scholarly journals Unraveled Practices of Participatory Budgeting in European Democracies

2021 ◽  
pp. 287-313
Author(s):  
Juraj Nemec ◽  
David Špaček ◽  
Michiel S. de Vries

AbstractThe goal of the final chapter was to summarize lessons about the worst and best practices, causes, and effects of (successful or unsuccessful) participatory budgeting, delivered by the country case studies included in this book. The information collected serves to check to what extent participatory budgeting as practiced in the countries involved presents a real attempt to change municipal budgets toward addressing the needs of marginalized groups and to improve decision-making based on local democracy and participation, or whether these processes as such are to be judged to be more important than any output and outcomes. All in all, the practices of PB as they evolved in European countries out of the innovative original as developed in Porto Alegre in the 1990s can be seen neither as a process of policy diffusion nor as a process of policy mimesis. The terminology of participatory budgeting remained, but the goals and tools to achieve the goals resulted only in marginal changes in the status quo in municipalities in European countries practicing participatory budgeting, instead of resulting in radical changes to increase spending in favor of marginalized groups. Participatory budgeting in selected European countries is far away from the level of “best practice” in which local democracy and participation are promoted. However, it is also not possible to conclude that all experiences are just “trivial pursuits”.

Author(s):  
Henriette I. Weber ◽  
Sebastian Vogt ◽  
Lisa-Marie Eberz-Weber ◽  
Holger Steinmetz ◽  
Sascha A. Wagner ◽  
...  

Consultative participation of citizens in political decision-making processes has been increasing in order to facilitate democratic legitimacy and responsiveness. Consequently, participatory budgets have been established as a 'best practice' for consultative participation of citizens in political decision-making processes. The authors compare participatory budgets of 31 German municipalities. An analysis of differences between successfully and unsuccessfully rated participatory budgeting processes provides informative insights and allows for in-depth comparison on a municipal level. The authors show that external service providers and electronic participation channels significantly increase the number of participatory citizens and are positively connected with pursued objectives of dialog processes and public responsiveness as well as efficient and effective decisions. Furthermore, the acceptance of all participants proved to be a key factor for a successful public participation process. The authors' analysis opens up new starting points for further research.


2019 ◽  
pp. 1087-1107
Author(s):  
Henriette I. Weber ◽  
Sebastian Vogt ◽  
Lisa-Marie Eberz-Weber ◽  
Holger Steinmetz ◽  
Sascha A. Wagner ◽  
...  

Consultative participation of citizens in political decision-making processes has been increasing in order to facilitate democratic legitimacy and responsiveness. Consequently, participatory budgets have been established as a 'best practice' for consultative participation of citizens in political decision-making processes. The authors compare participatory budgets of 31 German municipalities. An analysis of differences between successfully and unsuccessfully rated participatory budgeting processes provides informative insights and allows for in-depth comparison on a municipal level. The authors show that external service providers and electronic participation channels significantly increase the number of participatory citizens and are positively connected with pursued objectives of dialog processes and public responsiveness as well as efficient and effective decisions. Furthermore, the acceptance of all participants proved to be a key factor for a successful public participation process. The authors' analysis opens up new starting points for further research.


1970 ◽  
pp. 53-57
Author(s):  
Azza Charara Baydoun

Women today are considered to be outside the political and administrative power structures and their participation in the decision-making process is non-existent. As far as their participation in the political life is concerned they are still on the margins. The existence of patriarchal society in Lebanon as well as the absence of governmental policies and procedures that aim at helping women and enhancing their political participation has made it very difficult for women to be accepted as leaders and to be granted votes in elections (UNIFEM, 2002).This above quote is taken from a report that was prepared to assess the progress made regarding the status of Lebanese women both on the social and governmental levels in light of the Beijing Platform for Action – the name given to the provisions of the Fourth Conference on Women held in Beijing in 1995. The above quote describes the slow progress achieved by Lebanese women in view of the ambitious goal that requires that the proportion of women occupying administrative or political positions in Lebanon should reach 30 percent of thetotal by the year 2005!


Author(s):  
Steven Hurst

The United States, Iran and the Bomb provides the first comprehensive analysis of the US-Iranian nuclear relationship from its origins through to the signing of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in 2015. Starting with the Nixon administration in the 1970s, it analyses the policies of successive US administrations toward the Iranian nuclear programme. Emphasizing the centrality of domestic politics to decision-making on both sides, it offers both an explanation of the evolution of the relationship and a critique of successive US administrations' efforts to halt the Iranian nuclear programme, with neither coercive measures nor inducements effectively applied. The book further argues that factional politics inside Iran played a crucial role in Iranian nuclear decision-making and that American policy tended to reinforce the position of Iranian hardliners and undermine that of those who were prepared to compromise on the nuclear issue. In the final chapter it demonstrates how President Obama's alterations to American strategy, accompanied by shifts in Iranian domestic politics, finally brought about the signing of the JCPOA in 2015.


Author(s):  
Natalya Ivanovna Shaposhnikova ◽  
Alexander Aleksandrovich Sorokin

The article consideres the problems of determining the need to modernize the base stations of the cellular network based on the mathematical apparatus of the theory of fuzzy sets. To improve the quality of telecommunications services the operators should send significant funding for upgrading the equipment of base stations. Modernization can improve and extend the functions of base stations to provide cellular communication, increase the reliability of the base station in operation and the functionality of its individual elements, and reduce the cost of maintenance and repair when working on a cellular network. The complexity in collecting information about the equipment condition is determined by a large number of factors that affect its operation, as well as the imperfection of obtaining and processing the information received. For a comprehensive assessment of the need for modernization, it is necessary to take into account a number of indicators. In the structure of indicators of the need for modernization, there were introduced the parameters reflecting both the degree of aging and obsolescence(the technical gap and the backlog in connection with the emergence of new technologies and standards). In the process of a problem solving, the basic stages of decision-making on modernization have been allocated. Decision-making on the need for modernization is based not only on measuring information that takes into account the decision-makers, but also on linguistic and verbal information. Therefore, to determine the need for upgrading the base stations, the theory of fuzzy sets is used, with the help of which experts can be attracted to this issue. They will be able to formulate additional fuzzy judgments that help to take into account not only measuring characteristics, but also poorly formalized fuzzy information. To do this, the main indicators of the modernization need have been defined, and fuzzy estimates of the need for modernization for all indicators and a set of indicators reflecting the need for upgrading the base stations have been formulated.


2019 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
pp. 114-122
Author(s):  
N. A. Lysova

Experience of participatory budgeting in municipalities of Russian regions is reviewed in the paper. Forms of participation of the population in decision-making, as well as in the selection, realization and co-financing of public projects have been investigated. The analysis of the practices made it possible to identify the features and prospects of the Russian model of initiative budgeting.


2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-32
Author(s):  
Krystian Gurba

Organizations managing technology transfer from universities to the private sector, although born in Poland with a significant delay compared to Western European countries, are currently important actors in the Polish innovation system. The article summarizes the process of shaping the role and models of the functioning of these organizations. It discusses the status and functions of technology transfer centers and the institutional environment of academic technology transfer in Poland: legal framework, support programs, and partner organizations. Furthermore, it highlights the importance of cooperation networks in technology transfer and draws attention to specific initiatives focused on technology transfer in the biotechnology and pharmacy sectors.


Author(s):  
Charles Clarke ◽  
Jan Schlauer ◽  
Jonathan Moran ◽  
Alastair Robinson

Nepenthes is a genus of 130-160 species, almost half of which were described after 2001. The recent, rapid increase in species descriptions has been driven by application of a less rigorous species concept by botanists, taxonomic inflation, and discoveries of new taxa during explorations of remote parts of Southeast Asia. Many recently published species descriptions of Nepenthes are based entirely upon qualitative morphological information and are not supported by adequate research. Accordingly, the status of many Nepenthes taxa is contested. Evolution within the genus is not well understood, because nuclear and maternally inherited plastid genomes cannot resolve relationships between many species, particularly those that evolved recently through introgression or reticulate evolution. Improvement in our understanding of the systematics and evolution of Nepenthes requires the adoption of ‘best practice’ collection and preservation methods, and the application of quantitative analytical methods for morphological, genetic, and ecological information.


Author(s):  
Joshua Biro ◽  
David M. Neyens ◽  
Candace Jaruzel ◽  
Catherine D. Tobin ◽  
Myrtede Alfred ◽  
...  

Medication errors and error-related scenarios in anesthesia remain an important area of research. Interventions and best practice recommendations in anesthesia are often based in the work-as-imagined healthcare system, remaining under-used due to a range of unforeseen complexities in healthcare work-as- done. In order to design adaptable anesthesia medication delivery systems, a better understanding of clinical cognition within the context of anesthesia work is needed. Fourteen interviews probing anesthesia providers’ decision making were performed. The results revealed three overarching themes: (1) anesthesia providers find cases challenging when they have incomplete information, (2) decision-making begins with information seeking, and (3) attributes such as expertise, experience, and work environment influence anesthesia providers’ information seeking and synthesis of tasks. These themes and the context within this data help create a more realistic view of work-as-done and generate insights into what potential medication error reducing interventions should look to avoid and what they could help facilitate.


2021 ◽  
pp. 153568412199347
Author(s):  
José W. Meléndez ◽  
Maria Martinez-Cosio

Participatory planning has faced challenges engaging predominantly Spanish-speaking immigrants beyond the bottom rungs of Arnstein’s ladder of citizen participation. Participating at any level of the ladder requires individual civic skills, or capacities, that are integral to participatory processes. However, the specific skills necessary for collective action are less certain, due in part to a lack of clear definitions and a lack of clarity about how these capacities work in practice. Drawing on two years of data from a participatory budgeting process in an immigrant community in Chicago, Illinois, the authors identify key civic capacities that Spanish-speaking immigrants activated while engaging in civic discourse, and they explore the role these capacities played in moving ideas toward collective decision making. The authors present an organizational schema that aligns the study’s findings of 17 unique civic capacities with capacities identified in the literature as helping participants engage more meaningfully in decision-making processes.


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