Description
This project intends to help bring about change in organizations and in society, by exploring new pathways for the exercise of citizenship, and by building up trust between institutions and populations. It includes the creation of an annual good practices award for local authorities, and training activities aimed at local government technicians. It will also take the debate on active citizenship to Parliament and involve the parliamentary groups. The project consists of 3 phases: systematization of good practices on participatory democracy; training of actors for social innovation; and implementation, experimentation, consolidation and dissemination of practices regarding participatory democracy. Based on the working experience of the various participating organizations, and in the day-to-day life of the various communities involved, the project will empower organizations with regard to methodologies for participatory democracy, and experiment with new ways for social innovation.
Summary of project results
In Portugal the citizen’s participation in public life and political decisions is very low, even in local communities. Local authorities neither stimulate participation nor promote public auditions in order to know what the population want or need to guide their decisions. It is therefore crucial to empower the communities to have more intervention in local political decisions. Civil society must organize itself and create fora of discussion and formulation of collective opinions as a means to influence local decisions, to advocate more participation from municipal powers, to create a sustainable dialogue between local, regional and central level actors and to promote a more strategic and integrated approach to local and regional development. This project has trained officials and activists, disseminated practices of participation in four municipalities of Portugal as a first step to create a movement across the country of local governments engaged in favouring civil society participation. The project enabled the experimentation of 5 participation practices, conducted 21 training workshops, 6 regional forums and 4 conferences, 3 national and 1 International. The events occurred in a decentralized manner in 11 different cities. 97 people participated in specific training on experimental methodologies and 987 in workshops and conferences. A Network of Participatory Municipalities was created, gathering 47 Municipal Councils and 2 Parish Boards, with 46 NGOs also joining the project activities. The various national authorities have been involved too; as well as 14 higher education institutions. The "Recommendations for the Strengthening of Participative Democracy in Portugal" were sent to the National Parliament; and guides have been produced to disseminate the practices among the partner territories. The project has surpassed its ambitions: 8 public practices have been changed due to the influence of the project; 19 cooperation and dialogue activities have been initiated or developed; 117 people have been trained on citizens’ participation on public decision-making, and 51 people have been engaged in a community of practice on these issues. The project was a source of experience and knowledge on citizens’ participation for the NGO staff. The network of local governments that was set up, the mobilisation of so many actors and the skills gained ensure that the project will be sustainable and replicated elsewhere in the country.
Summary of bilateral results