PARTICIPATORY BUDGETING
The concept of participatory budgeting was developed in the late 1980s by the Brazilian Workers' Party. It was first fully implemented in the City of Porto Alegre. Since then, the concept has spread mainly in South America but has also been taken up in North America and several European countries, especially at the community level. Adapted to different local circumstances, various applications of the concept helped its further development. It proved to be a helpful democratizing tool, increasing social cohesion in communities and fostering a sense of self-efficacy among their members.
Participatory budgeting is a joint decision-making process on the distribution of public funds, with the aim of making this process more inclusive. The idea is that ordinary residents can actively participate in policy proposals’ development and selection. Participatory budgeting is therefore related to participatory democracy, direct democracy, and citizen sourcing.
Participatory democracy aims to increase the involvement of groups of people who are otherwise underrepresented or marginalized in political decision-making. In most cases, low-threshold forms of participation are used to enable as many people as possible to participate. These forms of participation are often digital.
Just as in the case of other forms of participatory democracy, the main challenge of participatory budgeting is mobilizing huge citizen participation in deliberation and decision-making. This should go beyond the social groups that are already engaged in representative democracy and citizen participation, especially those consisting of highly educated, high-income males connected to civil society organizations.
The concept of participatory budget development is potentially of outstanding importance in the field of cultural policy. It could respond to many contemporary societal challenges, brought about by globalization, migration, greater cultural diversity, digitalisation, and demands for greater participation and proximity to citizens. Furthermore, given the stability prevailing in cultural offerings, participatory budget development could not only lead to greater inclusion of previously marginalized groups but also to greater innovation and diversity in the cultural field. Namely, it is premised on citizens’ spontaneous contributions of their ideas and preferences to the discussion. In addition to leading to better policy outcomes, participatory budgeting could also increase the legitimacy of cultural policy.
Currently, the advocates of participatory budgeting are still trying to establish the concept in cultural policy. It promises more inclusiveness, more citizen participation, and more legitimacy for cultural policy. However, it still struggles with two sets of challenges. On the one hand, it is not easy to overcome the resistance of established cultural politicians and administrations, worried about the loss of their decision-making power. On the other hand, there is the difficulty of really mobilizing citizens beyond the already politically privileged social groups.
Based on all that has been said, one can conclude that participatory budgeting is a promising way to involve citizens in decision-making processes for the common good and to include marginalised population groups. The concept is still in its exploratory stage. To prosper and unfold its potential, it needs to be further popularised, among other things, by spreading the word about its current applications. By examining the experiment of participatory budgeting in the city of Zurich and presenting it as a case study, the INVENT project hopes to contribute to that goal. (JR, LF)