Participatory Dialogues
The Participatory Dialogues are spaces for meetings between citizens and state authorities (both national and local) to foster dialogue on matters of public interest. They are framed by Law Nr. 20500 on Citizen Participation. It allows to invoke a process where citizens can channel their concerns, ideas and solutions on specific issues or public policies. The methodology includes a regulated but flexible procedure, and defines beforeheand stakeholders and territorial units to be engaged. The process begins with the delivery of information on the subjects to be debated; it then continues with the "Working Platforms", activities with clear goals and deadlines established among the citizens and the authorities; finally the process concludes with a joint evaluative meeting. For the development of Dialogues, the "participatory dialogue" technique has been based on the Open Space methodology, and is used to generate conversations and agreements dynamically with a large number of participants. These meetings last for a half day or a day, and allow a large group of people (between 40-1000) to gather in the same venue to discuss a topic, analyze, debate, make agreements, and finally prioritize those agreements. The stakeholders engaged during the process are essentially two: civil society, through representatives, partner organizations, and citizens directly interested or affected by the issue, and the state body that convenes for the subject of public interest. Among other examples, these dialogues have been implemented by the Ministry of Sports and the Ministry of Health, with the participation of thousands of people who became involved in them.
Institutional design
Formalization: is the innovation embedded in the constitution or legislation, in an administrative act, or not formalized at all?
Frequency: how often does the innovation take place: only once, sporadically, or is it permanent or regular?
Mode of Selection of Participants: is the innovation open to all participants, access is restricted to some kind of condition, or both methods apply?
Type of participants: those who participate are individual citizens, civil society organizations, private stakeholders or a combination of those?
Decisiveness: does the innovation takes binding, non-binding or no decision at all?
Co-governance: is there involvement of the government in the process or not?
- Formalization
- embedded in the constitution/legislation
- Frequency
- sporadic
- Mode of selection of participants
- both
- Type of participants
- citizens civil society private stakeholders
- Decisiveness
- democratic innovation yields no decision
- Co-Governance
- yes
Means
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Ends
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