Abstract
AbstractIt is often challenging to establish a good relationship between the green initiatives of urban citizens and local governments. Our aim is to gain a better understanding of how citizens and local authorities interact and how they can establish good relationships, relationships that contribute to the realization of the aims and interests of citizen initiatives and local governments. We analysed these relationships for five different initiatives, including the perspectives of initiators and civil servants. We hypothesized that an important challenge is to connect the initiative’s informal world and the formal world of local governments. Relationships can be problematic due to a lack of recognition and appreciation for the initiators on the part of the municipality, diverging ambitions or ideologies between the initiative and municipality or unreliable behaviour of initiatives in the view of civil servants. The results showed that a willingness to work together and developing trust are key conditions...
Highlights
An increasing number of citizens are active in shaping their neighbourhoods and working within the public domain (Humphrey, 2001; van Dam, Salverda, & During, 2014)
Because we are interested in the perspectives of citizens’ initiatives (Cis) and local governments, we interviewed the initiators of five Cis and the local administrators involved with these Cis, with a total of ten respondents
They are acknowledged as initiatives with an important function at the local level, where urban citizens and their environment benefit from their activities
Summary
An increasing number of citizens are active in shaping their neighbourhoods and working within the public domain (Humphrey, 2001; van Dam, Salverda, & During, 2014) They are examples of what we call citizens’ initiatives (Cis). Because they are expected to provide a cheap alternative to costly governmental urban development programs, which can effectively contribute to the safety and liveability of neighbourhoods and communities (Marschall, 2004). They are believed to empower and educate citizens and reduce the extent to which individuals and social organizations rely on state bureaucracies (Bakker et al, 2012). They are illustrations of the changing relationship between governments and citizens, which can be seen as a transition, often referred to as the shift from government to governance (Kooiman & van Vliet, 1993), in what can be considered as a form of collaborative governance (Ansell & Gash, 2008), a model of governance that brings multiple stakeholders together in common forums to engage in decision-making processes
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