Wicked games changing the storyline of urban planning

A survey of methods for evaluating mini-publics

“…A study of participant interviews, which developed a “multidimensional evaluation model” with the factors of content dependence, stakeholder role, multi-tiered data, and development of criteria, demonstrates that the accuracy of and interest in deliberation topics and well-skilled facilitators are important for an effective process (Lundström et al 2016 ). Lundström et al ( 2016 ) contend that a clear vision for integration into the political decision-making system should ensure that citizens play active roles and do not remain only audience members; it is challenging to handle people who are inexperienced at participating in a deliberative process and justifying their opinions.…”

“…A study of participant interviews, which developed a “multidimensional evaluation model” with the factors of content dependence, stakeholder role, multi-tiered data, and development of criteria, demonstrates that the accuracy of and interest in deliberation topics and well-skilled facilitators are important for an effective process (Lundström et al 2016 ). Lundström et al ( 2016 ) contend that a clear vision for integration into the political decision-making system should ensure that citizens play active roles and do not remain only audience members; it is challenging to handle people who are inexperienced at participating in a deliberative process and justifying their opinions. Jones and Einsiedel ( 2011 ), in a study that analyzed semi-structured interviews with policy-makers and examined the institutionalization of the mini-publics method, noted that rational deliberations among various stakeholders took time but produced valuable results, including a new mechanism for ensuring transparency and accountability in decision-making process.…”

“…Regarding the theme of environment/society, the analyzed mini-publics were primarily in the field of urban planning. In recent years, problems that have been previously treated as tame by experts have been increasingly regarded as wicked problems; mini-publics on road maintenance, regional planning, and gasification plant installations were carried out (Franceschini and Marletto 2015 ; Lundström et al 2016 ; Mannarini et al 2018 ). Deliberations on the use of water resources allocation with biological and sociological interests were also undertaken (Straton et al 2011 ).…”

Ethics to Intersect Civic Participation and Formal Guidance

“…Experience in other fields shows that dedicated governance capabilities are required to handle appropriately complex-adaptive dynamics [1,8,16,26,74]. Such capabilities include adaptive, deliberative and participatory practices, reflexivity and variety of frames, resilience to uncertainties, responsiveness and capability to observe, revitalisation to block unproductive patterns, rescaling as well as cross-scale interactions.…”

“…The "blue" techno-commercial operations in the marine environment are embedded in global supply-chains and are subject to multi-level regulation/management. These features likely cause that marine "social-ecological systems" exhibit "complex-adaptive" dynamics [8], and therefore require modes of governance that account for the complexity and the inherent unpredictability [9,10]. People (or human agents, stakeholders), institutions (or governments, governance arrangements) and corporations and civil society organisations together co-shape complex-adaptive socio-ecological systems [11][12][13].…”