New resource pack highlights role of champions of participation in local governance

Champions of participation from Kenya, Bosnia, Argentina, Norway and the UK visit South Somerset District Council in June 2007

An international project to share learning among Champions of Participation in local government across 15 countries has culminated in the release of a resource pack.

The documents are based on a series of events and dialogues run by the Citizenship DRC (coordinated at IDS) and they include a report, policy brief and national and international case studies.

The Champions of Participation resource pack explores many questions, including: What happens when you bring together ‘champions of participation’ from countries in every continent to explore the problems and the potential for strengthening citizen participation in local government? What do their experiences, drawn from such different contexts, have in common? What are the lessons and how can sharing this experience inform and shape policy and practice in the UK and elsewhere?

The pack is the result of discussions involving over 40 people working inside and with local government to increase citizen engagement in local governance. It contains a report of a major learning event in 2007, a short paper on policy perspectives and a set of eight case studies from the UK and overseas.

Learning events

The Citizenship DRC and Logolink organised two learning events in 2007 and 2008 where government officials, elected councillors and citizen representatives shared their experiences and discussed challenges. In May 2007, 44 people (24 from the UK and 20 from 14 other countries) involved in local government came together to discuss the challenges and experiences of trying to increase citizen engagement. They comprised elected officials, including mayors from the Philippines and Brazil; city councillors from New Orleans and UK authorities; local government officials and other service providers; community activists; workers from local and national NGOs; academics and representatives of central government in the UK and in India.

The event focused on how local government can encourage and empower citizens to participate in local politics and contribute to decisions that affect their communities. Although there has been emphasis and focus on how civil society engages in government and on institutional design and processes for participation, little attention has been paid to the role of champions of participation inside government, whether they be elected officials or government officers.

Participatory approaches in the UK

In the UK over the past ten years, participation policy and practice has undergone a dramatic shift. Local government now routinely consults citizens about services and other issues and the community and voluntary sector is included in local partnership arrangements. On 24 January 2008, 16 of the UK participants (front-line government officials) met with Hazel Blears, MP, Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, to exchange views and experiences of championing participatory democracy within local government. They also talked more specifically about the implementation of the new UK Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Bill which states that councils have a ‘duty to involve’ citizens. Participants from Nigeria, South Africa, China, USA, Bulgaria and Spain joined the meeting via video and telephone links. Blears said: ‘The international element of this is quite special. Often the pitfalls in the UK are that we over-engineer everything. We use exclusive language. Lessons from these countries are excellent in helping us think through what we can do.’

Developing policy based on shared experiences The value of the international exchange since June 2007 was evident with participants applying new learning to their own contexts. Shazia Hussein from Tower Hamlets, London, for example, applied learning from the champions of participation workshop in June 2007 in the process of developing Tower Hamlet’s Local Area Agreement and Sustainable Communities strategy. Mike Huggins, City Manager in Wisconsin, US, said of the June 2007 event: ‘For me it was both transformational and transactional experience. Opportunities to look at democracy and citizen participation in different contexts gave me so many insights into my experiences. As I listened to the champions at the workshop and saw their efforts to expand democracy in contexts where it is not very easy renewed my passion and energy for participatory democracy. And seeing things in a different culture gave me ideas about what to do at the local level.’

These events were sponsored by the Citizenship DRC and Logolink.