Typhoon Haiyan (2013–2017). Using this case-study approach, we demonstrate how social media has produced novel forms of brokerage shaped by circulating images online. This new kind of brokerage involves a layered network of brokers that both shapes citizen aid efforts and creates new channels for localising aid, enhancing the control of citizen groups in the Global South over aid.     

A Preliminary Examination of Citizen Orientation and Multiple Dimensions of Organizational Performance

In this article, I discuss citizen orientated public management in relation to extant frameworks and theories in public management and organization research, including the role of the public servant, collaborative public management, citizen coproduction, and relational bureaucracy. Following the discussion, I hypothesize about the relationship between public organizations’ citizen orientations and multiple dimensions of organizational performance. I use data from approximately 900 New York City elementary and middle schools from 2008 to 2011 to examine the relationship. Preliminary findings indicate that a citizen orientation is positively related to multiple dimensions of public organization performance.     

Citizen participation in solid waste policymaking: a case study of the spokane experience(1)

The focus of this case study was on citizen participation in solid waste policymaking in Spokane, Washington. It was predicated on the idea that there is a need for government to develop more workable and meaningful approaches to facilitating citizen participation in public policymaking. The formulation and implementation of solid waste management policy in Spokane proved to be a technological and democratic trial for the community. The research used three models of citizen participant styles - coopted, prudent, and confrontive - as it examined the views of citizen group leaders, city and county administrative staff, and elected officials involved in this policy dispute with regard to: 1) the purposes of citizen participation, 2) the desirability of citizen participation, 3 ) the impacts of citizen participation, 4) the most effective approaches for citizen participation, and 5) the levels of satisfaction associated with various approaches to citizen participation.     

Local Governance and Local Democracy: The Barcelona Model

Using Barcelona as a case study, this article examines the relationship between local governance and local democracy. It begins with the terms of the debate and continues by identifying the context in which a particular model of governance arose in Barcelona. The article then looks at the extent to which governance fosters democracy, by strengthening the role of civil society organisations in government and creating new spaces of deliberation between the state and the citizenry. The final section examines the limitations of Barcelona's model of local governance in enhancing local democracy. The key finding is that the predominant role of the local council in facilitating citizen participation has as many strengths as it has weaknesses. In short, when participation becomes public policy it becomes a double-edged sword.     

Assessing China's Public Price Hearings: Symbolic Aspects

Abstract

The effectiveness of the public hearing as a participatory instrument has been debated. This paper argues that evaluation of the public hearing could be improved by an interpretive and institutional analysis. Introducing four major recent public hearings, this comparative study assesses the development and use of public hearing in China's governmental price making. It concludes that the public hearing should be viewed as a type of participatory institution. Its effectiveness relies on other institutional factors and on whether it can evoke values of citizenship, due process and deliberation. Constrained by China's political and social institutions, current Chinese price hearings are framed on the basis of consumer rights rather than citizen rights. The public hearing is perhaps the oldest and most widely used technique for citizens to participate in governmental decision making in western countries (Checkoway, B. The politics of public hearing. J. Appl. Behav. Sci. 1981, 17(4), 566–583), but it is not a popular topic theme at present. While the public hearing originally emerged for the purpose of due process in trial‐type or quasi‐judicial rule making, it has become an important citizen participation instrument since the 1960s and 1970s (Ibid. and Cole, R.L.; Caputo, D.A. The public hearing as an effective citizen participation mechanism: a case study of the general revenue sharing program. Am. Polit. Sci. Rev. 1984, 78(2), 404–416), especially to make public policy responsive to those disadvantaged. In contrast, the public hearing was not in place until the late 1990s in China, but it has become a top issue theme since 2000. This paper aims to assess the development and use of public hearings in China from a comparative perspective: is it effective for citizens to participate? If not, will it work in the future? How does the institutional context affect the operation, effectiveness and symbolism of public hearings in China? The paper also sheds lights on how to use interpretive and institutional analysis for the evaluation of public hearings in general.     

In participatory budgeting we trust? Fairness,tactics and (in)accessibility in participatory governance

ABSTRACT

Participatory budgeting (PB) is a significant innovation in democracy and local development. PB provides the opportunity for citizens to engage in processes of deliberation and decision-making upon the allocation of public funds. As new critical discourse emerges surrounding this model of local government spending, a significant area warranting investigation concerns how trust, and indeed mistrust, factor into PB. Through an analysis of interviews with residents and Council staff engaged in PB processes in a county in the north of England, we highlight the ways in which issues of trust can impact on participation in these initiatives, and also strengthen relationships between voting delegates, project teams and local government. This paper argues that increasing the perceived accessibility, and reconsidering the inclusion of mass membership groups in PB, might help to create progressive, effective and trustful participation.     

Local Government Public Servants Performance and Citizens Participation in Governance in Nigeria

Abstract

This paper examines the performance of public administrators at the local government level in Nigeria. It traces the development of local governments in Nigeria from 1945 to present times. It argues that the shift in the critical decision‐making powers and functions of local government requires its public administrators to be better‐trained professionals. However, without citizens' participation in governance, public servants' accountability will be low. The study addresses the following questions: How do public sector performance and development of actions by citizens affect accountability in the local governments? How much training do public administrators in Nigeria's local governments have in public management? What is the relationship between performance and citizenship participation in local governments' development process? The question of interests in this study is how public administration at the local government level can better serve Nigeria's communities and in so doing develop authentic relationship with citizen groups, and equitably enhance public trust, legitimacy, and performance of the public sector in the nation.     

A deficit of democratic authenticity: Political linkage and the public in Andean polities

The article argues that Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela are political systems suffering from an acute deficit of democratic authenticity, that is, a loss of substance in democratic processes. The deficit in democratic authenticity is a product of malfunctions in the mechanisms of political linkage and multiple barriers that inhibit effective citizen participation in public life. Rather than acceding to minimalist interpretations of democracy that deemphasize the importance, of active citizen participation, the author stresses the importance of maintaining a rigorous normative definition of democracy as the standard by which to assess the state of democractic political development. Catherine M. Conaghan is a Queen’s National Scholar and professor of political studies at Queen’s University. She is the author ofRestructuring Domination: Industrialists and the State in Ecuador (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1988) and co-author ofUnsettling Scatecraft: Democracy and Neoliberalism in the Central Andes (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1994).     

COUNCILLORS’ RECEIPT AND USE OF CITIZEN INPUT: EXPERIENCE FROM NORWEGIAN LOCAL GOVERNMENT

The article expands citizen participation research by tackling participation from the viewpoint of elected officials – the recipients of citizen input. The article studies the role citizen input plays in elected officials’ decision making. Citizen input is defined as information elected officials obtain through direct contact with citizens and representatives of local associations. Using survey data from Norwegian local government, the article assesses how much citizen input councillors receive, and to what extent they use it to set local agendas. It is demonstrated that Norwegian councillors have a high degree of exposure to citizen input and that citizen input constitutes most councillors’ primary source of agenda‐setting inspiration. The article also examines differences in the extent to which councillors use citizen input, and draws on existing theoretical and empirical research to discuss how these differences can be explained. For example, findings that local government frontbenchers and highly educated councillors consider citizen input less useful than others do are explained by an analytical perspective emphasizing councillors’ varied needs for such information.