Citizen centred participation
From BarcampUKGovweb
2010 session offer: Citizen centred participation
Open session plan - based on something like a 45 min slot, but adaptable
- What do citizens want from participation? - brief (< 5 mins) intro, then roundtable
- ...how might government help deliver it? - open discussion
- recap and review
Intro
As others, for example David Wilcox (ref?), have noticed, whilst a lot has been written about participation, it tends not to be considered from the point of view of citizens.
In a more resource constrained future it seems to make sense to make best use of our greatest resource - us, our ingenuity and creativity. For example it's arguable that we haven't got much hope of meeting our carbon reduction targets unless we're all involved.
If the 'Open Declaration on Public Services 2.0 in the European Union' http://eups20.wordpress.com/ put down a marker for the values of transparency, participation and empowerment, is it possible to flesh out the participation bit (a big enough topic in itself) of this specifically in a UK context? In the context of participation by citizens with government, local government and institutional civic society?
Is it possible to be relentlessly citizen centred about participation? Is it possible to counter, with something more positive, each and every resort to defensiveness which can seem to put the narrow interests of government as institution ahead of a much richer potential of government as enabler of the wellbeing of us all?
Q. What do citizens want from participation in policy making? A. influence, opportunties for involvement, and recognition via transparency
i. influence, can be direct, subtle
- on policy, design, implementation and evaluation
- on the design of involvement processes, including processes of synthesis and where necessary conflict resolution
- on the scope and context of involvement processes
ii. opportunties for involvement
- opportunities for involvement including self created, self organised ones,
- opportunties for all interested parties not just a favoured few
- opportunties to be proactive not just reactive
- opportunities which will tend to be always open
iii. recognition via transparency via fully open and complete online record of involvement and influence, for purposes of recognition, reward, respect, trust, and, last but not least, learning and not having to keep reinventing the wheel
Notes, useful links, references via Sustainable Community Action wiki
