Chapter 2. The Approach of the Association of Local Democracy Agencies to Citizen Participation

2016 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Citizen Participation ◽  
Local Democracy

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 Possibilities for Decentralisation in Thailand: A View from Chiang Mai

2021 ◽  
pp. 76-96
Author(s):  
Andrew Harding ◽  
Rawin Leelapatana
Keyword(s):  
Citizen Participation ◽  
Potential Model ◽  
Provincial Government ◽  
Local Democracy ◽  
Military Government ◽  
Chiang Mai ◽  
Local Authorities ◽  
Local Stakeholders ◽  
Fiscal Decentralisation

In this article we examine radical proposals for political, administrative and fiscal decentralisation in Thailand which were developed for Chiang Mai as a potential model for Thailand as a whole. They lay emphasis on local self-government and citizen participation. We argue that these proposals offer a way forward for a Thai decentralisation process that has yet to proceed to the extent envisaged when it was commenced in the 1990s as part of democratisation, embraced most notably in the 1997 Constitution. Moreover, this process, we argue, offers a way out of the extreme confrontation between the yellow and red factions that has troubled Thailand since 2005. As Thailand returns to civilian rule after five years of military government, and local and provincial government comes once more to the fore, we argue that the Chiang Mai Metropolitan Administration Bill of 2013 offer more local democracy as well as imaginative ways of recruiting the enthusiasm of local stakeholders in a system designed to link provincial and local authorities, and the citizenry, in a virtuous circle of democracy and development.

scholarly journals Municipalities and democracy in Chile: Are they complying with the 20,500 Law On Citizen Participation?

2021 ◽  
pp. 63-80
Author(s):  
Egon Montecinos ◽  
Patricio Contreras
Keyword(s):  
Citizen Participation ◽  
Great Majority ◽  
The Political ◽  
Local Democracy ◽  
Political Will ◽  
Current State ◽  
Municipal Management ◽  
Main Factors ◽  
The Law ◽  
Municipal Level

This article describes and characterizes the current state of citizen participation at the municipal level in Chile, taking as reference the law 20.500. The objective is to identify the main factors that are influencing the dynamic disparate of implementation of the law, based on a study conducted in fifty-two municipalities. It is argued that there are municipalities that meet minimum participation standards, but in the great majority it has not been gravitating. Some reasons that would be influencing this dynamic, they are the low incentives of the law to incorporate citizen participation in municipal management, the excessive dependence on the political will of mayors to initiate it, the municipal financial precariousness to sustain it. The main conclusion is that the contributions of the law to municipal participatory democracy have been low, persisting a representative local democracy of low intensity and associated with exclusively procedural aspects.

scholarly journals Only for Citizens? Local Political Engagement in Sweden and Inclusiveness of Terms

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (14) ◽  
pp. 7839
Author(s):  
Bozena Guziana
Keyword(s):  
Civic Engagement ◽  
Social Construction ◽  
Citizen Participation ◽  
Social Sustainability ◽  
Political Engagement ◽  
The Political ◽  
Local Democracy ◽  
Local Authorities ◽  
Local Participation ◽  
Ethical Concerns

In both policy and research, civic engagement and citizen participation are concepts commonly used as important dimensions of social sustainability. However, as migration is a global phenomenon of huge magnitude and complexity, citizen participation is incomplete without considering the political and ethical concerns about immigrants being citizens or non-citizens, or ‘the others’. Although research on citizen participation has been a frequent topic in local government studies in Sweden, the inclusiveness and exclusiveness of terms used in the context of local political engagement, which are addressed in this article, has not received attention. This article examines the Swedish case by analyzing information provided by the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and by websites of all 290 municipalities as well terms used in selected research publications on local participation. Additionally, this article studies the effectiveness of municipal websites in providing information to their residents about how they can participate in local democracy. The results show that the term citizen is commonly and incorrectly used both by local authorities and the Association. The article concludes that the term citizen is a social construction of exclusiveness and the use of the term citizen should be avoided in political and civic engagement except for the limited topics that require formal citizenship.

scholarly journals Decentralization of Authorities in Ukraine; As an Efficient Instrument for Strengthening Local Democracy in The Modern Stage Of Government

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 6786-6792
Keyword(s):  
Local Government ◽  
Citizen Participation ◽  
Local Governance ◽  
Local Level ◽  
Active Form ◽  
Research Paper ◽  
Local Democracy ◽  
Public Budget ◽  
Current Crisis ◽  
Everyday Problems

The article deals with the issue of the decentralization of power in Ukraine, the unification of territorial communities, the development of a democratic local government, the establishment of local democracy, the factors that influence this process, the forms of participation of residents in solving everyday problems of the community. The purpose of the research paper is to reveal the mechanisms of decentralization of power at the local level, identify the main tendencies that appear during its implementation, ways to improve local governance and develop local democracy in the current crisis. In result, the study has established that the found in the developed democratic countries, the Institute of Local SelfGovernment – is a unique area that promotes the introduction of such signs of democracy as a community of tasks, joint responsibility, universal agreement, brotherhood, tolerance, equality. So, local democracy is necessary; it should be developed, strengthened in all directions. Has been established that the active form of citizen participation in community affairs is the implementation of the idea of the participation budget or public budget. The project had supported in virtually all regions of Ukraine and, thanks to it, people managed to solve a large number of local affairs under its responsibility, while increasing transparency and accountability of management structures and deepening decentralization processes on the ground.

Current Features and Developments of Local Governance in Finland

2020 ◽  
pp. 1849-1872
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.

Governance and Collaboration: Review Article

2006 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 315-321 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine Durose ◽  
Kirstein Rummery
Keyword(s):  
Social Policy ◽  
Citizen Participation ◽  
Public Services ◽  
Collaborative Governance ◽  
New Labour ◽  
Local Democracy ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Policy Practice ◽  
Collaborative Working ◽  
Key Policy

Rod Rhodes (1997) Understanding Governance: Policy Networks, Governance, Reflexivity and Accountability, Open University Press 1997.Gerry Stoker (1998) ‘Governance as theory: five propositions’, International Journal of Social Sciences 50, 1, 17–28.Helen Sullivan and Chris Skelcher (2002) Working across Boundaries: Collaboration in Public Services, Palgrave.Janet Newman, Marion Barnes, Helen Sullivan, and A. Knops (2004) ‘Public participation and collaborative governance’, Journal of Social Policy 33, 203–223.From a term used largely within political science in the mid-1990s, ‘governance’ has become a key conceptual and analytical convention adopted by social policy, largely because of its usefulness in examining questions that are key to the discipline: citizenship; welfare rights and responsibilities; accountability; legitimacy and partnership working. Clarence and Painter (1998) have constructed a useful characterisation of public policy, identifying a shift in emphasis from hierarchies, to markets and now to collaboration. Networks, ‘joined up’ governance and partnership working are now central in both policy practice and analysis. These processes are not new, but New Labour have clearly expanded and accelerated them. For New Labour, collaborative working is now perceived as central in their response to key policy challenges: improving public services, tackling social exclusion and revitalising local democracy. These processes are now evident at all levels of policy making from supranational organisations such as the European Union down to neighbourhood-based initiatives. It appears that we are moving from the closed, unitary system of government of the Westminster model to a more open, decentralised system of governance. Our conceptions of citizenship have accordingly shifted, from one based on representation to one based on active participation, particularly within local communities. Governance is an issue which concerns all levels of government and citizen participation, from international-level World Bank concerns about commitment to efficiency and accountable government, to highly devolved localised urban regeneration partnerships.

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