EUKN - European Urban Knowledge Network - Participatory Methods Toolkit

Participatory Methods Toolkit - A practitioner’s manual

Introduction

To facilitate practical knowledge sharing, the King Baudouin Foundation and the Flemish Institute for Science and Technology Assessment, both actively involved in participatory methods, decided to edit a publication with the ambition to create a hands-on toolkit for starting up and managing participatory projects.

Description

The manual starts with a general theoretical introduction into participatory methods. Why should one opt for a more participatory mode of policy making? When is a participatory approach appropriate?

The second part of the manual is more practical. This part of the manual offers an overview and explanation of thirteen participatory methods. Each of the methods is thoroughly described and assessed. A comparison based on a number of relevant aspects is made for all the methods.

Background information

A participatory approach to policy-making is a way of building social cohesion. It is a useful process to achieve consensus when differences in opinion and even conflicts need to be resolved. When this approach is taken up early in the process, participants can share their perspectives, values and reasoning on an emerging issue as these develop and mature. When opinions have already been polarised, some methods are particularly useful at mediating between interest groups to achieve consensus or at least arrive at a common decision after all perspectives have been expressed. At a minimum, these methods help all voices to be heard and thereby give life to democracy.

Conclusions

Effective and meaningful public involvement is essential to:

enable high quality and democratic governance;
strengthen civil capacity;
develop and deliver programmes effectively and efficiently build public confidence and trust in decisions;
generate a greater understanding of public issues, concerns, priorities and solutions;
build broader support for programmes and initiatives;
increase mutual learning through the sharing of information, data and experiences;
ensure that decisions and policies incorporate knowledge and expertise that otherwise might be overlooked;
reflect a wider range of public concerns and values in decision-making;
rapidly identify possible controversial aspects of an issue and help bring together different points of view to achieve consensus in a collaborative manner.

Contact info

Flemish Institute for Science and Technology Assessment, viWTA
Phone: +32 2 552 40 50
viwta@vlaamsparlement.be

Publication date

01/09/2005

Researcher

Stef Steyaert (viWTA) and Hervé Lisoir (King Baudouin Foundation)

Article info
ISBN: 9051305060

Links

Flemish Institute for Science and Technology Assessment King Baudouin Foundation

Participatory Methods Toolkit - A practitioner’s manual (PDF, Eng, 1.4 MB)

Document type

research

Themes

Urban Policy > Social inclusion & integration > Community development

Keywords

Capacity building, Citizens' participation