Too big to fly? A review of the first EU citizens' conferences

Boussaguet, Laurie; Dehousse, Renaud

doi:10.3152/030234209x481996

Cited by 13 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 10 publications

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“…FGs can be conducted at the national level with a group of diverse citizens who speak the same language and are able to take the specificities of the local context into account. Given that the project was transnational in scope, it was important to address how to manage the diversity and the complex logistical set-up [18]. Preparation, data collection, analysis, and reporting of the FGs took place in the period from January 2013 to February 2014.…”

Section: Approachmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A second uncertainty relates to the transnational character of the study, as this may give rise to specific methodological challenges [18]. Although previous transnational participatory studies [19] have shown that such initiatives are in principle feasible and that citizens value them, participation tends to be much more difficult to organize.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Toward a Socially Desirable EU Research and Innovation Agenda on Urban Waste: A Transnational EU Citizen Consultation

Lynch¹,

Kupper²,

Broerse³

2018

Sustainability

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Growing waste production has become a global sustainability challenge that is in need of innovative solutions. It has been argued that greater public engagement in science and technology policy could stimulate new directions for innovation and provide orientation for the development of more acceptable, sustainable, and desirable innovations that address societal needs. In 2013, the European Commission (EC) piloted a EU-wide study to engage citizens in setting the research and innovation (R&I) agenda on urban waste. This yielded the question: 'To what extent are the proposed ideas considered innovative, feasible, and meaningful for the EC R&I agenda?' This article addresses the outcomes of 100 focus group discussions held in 27 European Union (EU) countries in which 992 citizens were consulted. Citizens discussed a number of (self-experienced) barriers and concerns regarding waste management, and proposed and prioritized over 350 ideas to realize a (near) zero-waste society. Although citizens found it complex to propose innovative and feasible ideas, their priorities were consistent with current EU research policy areas of importance (e.g., reduce packaging, stimulate recycling), and in addition, citizens proposed various new ways to strengthen current waste management (e.g., innovations to enhance convenience in household waste management). We argue that citizen involvement in EC R&I agenda-setting across the EU is feasible, and leads to meaningful input. However, in making sense of this input, it is essential to take contextual differences into account. Various recommendations are given for future agenda-setting activities at the EU level.

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Section: Approachmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Toward a Socially Desirable EU Research and Innovation Agenda on Urban Waste: A Transnational EU Citizen Consultation

Lynch¹,

Kupper²,

Broerse³

2018

Sustainability

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“…The citizens' conference model has been repeatedly copied, modified, and exported throughout the world. The first citizens' conference organized at the European level took place in 2005 (Boussaguet and Dehousse 2009). Fourteen citizens from each of nine EU countries came together in a series of national and European meetings to discuss the social and ethical implications of modern neuroscience (www.meetingmindseurope.org).…”

Section: The Citizens' Conference Modelmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Paradox of Participation Experiments

Bogner

2011

Science, Technology, & Human Values

116

117

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An ongoing trend in technology policy has been to advocate participation. However, the author claims that lay citizens’ participation typically materializes in the form of a laboratory experiment at present. That is, lay participation as currently organized by professional participation experts under controlled conditions rarely is linked to public controversies, to the pursuit of political participation or to individual concerns. Derived from qualitative research on two citizen conferences, the author shows empirically that in practice, this laboratory participation leads to paradoxical effects: successfully carrying out the experiment results in a systematic disappointment of the hope for gains in rationality typically attached to lay participation. Finally, the author relates this result to sociological debates about new modes of knowledge production. Under such a perspective, the author sees a paradoxical development: while society at large is becoming a laboratory in which knowledge is produced, participation practice is retreating from society into the lab.

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“…The context of these initiatives includes ongoing debate about the democratic deficit of the EU, which some policy makers and academic commentators have suggested can at least partially be addressed through the use of ideas associated with deliberative democracy. 34 The recent use of deliberative polling is a particularly helpful case study of the limits and potentials of mini-publics as means of promoting deliberative democratic values in transnational settings. Reflection on the polls suggests that it may be illuminating to shift our attention away from what is becoming a familiar set of issues in the critical literature on deliberative polling, toward the more underexplored issue of the determination of relevant publics in transnational settings.…”

Section: The Case Of Deliberative Polling In the Eumentioning

confidence: 99%

Anticipating Transnational Publics

Smith

2013

Politics & Society

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This article evaluates mini-publics as a potential means of realizing deliberative democratic values in transnational contexts. A mini-public is a group of citizens that is chosen by random or near-random selection to debate matters of public concern in a suitably structured deliberative environment. The argument of the article is that minipublics can be an important deliberative resource, but only as supplements to rather than replacements for alternative means of reforming transnational institutions. These forums can be used to prefigure transnational publics, but entrenched institutional assumptions about the delineation and definition of these publics must be subject to critical scrutiny by other elements of a transnational deliberative system. This argument is developed through a critical engagement with the literature on minipublics, an analysis of a prominent example of a transnational mini-public, and a defense of the role of civil society as a resource for counteracting the shortcomings of mini-publics.

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Too big to fly? A review of the first EU citizens' conferences

Cited by 13 publications

References 10 publications

Toward a Socially Desirable EU Research and Innovation Agenda on Urban Waste: A Transnational EU Citizen Consultation

Toward a Socially Desirable EU Research and Innovation Agenda on Urban Waste: A Transnational EU Citizen Consultation

The Paradox of Participation Experiments

Anticipating Transnational Publics

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