What Does it Mean to Mainstream Participation in Decision-Making?

A “deliberative wave” is sweeping the world, but how much policy change is it leaving in its wake? The OECD has tracked citizens’ assemblies and other deliberative processes across 34 countries, with over 80,000 citizens having been randomly selected to take part in these activities since 1979. But while there has been much energy and excitement surrounding citizens’ assemblies in recent years, there has also been growing concern about their impact on decision-making.

This experience is hardly unique. In the decades-long discussion of the value of participatory and deliberative democracy, there have regularly been such criticisms of processes not being adequately empowered or connected to decision-making.

A major part of the problem is that these participatory and deliberative processes are not yet mainstreamed or embedded into government. They typically rely on the patronage and skills of specific reformers, but often come up against institutional processes, capacity gaps, and work cultures that are inhospitable to their impact or longevity.

In response, there is an increasing push toward mainstreaming participationInstitutionalizing opportunities for public participation in decision-making enhances government capacity for continuous and meaningful engagement with the public, ensuring that participatory processe.... Let’s take a closer look at what a mainstreaming approach might mean.

The Mainstreaming Approach

The Open Gov Challenge is very explicit about the need for deeper participation, which focuses on ensuring there is a legal framework to support a higher level of public involvement in policy-making and creating institutional mechanisms that are responsible for improving participation.

To deal with the shortcomings, we propose a basic framework for understanding and achieving mainstreaming:

• Make participation commonplace: Transition from sporadic events to enduring rights and opportunities for citizens to engage.
• Elevate the quality of participation: Equip institutions with the skills and resources to design and execute fit-for-purpose, innovative, and inclusive engagement processes.
• Enhance the impact of participation: Establish clear connections between public input and decision-making processes, potentially even delegating decision-making authority to citizens.
• Ensure consistency in participation: Promote the adoption of best practices across government agencies and sectors, fostering a coherent whole-of-government approach to public participationGiving citizens opportunities to provide input into government decision-making leads to more effective governance, improved public service delivery, and more equitable outcomes. Technical specificatio... at all levels. In particular, ensure that the relationship between participation activities and legislative or administrative decisions is clear and understood, rather than ad hoc.

Approaches to Mainstreaming Public Participation

Across OGP’s membership, we are seeing a few common approaches to mainstreaming public participation. Below is a list of promising reforms.

Develop frameworks, minimum standards and guidance for the conduct of public participation. The United States is developing a Federal Framework for Public Participation and Community Engagement (PPCE) and a Federal PPCE Toolkit of leading practices, guidance and case studies.

Institutionalize specific methods or mechanisms of participation. This could include constituting a standing citizens’ assembly or implementing a centralized digital participation platform). Finland has developed a model of National Dialogues, which is continuing to be strengthened to improve inclusionOGP participating governments are working to create governments that truly serve all people. Commitments in this area may address persons with disabilities, women and girls, lesbian, gay, bisexual, tr..., expand use, and utilize their results.

Introduce new or enhanced rights and requirements for participation. An example is the passing of laws that require public involvement in certain decisions. Croatia introduced amendments to the Rules of Procedure to require proposals of draft laws to undergo a consultative process (aligned with the Code of Practice on Consultation). Proposals must also include a report on the outcomes of consultations together with the relevant draft law.

Establish participation teams, centers of good practice, or independent participation bodies. Armenia is establishing a Participatory Governance Unit within the Prime Minister’s Office to build institutional capacity for inclusive public participation.

Create dedicated budgets and resources to support public participation processes. Estonia has developed a co-creation accelerator to support government ministries’ engagement activities related to EU structural funds by awarding grants of up to €50,000 and a three-day development program.

Promote an institutional culture of openness and collaboration compatible with public participation in decision-making. The Netherlands is professionalizing participation by establishing a knowledge network of public participation professionals from within and outside government, supporting interdepartmental collaboration on participation, and designing an online participation guide for participation.

Remove structural barriers to public participation. France is defining a Citizen Participant Status Framework to support people involved in long-term deliberative initiatives, potentially through payments or special work leave allowances, enabling greater accessibility and inclusivity.

These individual examples are positive. Often, however, they remain piecemeal, addressing some barriers to participation, but not others. Similarly, they only rarely formalize the links between participatory processes and decision-making. Future efforts to mainstream public participation would be strengthened by taking more of a holistic, strategic, and whole-of-government approach, as described in the Open Gov Challenge.