In this chapter, the authors present and discuss the results of the IDEAL-EU project, in which three European Regions - i.e. Tuscany, Catalonia, and Poitou-Charentes - have involved citizens (and particularly young people) in discussing and deliberating on the priorities of the new climate change agenda of the European Parliament, supported by two distinct ICT instruments: a Social Networking Platform and a pan-European Virtual Town Meeting. The authors describe and assess the technical tasks and the concrete initiatives undertaken from project conception to the end of trials. They introduce a participatory workflow composed of four modules: 1) agenda setting and prior analysis, 2) getting support and topic refinement, 3) discussion and deliberation, and 4) orchestration and evaluation. Finally, the authors address the sustainability of the IDEAL-EU workflow and its corresponding ICT infrastructure in the perspective of future utilization in additional eParticipation experiments.
One of the main factors contributing to the limited impact of eParticipation projects is the presence of a high level of social complexity that has been identified by Macintosh as one of the five challenges in the implementation of eParticipation practices. How to make sense of social complexity is still an open issue as well as the way governments can take benefit from the wealth of information that is already available on their constituencies’ collective behaviour. In this paper, we contend that the presence of a considerable variance in terms of political interests, educational level and technological skills makes it very difficult to design workable and effective systems to support participation. A modular strategy is then recommended requiring policy designers to make a step towards citizens rather than expecting the citizenry to move their content production activity onto the “official” spaces created for ad hoc participation.
Abstract. Among the various analytical dimensions purporting to an appraisal of the replication potential of eParticipation projects, institutional factors deserve considerably more attention by theorists and practitioners alike. This paper introduces a "process oriented" definition of sustainable eParticipation, based on five key attributes: juridical compliance, legitimacy, social value, efficiency, and productivity. These can be used to assess the level of potential integration of a participatory practice or trial within the legal, political, social and organisational contexts of the public sector institutions involved. We posit that sustainable participation will emerge whenever these five dimensions are not jeopardised, compromised, or are left unaltered, by the introduction of participatory elements into any decision-making process regarding issues of public relevance. Empirical investigation is recommended to assess the impact of specific Preparatory Actions on eParticipation by using the five propositions introduced.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.