Citizen Participation In Governance Research Articles

Does Technologically Enabled Citizen Participation Lead to Budget Adjustments? An Investigation of Boston, MA, and San Francisco, CA

Citizen participation in government can provide a broad range of benefits to governments and citizens alike. Advances in information technologies have enabled new types of citizen participation with governments. However, we currently lack an understanding of how these new types of participation, particularly those that generate information on community needs, influence resource allocations. This article focuses on one of these new technologies, 311 systems, and how citizen requests might influence departmental budget allocations. We track budget allocation in the cities of Boston and San Francisco for 106 departments or subunits from FY2005 to FY2013. Our findings indicate that there is no significant resource benefit for departments using 311 versus those that do not. While departments using 311 do have larger budget allocations than those that do not, those departments had larger budget allocations prior to the implementation of 311. And while data generated in the 311-enabled citizen participation are increasingly used to measure departmental performance, the findings of this study show that this information has little to no effect on the allocated share of the budget for departments.

Remedying Africa's Self-propelled Corruption: The Missing Link

ABSTRACTThis paper analyses mechanisms and circumstances that facilitate and mitigate against corruption in African countries. We focus on governance indicators that strongly correlate with corruption and suggest that this phenomenon in Africa results from poor democratic practice enabled by asymmetrical concentration of power in governments and the rise of alliances between elites and corporate interests within neo-liberal economic systems. Countries with low corruption have processes in which citizens engage robustly in public governance and public accountability, suggesting that solutions to corruption can originate from within existing governance practices in Africa. We explore African countries that manage to mitigate corruption by reviewing processes of citizen participation in governance occurring through innovations in contemporary mechanisms of decision-making and reintegration of traditional practices in public governance institutions and processes. We argue that corruption in Africa is not a ‘cultural’ phenomenon, but rather that long-standing cultural practices provide innovations in governance that reduce corruption. This paper concludes that wider citizen engagement in public governance strengthens ‘voice and accountability’, balances power asymmetries in decision-making processes of governments, and promotes ‘socially conscious’ leaderships committed to greater transparency and accountability in government.

The Volk of New Jersey? State Identity, Distinctiveness, and Political Culture in the American Federal System

The legal literature on federalism has long taken for granted that Americans no longer meaningfully identify with, or feel strong loyalties to, their states. This assumption has led some scholars to reject federalism altogether; others argue that federalism must be reoriented to serve national values. But the issue of identity and loyalty sweeps far more broadly, implicating debates about the political safeguards of federalism, the ability of states to check national power, and the likelihood that states will produce policy innovations or good opportunities for citizen participation in government. The ultimate question is whether American federalism lacks the cultural and psychological support to sustain itself.This article is the first comprehensive effort to assess whether contemporary American states are meaningfully distinctive from one another and whether contemporary Americans identify with their states. The death of state identity is an empirical claim, but no proponent of that claim has ever marshalled empirical evidence to support it. It is also a claim unique to legal scholarship: Scholars in political science, history, economics, cultural psychology, and other disciplines have developed extensive literatures on state political cultures. This article surveys those literatures and collects evidence on the states’ geographic, demographic, and policy diversity, states’ impact on political preferences, relative trust in state and federal institutions, state’s distinct historical narratives, and the impact of individual mobility among the states. I conclude that reports of the death of state identity are greatly exaggerated — and that has important implications for American federalism.

Open Government Partnership as a new global intergovernmental initiative

Arising with a higher frequency economic crises over the last decades coupled with thedeteriorating situation in the public finances have not always been caused by wrongdecisions taken by the public authorities or their mismanagement. The crises of confidence in financial institutions in numerous countries combined with crises of confidence in the state spur to look for new solutions in the public institutions managementand their relationship with the national and international environment. The concept ofopen government (OGP) fits into this trend. It is, in a sense, a new, although for somecountries only a modernized way of organizing activities and institutions in a state thatuses digital technology and communication tools in order to increase the participationof citizens in governance at all levels and decision-making. In addition, it is assumedthat the knowledge and involvement of citizens can be used to effectively solve problemsboth at central and local levels. In the article the author tries to explicitly point out thatwhile the Open Government Partnership initiative should be assessed positively, it cannotbe regarded as a panacea for contemporary problems in management of the state andcommunication with the public. The mere membership does not guarantee to streamlinethe procedures, mechanisms, institutions and society involvement in public life. Thesespecific actions aimed at increasing transparency, efficiency and cooperation as well asparticipation of citizens are an indicator of change. And these can be undertaken withinthe framework of the Partnership, as well as outside of it.

Women and Local Governance in Developing Countries: A Case Study of Ejisu, Ghana

Since 1988, Ghana has implemented comprehensive reforms to promote grassroots and citizen participation in government. This article examined women’s participation in local governance. Through an interview of 353 women in Ejisu, it was found out that the women performed almost all household chores, 62.3% of whom partly financed their households while 17% solely financed their households. About 27% of the women were members of CBOs, and 25% were assembly members. The women were restrained in local government participation by marriage, perceived superiority of men, and illiteracy. Encouragement of women and girls’ education are contingent to promoting women’s participation in local governance.

E-government as the Mechanism for Eradicating Corruption in India

E-governance is a vital tool to facilitate the participation of citizens in governance. It has tremendous potential to change the existing relationship between citizen and government by treating the citizen as an important stakeholder. It has revolutionised the delivery of service from focus on administration to customer driven one. Information and communications technologies (ICTs)-driven government has significantly reduced corruption and enhanced quality of services. It aims at providing responsive governance and greater involvement of citizens in policy related processes. The author has analysed many empirical studies of various states to demonstrate the role of e-governance in promoting transparency and accountability in public governance.

Free Speech Without Democracy

In the United States, First Amendment protections for free speech are deeply associated with democracy. The dominant view in the Supreme Court and among commentators is that the primary (albeit not necessarily the only) reason we protect free speech is because of its essential role in advancing democratic self-governance. What are the implications of the democratic self-governance theory for free-speech protections outside the United States, in particular in nondemocratic countries? If we assume that the role of free speech is to advance democratic politics, then presumably non-democratic countries would have no reason to protect or tolerate speech. After all, if one rejects western-style liberal democracy, presumably one also rejects the subsidiary rules that undergird that system of government. The truth, however, is more complex. First of all, the vast majority of constitutions in the world grant at least some level of written protection for free speech, even though many of these constitutions are in countries which do not even purport to be free, multiparty democracies. Of course, many of these constitutional protections are shams; but it is simply not the case that no autocratic regimes permit free speech. The purpose of this paper is to explore how and why that might be so, and to consider whether the answers to these questions might have implications for domestic law.I begin by surveying the scope of global protections for free speech in written constitutions, and then examining in some detail three case studies of autocratic countries which have provided a degree of room for free speech: modern Communist China, the Soviet Union during the Glasnost era under Mikhail Gorbachev, and modern Qatar. In each case, I demonstrate that the regime provides meaningful protections for free speech, albeit with clear limits. I also argue that in each of these cases, the leadership has absolutely no interest in advancing democracy or surrendering their monopoly on power. Yet even without democracy, they perceive that permitting some degree of free speech advances their interests and the interests of their citizens and nations.Based on my case studies, I identify three distinct reasons why autocratic leaders might have an interest in permitting some freedom of speech by citizens. The first, and most significant, is internal control. In any large, bureaucratic system, central leadership often faces great difficulty in getting local officials to advance central policies and follow central leadership. Citizens can play an important role in identifying, and publicizing, corruption and lawlessness, as well as violations of central policy, at the local level. Second, free speech can act as a safety valve. Permitting some degree of free speech can, therefore, alleviate pressures for political change. Third, free speech as a form of citizen participation in government can lend legitimacy to a government, even without the legitimacy conferred by popular consent through elections. I also explore the countervailing factors – notably the desire for rulers to maintain their power – which result in clear limits on what sorts of speech will be tolerated in autocracies.I close by considering whether these alternative justifications for protecting free speech have any implications for speech within the United States. I argue they do, for this reason: even though our system of government is at its base democratic, actual citizen interactions with the government often are not experienced this way. This means that in addition to protecting democratic government, free speech also plays some of the same roles in the U.S. as in autocracies: permitting oversight over the bureaucracy, providing a safety valve, and granting legitimacy to high officials. I close by considering some doctrinal implications of this insight.

Assessing the Determinants of Information Accuracy in Coproduction

Coproduction is a way in which citizens are involved in delivery of public services. Earlier works in the coproduction literature focus on how citizen participation in government can help reduce costs and improve government services, but the study of how accurate the information gathered via coproduction has not yet been explored. This paper focuses on a coproduction mechanism with an explicit information gathering focus uses: 311 systems (call centers, websites, and smartphone apps). It utilizes the related crowdsourcing literature to better understand the potential errors of coproduction. This results show that task simplicity drives accurate, while task complexity drives inaccuracy. The results also demonstrate that the problems with coproduction are not always a problem of bad information, but poor program management (particularly response time to service requests).

Enabling Social Sustainability of E-Participation through Mobile Technology

The social sustainability of information and communication technology for development (ICT4D) projects such as e-government in developing nations remains a vexing issue. Particularly pertinent to the concept of e-government is that of electronic participation (e-participation) of citizens in services offered over an e-government platform, yet studies claim that such initiatives exacerbate the social exclusion problem. Globally, and specifically in Africa, the ineffective participation of citizens is marked by waning confidence in service delivery capabilities of political institutions, yet e-government is considered as one of the reform instrument for the attainment of good governance. Governments and pressure groups in many countries are realizing that these trends are problematic and are seeking to broaden and deepen citizen participation in governance, notably through the use of mobile technologies that continues to play a vital role in the trajectory of ICT development in Africa. This study advances the prominent role that mobile technology will play in anchoring e-participation strategies and policies to improve the social sustainability of ICT4D projects geared toward improving governance. The paper presents the results of cluster analysis of a survey aimed at assessing the accessibility, attitudes and the skills necessary for embedding mobile technology as part of an e-participation strategy.

An Arab Open Government Maturity Model for Social Media Engagement

While embrace of social media as a component of open government initiatives is still in its infancy in the Arab World, there is much expectation that public sector social media use will have a transformative impact on citizen participation in government, policy formation, and the way public sector entities conduct business. However, existing evolutionary models of e-government and open government maturity based on the experiences of Western democracies offer little support to Arab entities that operate in an institutional environment characterized by much different governance traditions. This study develops a social media maturity model which views public sector social media adoption as an evolutionary process that may involve substantial organizational changes for Arab institutions to move from initial stages of social media adoption to more advanced stages of social media use that truly reflect transparency, public participation, and collaboration. We find that current social media use by Arab government entities is focused primarily on one-way government to citizen communications that chronicle the activities of entities rather than offering additional public transparency and opportunities for citizen participation and collaboration. Arab open government initiatives remain focused on providing information on low priority activities which is already available via traditional media and on institutional websites. In this way, rather than being a force for reform, social media use in open government initiatives has perpetuated existing patterns of opacity, centralized decision making, and paternalism.

Governance and Citizen Engagement in the 21st Century

This mini-symposium on governance and citizen engagement consists of two interesting and informative articles. Each article takes a different approach in urging governments to engage citizens in governance processes – public policy formulation processes in particular – in order to strengthen governance and decrease citizen alienation, and for the establishment of a multicultural organizational moral code to enable the conduct of business across national boundaries. These papers were originally presented on a panel at the annual conference of the American Society for Public Administration,” March 2, 2102, in Las Vegas, Nevada. The fundamental assumption that underlies these articles is that citizen participation in governance using shared value sets is a necessity, not a nicety (Also see Kooiman, 2003). The implications of continuing citizen estrangement and alienation from governments appear to be approaching crisis levels in the United States (Box, 1998; King, 2011; King & Stivers, 1998), in many totalitarian nations in the Middle East and Asia (Farazmand 2002; 2009), and in the recent turbulence associated with the debt crises in Europe. Likewise, the increasing globalization of businesses, NGOs, and government alliances has been complicated and restricted by clashes of culturally-based values that cannot be resolved by simply expecting participants from one country to defer to the ethical codes of another. These articles thus present conceptual frameworks for citizen engagement that are rooted in the ethics of citizenship. “Sound Governance: Engaging Citizens through Collaborative Organizations,” by Ali Farazmand addresses the framing question, “Why is the issue of citizen engagement important enough to warrant a mini-symposium?” Or, “What are the stakes and/or the potential stakes?” Farazmand’s article articulates the need for citizen engagement compellingly: Citizen disengagement and alienation from government and governing is endemic in this era of rapid global change. Farazmand proposes that globalization of capital, “a process that transcends nation-states, economies, markets, Public Organiz Rev (2012) 12:219–221 DOI 10.1007/s11115-012-0190-y

Repairing the Budget Contract between Citizens and the State

This article argues that the budget is essentially a contract between citizens and the state, and that the contract is in a great state of disrepair. The ongoing debate and action in OECD countries should focus on post-crisis revenue and expenditure policies in order to repair this contract. The combination of fiscal stress, high expectations and citizen mistrust, however, greatly complicates the task. JEL classification: A130, H500, H600 Keywords: budget as contract, citizen expectations, citizen participation in government, trust in government, sustainable revenue and expenditure policies, accountability

A Human Rights Perspective on Citizen Participation in the EU's Governance of New Technologies

This article considers the EU’s approach to citizen participation in the governance of new technologies from a human rights perspective. Noting that there is a dearth of insight on the interplay between citizen participation and human rights, the article sketches the essence of its own human rights perspective as being about empowerment. This perspective is brought to bear on EU discourse on citizen participation in the governance of new technologies. Analysis of the discourse- comprising law, citizen participation in EU governance and citizen/science relations, the ‘public understanding of science and technology’, risk and bioethics - reveals a dis-empowering ‘deficit model’ of citizens in need of education through their participation in governance. The analysis thus suggests that citizen participation in EU governance of new technologies is not truly informed by human rights, but is instead used as a legitimating technique.

Public Participation in Post‐Fordist Urban Green Space Governance: The Case of Community Gardens in Berlin

This article examines citizen participation in the governance of contemporary urban green space. Rather than exploring normative questions of ideal forms of participatory democracy, it focuses on changing roles and relationships between local state and non-state actors in order to identify and explain the changing nature of participation. I argue that neoliberal urban restructuring has changed the conditions for participation and thus participation itself in fundamental ways and that we need an account of changes in statehood and governance in order to capture this conceptually. Based on the case of community gardens in Berlin, the article discusses the extent to which this changed relationship is expressed by current citizen participation as well as the potential and problems that result from it. My empirical results show the emergence of a new political acceptance of autonomously organized projects and active citizen participation in urban green space governance. The central argument of this article is that this new acceptance can be conceptualized as an expression of the neoliberalization of cities. Nevertheless, this neoliberal strategy at the same time leads to complex and contradictory outcomes and the resulting benefits are also acknowledged.

The Internet and Increased Citizen Participation in Government

What roles do communication systems, information technologies and the internet play in fostering citizen participation and influencing the electoral and administrative decisions of government? The internet is simultaneously a world-wide broadcasting network, a mechanism for information dissemination, and a medium for collaboration and interaction between individuals and their computers without regard for geographic boundaries or time zones. This article describes the origins of participatory democracy, discusses how modern concepts of democracy link to citizen participation, and describes the ways that newly-created spaces on the internet referred to as “polispheres” are being used by political activists and candidates to facilitate wider collaboration and citizen participation. The following questions are addressed: What role does the internet play in fostering and aiding citizen participation in government? Does increased involvement lead to greater trust and confidence in government? What role did the internet play in apparently reversing downward trends in citizen apathy and drawing 8 million new voters to the United States 2008 presidential election? The article suggests that information technology facilitates broader citizen participation and identifies the challenges facing governments in adopting internet-based ICT strategies.

Contingent Democratisation? The Rise and Fall of Participatory Budgeting in Buenos Aires

AbstractThe implementation of participatory budgeting in Buenos Aires following the crisis of December 2001 was a highly unlikely event. The different parties involved had competing and contradictory agendas that did not coincide with participatory budgeting's stated aims of extending citizen participation in government, but these interacted in a way that contingently created a space for a viable process to develop. Subsequent political shifts led to the demise of participatory budgeting, but the Buenos Aires case is nevertheless important because it highlights the way in which such processes can emerge in the absence of strong programmatic politics, thereby potentially opening new avenues for the promotion of democratic innovation.

Connecting Neighborhood Councils and City Agencies: Trust Building through the Learning and Design Forum Process

Though citizen trust in government is very important for the legitimacy of the government, there is evidence to show that citizen trust in government is decreasing, not only in the United States of America but also all over the world. Scholars argue that citizen participation and collaborative processes involving citizen stakeholders in government decision-making could lead to increasing citizen trust in government. However, the argument that citizen participation in governance and citizen-government collaboration can lead to increased trust in governance from a conceptual or macro level perspective is difficult to visualize or establish empirically. We suggest that this collaboration and participation has to be at the experiential micro or local government level rather than at the conceptual macro level. Citizen participation in general has to translate into collaborative relationships between specific micro-level citizen organizations and city or local public agencies. We also propose that citizen participation mechanisms like collaborations and cooperative arrangements as well as the processes of collaboration are critical to establish the participation-trust causal relationship. We then present our Learning and Design Forum model as a process that facilitates a sustainable agreement between neighborhood councils and city agencies model for developing mutual trust and collaboration.

The Role of the University as a Mediating Institution in Neighborhood Council-City Agency Collaboration

In a representative democracy, citizens depend on their public representatives and administrators to act on their behalf. However, city agencies often fail to respond to the needs of the people, who feel alienated from city hall because of the gap between expectations and reality, and this gap leads to a lack of trust between citizen groups and city administrators. Citizen participation in governance, especially in the form of neighborhood councils, is suggested as one solution to overcome this declining trust, because neighborhood councils can be an effective vehicle to collaborate with city agencies.

Citizenship education: does it have a place in the curriculum?

Abstract The call for citizenship education as a compulsory part of curriculum has met with a varied response worldwide. While everyone would espouse ideals of ensuring our young people grow up to be active and fair-minded citizens, why does citizenship education not figure more prominently in our curriculum'? This article discusses past, present, and possible future of citizenship education in New Zealand Curriculum. Introduction The call for citizenship education as a compulsory part of curriculum has met with a varied response worldwide. In United Kingdom it was made a compulsory cross-curricular theme in 2002 (see, for example, Kerr, 2002); in United States (where it is known as civics) it is a curriculum area with a set of national standards (Pederson & Cogan, 20(12); in Australia there is ministerial endorsement of Discovering Democracy (a programme that is federally funded and distributed to all states) and there are active citizenship programmes in most states (O'Brien & Parry, 2002); in Canada there has been renewed interest across provinces (Hebert & Sears, 2001); in New Zealand, it barely rates a mention. This article takes notion of citizenship education and discusses its relationship to current New Zealand curriculum. Why has this concept not taken root? I will argue that although it is not specifically named as such, it does exist in a range of guises. I will also argue that there is huge potential for enhancing and strengthening threads that do exist. This article begins with a general discussion of citizenship and citizenship education. I then examine history of citizenship education in New Zealand curriculum and discuss its current status before concluding with recommendations for strengthening its potential. Citizenship: what is it? If not born in New Zealand or of New Zealand parentage, an applicant for New Zealand citizenship must, under Citizenship Act 1977, have: * completed a period of permanent residency for three years (or two years, if married to a new Zealand citizen); * intention to continue to live in New Zealand; * ability to understand and speak English; * a knowledge of and privileges of New Zealand citizenship; and * been certified to be of good character. (1) So what are these responsibilities and privileges? Yvonne Hebert and Alan Sears (2001), writing for Canadian Education Association, define citizenship as the relationship between individual and state, and among individuals within a (p. 1). Rob Gilbert (1996, p.108), an Australian social studies educator, views citizenship as a contested term. He explains: Some definitions emphasise nation stale as an entity to which people should give allegiance and loyalty. Other definitions emphasise individual rights or a sense of shared loyalty. Others focus on citizen participation in government. Gilbert outlines four major views of citizenship: * as a status implying formal rights and duties; * as an identity and a set of moral and social virtues based on democratic ideal; * as a public practice conducted through legal and political processes; and * as participation in decision making in all aspects of life. When discussing citizenship in New Zealand elsewhere (for example, Mutch, 2005) I have adapted these categories as follows, with second one being separated into two to make a total of five: citizenship as status; citizenship as identity; citizenship as democratic ideal, citizenship as public practice; and citizenship as participation. Citizenship as status relates to legal rights and that a person has as a member of a nation state and of a community within that political entity. Citizenship as identity is broader than purely national identity--it can include religious, political, ethnic, regional, or other affiliations, a notion that Kymlicka (1995) calls multicultural or multiple citizenship. …

Citizen Participation in Governance Through Representation: Issue of Gender in East Asia

In the modern age, although East Asia represents some of the most successful economies such as Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea, and (now) China, the level of political and administrative development in the region remains controversial. One of the major indicators of such politico‐administrative development is the extent of citizen participation in governance through various democratic means, including the formation and expression of public opinion, people's involvement in government decisions and deliberations, and direct representation of citizens in governing institutions. However, the direct representation of citizens is considered one of the most effective modes of participation in institutions such as legislature, cabinet, and bureaucracy. In this regard, although the representation of women in these governing institutions has gained global significance, it still remains relatively weak in most East Asian cases. This article evaluates the extent of such women's participation in governance through representation in East Asia, examines the major factors constraining this representation, and suggests remedial alternatives to improve the situation.