scholarly journals The Policy Brief Assignment: Transferable Skills in Action in a Community-Engaged Writing Project

2016 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurie Grobman
Keyword(s):  
Citizen Participation ◽  
Local Governance ◽  
Writing Studies ◽  
City Council ◽  
Professional Writing ◽  
Capstone Course ◽  
Writing Project ◽  
Transferable Skills ◽  
Program Star ◽  
Oral Presentations

The policy brief assignment in my capstone course in professional writing was designed as a community-engaged project in partnership with a nonprofit organization whose mission is to grow Reading, Pennsylvania's economy. The assignment was intended to do real work in the world: the nonprofit's director, a city council member, and an outreach manager for the city of Reading plan to use the policy briefs to convince Reading's City Council to adopt the recommended policies to enhance citizen participation and representation in local governance and to address deficiencies identified through the STAR Community Rating System(r) (STAR), the nation's leading sustainability framework and certification program (STAR 2016). I welcomed the collaboration and designed the assignment with the goal that students would experience what writing faculty always tell them: fundamental concepts in composition and rhetoric/writing studies are operational in the workplace, and understanding writing and communication rhetorically opens up possibilities for them to enter diverse and unfamiliar writing contexts. Students successfully researched, synthesized, organized, and clearly communicated information in a content area and genre new to them. They presented their policy briefs in written and electronic form to the community partners and explained their work in oral presentations. It was an exciting, nerve-wracking, and challenging endeavor, and, as I will describe, the periods of dissonance led to the best learning experiences--for students and for me.

Exploring the Uncharted Territory of Devolution in Zimbabwe

2019 ◽  
Vol 49 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jephias Mapuva ◽  
George P Miti
Keyword(s):  
Local Government ◽  
Service Delivery ◽  
Citizen Participation ◽  
Local Governance ◽  
Public Affairs ◽  
Participatory Governance ◽  
Enabling Environment ◽  
Efficiency And Effectiveness ◽  
Local Levels

Devolution, which was incorporated into the Constitution of Zimbabwe through section 264, is a new phenomenon in Zimbabwe. This incorporation came about because of the need for participatory governance and the devolution of power away from the centre. Over the years, local governance has been informed by a plethora of pieces of legislation that do not provide an enabling environment for citizen participation, giving Zimbabwe’s local government a chequered history that excludes citizens from participating in public affairs that affect their lives. An analysis of section 264 of the Constitution revealed that devolution has the propensity to enhance transparency, efficiency and effectiveness as well as the fulfilment of central government’s responsibilities at provincial and local levels. This article argues that the belated implementation of the devolution of power has delayed improved service delivery, effectiveness, efficiency and accountability within local governance. This article further seeks to explain how the implementation of section 264 of the Constitution can bring about good local governance.

scholarly journals Citizen Participation and Machine Learning for a Better Democracy

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Procter ◽  
Miguel Arana-Catania ◽  
Felix-Anselm van Lier ◽  
Nataliya Tkachenko ◽  
Yulan He ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Machine Learning ◽  
Citizen Participation ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Information Overload ◽  
City Council ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Development Goals ◽  
Democratic Systems ◽  
The City

The development of democratic systems is a crucial task as confirmed by its selection as one of the Millennium Sustainable Development Goals by the United Nations. In this article, we report on the progress of a project that aims to address barriers, one of which is information overload, to achieving effective direct citizen participation in democratic decision-making processes. The main objectives are to explore if the application of Natural Language Processing (NLP) and machine learning can improve citizens? experience of digital citizen participation platforms. Taking as a case study the ?Decide Madrid? Consul platform, which enables citizens to post proposals for policies they would like to see adopted by the city council, we used NLP and machine learning to provide new ways to (a) suggest to citizens proposals they might wish to support; (b) group citizens by interests so that they can more easily interact with each other; (c) summarise comments posted in response to proposals; (d) assist citizens in aggregating and developing proposals. Evaluation of the results confirms that NLP and machine learning have a role to play in addressing some of the barriers users of platforms such as Consul currently experience.

Implementation of Social Media Concepts for E-Government

2019 ◽  
pp. 1071-1091
Author(s):  
Raimundo Díaz-Díaz ◽  
Daniel Pérez-González
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Citizen Participation ◽  
Smart Cities ◽  
City Council ◽  
Political Agenda ◽  
The Public ◽  
Partnership Model ◽  
The Government ◽  
Technological Platform

Some governments have proven social media's potential to generate value through co-creation and citizen participation, and municipalities are increasingly using these tools in order to become smart cities. Nevertheless, few public administrations have taken full advantage of all the possibilities offered by social media and, as a consequence, there is a shortage of case studies published on this topic. By analyzing the case study of the platform Santander City Brain, managed by the City Council of Santander (Spain), the current work contributes to broaden the knowledge on ambitious social media projects implemented by local public administrations for e-Government; therefore, this case can be useful for other public sector's initiatives. The case studied herein proves that virtual social media are effective tools for civil society, as it is able to set the political agenda and influence the framing of political discourse; however, they should not be considered as the main channel for citizen participation. Among the results obtained, the authors have found that several elements are required: the determination and involvement of the government, a designated community manager to follow up with the community of users, the secured privacy of its users, and a technological platform that is easy to use. Additionally, the Public Private Partnership model provides several advantages to the project, such as opening new sources of funding.

Current Features and Developments of Local Governance in Finland

2016 ◽  
pp. 304-327
Author(s):  
Hanna Vakkala ◽  
Jaana Leinonen
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Local Government ◽  
Deliberative Democracy ◽  
Citizen Participation ◽  
Local Governance ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Process Efficiency ◽  
Structural Reforms ◽  
Local Democracy

This chapter discusses local governance renewals and the recent development of local democracy in Finland. Due to profound structural reforms, the role of municipalities is changing, which is challenging current local government processes, from management to citizen participation. Nordic local self-government is considered strong, despite of tightening state steering. Ruling reform politics and the increasing amount of service tasks do not fit the idea of active local governance with sufficient latitude for decision-making. To increase process efficiency, electronic services and governance have been developed nationally and locally, and solutions of eDemocracy have been launched to support participation. Developing participative, deliberative democracy during deep renewals creates opportunities but also requires investments, which create and increase variation between municipalities. From the point of view of local democracy, it becomes interesting how strong municipal self-governance and local governance renewals meet and how the role and status of municipalities are changing.

scholarly journals Citizen Engagement for Co-Creating Low Carbon Smart Cities: Practical Lessons from Nottingham City Council in the UK

Energies ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (24) ◽  
pp. 6615
Author(s):  
Sam Preston ◽  
Muhammad Usman Mazhar ◽  
Richard Bull
Keyword(s):  
Energy Consumption ◽  
Built Environment ◽  
Citizen Participation ◽  
Smart City ◽  
Smart Cities ◽  
City Council ◽  
Citizen Engagement ◽  
Low Carbon ◽  
City Development ◽  
The Uk

Cities constitute three quarters of global energy consumption and the built environment is responsible for significant use of final energy (62%) and greenhouse gas emissions (55%). Energy has now become a strategic issue for local authorities (LAs) and can offer savings when budget cuts have threatened the provision of core services. Progressive LAs are exploring energy savings and carbon reduction opportunities as part of the sustainable and smart city agenda. This paper explores the role of citizens in smart city development as “buildings don’t use energy: people do”. Citizens have the potential to shape transitions towards smart and sustainable futures. This paper contributes to the growing evidence base of citizen engagement in low carbon smart cities by presenting novel insights and practical lessons on how citizen engagement can help in smart city development through co-creation with a focus on energy in the built environment. A case study of Nottingham in the UK, a leading smart city, is analysed using Arnstein’s Ladder of Citizen Participation. Nottingham City Council (NCC) has pledged to keep “citizens at the heart” of its plans. This paper discusses learnings from two EU funded Horizon 2020 projects, REMOURBAN (REgeneration MOdel for accelerating the smart URBAN transformation) and eTEACHER, both of which aimed to empower citizens to reduce energy consumption and co-create smart solutions. Although these two projects are diverse in approaches and contexts, what unites them is a focus on citizen engagement, both face to face and digital. REMOURBAN has seen a “whole house” approach to retrofit in vulnerable communities to improve liveability through energy efficiency. User interaction and co-creation in eTEACHER has provided specifications for technical design of an energy saving App for buildings. eTEACHER findings reflect users’ energy needs, understanding of control interfaces, motivations for change and own creative ideas. Citizens were made co-creators in eTEACHER from the beginning through regular communication. In REMOURBAN, citizens had a role in the procurement and bidding process to influence retrofit project proposals. Findings can help LAs to engage demographically diverse citizens across a variety of buildings and communities for low carbon smart city development.

Stepping into the Role of Professional Writer

2011 ◽  
pp. 250-260
Author(s):  
Christine Aikens Wolfe ◽  
Cheryl North-Coleman ◽  
Shari Wallis Williams ◽  
Denise Amos ◽  
Glorianne Bradshaw ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Research ◽  
Annual Meeting ◽  
National Writing Project ◽  
Professional Writing ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Santa Fe ◽  
Writing Project ◽  
Professional Writers ◽  
Experimental Group

A group of National Writing Project teachers from around the nation attended a Professional Writing Retreat in Santa Fe in 2004 and continued their collaboration. This chapter examines the progress of the group’s commitment to communicate by electronic means about writing about teaching. Teachers from the experimental group, those who answered the call to examine their continued involvement with the group, provide qualitative research narratives about how each responds as they help one another to step into the role of professional writer. Statistics gathered from both the experimental and a control group of teachers (who attended the same retreat but did not answer the survey) allow the reader to chart the teachers’ success in: (a) presenting together about being professional writers, (b) writing together as professional writers, (c) writing individually about teacher-practice, and (d) meeting at the National Writing Project’s Annual Meeting in order to continue to support each other’s work.

Dual Legitimacy in the Development of the Network City - A Case Study of Kaohsiung City Council

2014 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 591-621 ◽  
Author(s):  
Da-Chi Liao ◽  
Hsin-Che Wu ◽  
Chen-Hsun Li
Keyword(s):  
Local Government ◽  
Local Governance ◽  
Executive Branch ◽  
City Council ◽  
Dual Systems ◽  
City Network ◽  
The City ◽  
Kaohsiung City

This paper discusses the theoretical rheology of local governance from the bureaucratic system to the network city and explores whether and how such a city network can be developed in a dual local government system. This paper suggests that, in dual systems, councilors are nodes which extend their networks, and councilors together can construct a more comprehensive network than a city executive branch alone does, so as to remedy the executive branch’s deficiencies concerning city affairs. This paper chooses Kaohsiung city council as its case study and provides evidence that the network developed by city council and councilors covers many city affairs which are ignored by the city executive branch. This result also implies that the network city may be better feasible in a dual local government system than in a unitary one.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document