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.     

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.     

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.     

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.     

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.     

Democratic Innovations: Reinforcing or Changing Perceptions of Trust?

Declining trust in representative institutions is considered one of the most significant political problems of our time. It is often suggested that democratic innovations—or mechanisms which aim to increase and deepen citizen participation in the political decision-making process—can help reverse this trend. However, empirical research about actual effects of participation on trust is scarce, and weakened by causality problems. With survey data representing 1,470 participants in a landmark Swedish e-petition system, the article shows that both generalized attitudes and process evaluations matter in how trust is affected by democratic innovations.     

The Management of Citizen Participation in Taiwan: A Case Study of Taipei City Government's Citizen Complaints System

Abstract

Citizen participation is one of the core values of democracy. Democratization means an increase in citizen participation in public affairs. However, the issue of democratization is rarely studied in the field of public administration. In this article, we use the Taipei City Government (TCG) Citizen Complaints System to illustrate some tensions relating to citizen participation in a newly democratizing country. We interviewed the TCG officials to piece together the puzzle of how the citizen complaints system works. Furthermore, we conducted a survey on how each channel and media is used by citizens to file their complaints. Then, we focused on the development of the Taipei City Mayor's e‐mail box to see how the tension between participation and cost is handled by utilizing newly emerging information technology. We then evaluate these developments in terms of publicity, accessibility, and accountability suggested by Senevirante and Cracknell (Seneviratne, M.; Cracknell, S. Consumer complaints in public sector services. Public Admin. 1988, 66, 181–193). Accordingly, we propose suggestions for improvement from these three aspects for TCG and other governments as well to establish a citizen complaints system that substantiates democracy.     

Market-Oriented Urban Planning – Constraining Citizen Participation

Urban planning in Norway can be characterised as market oriented, with responsibilities for the formulation of planning largely delegated to private developers. Even though the principle of citizen participation has a strong and longstanding tradition in Norway, the market-oriented practices challenge the ability of citizens to influence their spatial surroundings. Based on broad surveys and qualitative case studies, this article maps the attitudes of developers, councillors and planners towards citizen participation and studies the strategies of local community associations. Our analysis shows that developers value citizen participation to a much lesser degree than councillors and planners, which can explain the lack of participatory channels in early phases. Official avenues for participation occur later, primarily through hearings. Local associations find this to be too late, characterising urban planning as a path dependent process; as a consequence, local associations attempt to influence planning processes in a more informal way by contacting councillors directly.     

The Influence of Direct Democracy on Political Interest,Electoral Turnout and Other Forms of Citizens’ Participation in Swiss Municipalities

Based on the data of a survey conducted among Swiss municipalities, this article inquires into the relationship between different institutional settings of local democracy and the amount of political interest of citizens as well as electoral participation and new forms of citizen participation like participatory planning or local agenda 21. The study identifies six distinct settings of local democracy in Switzerland, ranging from pure direct democracy to representative democracy. The analysis shows that the institutional setting of local democracy has no impact on the political interest of the citizens. It also reveals that instruments of direct democracy do not significantly weaken representative democracy as far as electoral participation is concerned. New forms of citizen participation are predominantly used alongside with means of direct democracy.     

Citizen Participation in German and Spanish Local Governments: A Comparative Study

In recent decades, citizens have become more and more disenchanted with the traditional institutions of representative government, detached from political parties, and disillusioned with old forms of civic engagement and participation. This has favored a renewed interest in citizen engagement and citizen participation and a growing re-emergence in academic and political discourse of ideas and values of community, localism, and citizen participation. This article analyzes the main objectives and the actual implementation of citizen participation initiatives in the local governments of two European Continental countries, Germany and Spain. The aim is to find out the factors that affect the possible decoupling between the objectives and the “real” uses of citizen participation. Our results show that most local governments in these two countries are using citizen participation only to increase the level of perceived legitimacy or to comply minimally with legal requirements, without really taking advantage of citizen participation to enhance decision-making processes. These findings confirm that institutional theory becomes the rationale to explain the implementation of citizen participation in these two European Continental countries.     

Public Participation and Public Service Modernization: Learning from New Labor?

The public participation agenda is a significant element of public service reform in Europe and beyond. This article examines how citizen participation in local public services was conce ived and enacted under successive New Labor governments in the UK during the period 1997–2010. It is suggested that the emphasis on public participation was central to the ethos of New Labor. This accounts for the persistence of the participation agenda even in the face of scant empirical evidence that specific engagement and empowerment initiatives were successful. Significantly, there was no single New Labor participation narrative. There were instead several distinct strands, drawing variously from the Party's received traditions of State welfarism, corporatist central-local relations, municipal socialism, Blairite managerialism, and, lastly, mutual cooperativism. The article assesses the legacy of New Labor and public participation in the UK before drawing wider conclusions relating to international experience.     

Attaining participatory objectives: Citizen information and training needs

In this article the authors examine three interrelated elements of citizen participation: participatory objectives, participation techniques, and citizen information and training needs. Four objectives of citizen participation are identified, and techniques are then categorized according to their most appropriate objective. Each objective and its associate techniques are examined in terms of participant training and information needs. The intent is to illustrate the relationship between participatory objectives and techniques and that training and information relevant to the techniques selected is necessary.     

Political-Administrative Relations in Collaborative Environmental Management

One of the central ideas of liberal democracy is to ensure broad-based citizen participation in the governance process that goes beyond simply voting. However, evidence shows that on many occasions it has been failing to do so both in the developed and developing countries. As such, this paper, based on an empirical study, analyzes the scopes, forms, and nature of citizen participation in the urban local governance process in Bangladesh. It is found that citizen participation has been nominal in the local governance process due to a number of social, political, and institutional factors, for example, electoral politics, limited citizen’s accesses to various decision-making bodies, the existence of clientelistic politics and the presence of a weak civil society.     

Commissioning for Health and Wellbeing: An Introduction

Local government reforms have been carried out in a number of European countries, aiming at both more effective service production and increased citizen participation in local politics. Although extensive research has been carried out analysing the content and background of these reforms, few if any, studies have considered the democratic effects of these reforms at the level of the individual citizen. This article investigates relationship between local government reforms and citizen trust in local government, focusing on individual-level data on local government reforms in Norway in 2008. The analysis shows that it is difficult to find a clear relationship between reform policies and trust in local politicians. These findings parallel other contributions in concluding that it is difficult to find substantial effects from local government re-organisations.     

Trust in the leadership of governors and participatory governance in Tokyo Metropolitan Government

This article examines the relationship between the trust in leadership of political leaders and citizen participation by analysing data on Tokyo residents. Among the four variables we used to designate types of, or attitudes towards, public participation, only actual participation has a positive influence on trust. The normative recognition of participation is associated with a critical attitude towards the government. As the unclear needs of citizens have the greatest impact on trust, citizens’ trust is built through relationships between citizens and not between citizens and their government. The importance of positive actions from the local government such as public officials and political leaders that stimulate citizen awareness to the point where citizens take interest in public administration, practice participation, and enlarge participation opportunities, is increasing. We also need to consider the limitations of citizen ability to understand public issues and reflection of their needs, and the limitations of participatory governance on the decision-making process.     

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.     

An exploration of citizens' professionalism in coproducing social care services

Citizens' involvement in public service delivery challenges the principles of professionalism as such citizens are amateurs. However, there is little evidence of the (non)integration of these principles by citizen coproducers and how this affects professionalism in public service delivery. This article focuses on two principles of professionalism: expertise and accountability. The theoretical framework further reviews the coproduction literature on what can be expected of citizens with regard to these principles and elaborates on the concept of amateurism. The concepts of professionalism and amateurism form the framework for the analysis of citizen coproducers' identity. Empirically, this paper presents two case studies of social services in the European context. The results show that these citizen coproducers to a certain extent create a professional identity, tend to stay away from integrating accountability, and introduce elements of amateurism. The presence and guidance of public servants in coproduction can ensure accountability and streamline amateurism.     

Tension in democratic administration: Does managerial confidence in administrative capacity reduce citizen participation in organizational decision-making?

The tension between bureaucratic and democratic values has characterized significant debates in the field of public administration. In this article, we ask, does public managers' confidence in their organizational administrative capacity affect citizen participation? Using managerial confidence in organizational response capacity (ORC) during crises as a vehicle to investigate the tension between democratic and administrative values, we examine whether an administration-centric approach to management influences citizen participation. We posit that higher levels of managerial confidence in organizational administrative capacity can lessen the pressure from political stakeholders which, in turn, might allow managers the autonomy to isolate themselves from the general public. The empirical analysis uses a structural equation model (SEM) to examine survey data from senior managers in 500 US cities. We find that managerial confidence in ORC reduces citizen participation, but only indirectly through diminishing influence from other governmental actors or by allowing managers to win the trust of political principals.     

Political engagement and participation of Thai citizens: the rural–urban disparity

The nature of citizen participation and engagement in public life in Thailand has changed dramatically over the last decade. This article focuses on explaining the changing pictures of political engagement – political interest, knowledge, and efficacy – among rural and urban Thai citizens since the House of Representatives election in 2001. The major attempt made in this article also to explain how these changes affect patterns of political activism (i.e. in voting, political contacting, and protesting activities), particularly between the rural and urban Thai voters. Relying on three latest survey data taken from the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems, the article suggests that the factors facilitating greater political participation are relatively different between rural and urban residents, and such differences cannot simply be explained as a result of a deeper engagement in the patron–client relationship of the rural than of the urban. Indeed, those differentiations depend on several factors and vary according to different kinds of political activity.     

Changes in the dimensions of political competition in Europe and their impact on citizens’ engagement via Facebook

ABSTRACT

This article focuses on a little-explored area of research, seeking to explain how political changes influence the participation of citizens in the social networks of local governments. In the context of the recent upsurge of anti-system movements and political parties in the European Union, we analyse a new set of data on participation via local governments’ Facebook pages during a turbulent period in European politics. The results obtained show that when a local government is affected by changes in political competition there is a greater degree of citizens’ engagement through social networks. Our analytical framework shows that this increased engagement is directly associated with the vulnerability of political parties, especially when the governing party loses its absolute majority and is constrained or prevented from carrying out political initiatives.