Citizens express persistent dissatisfaction with how representative democracy is practised. While democracy remains widely supported, a gap between democratic values and their implementation has created a crisis of representation.
The answer isn’t less democracy, but more. New participatory and deliberative processes aimed at involving citizens in decision-making are gaining traction across Europe, but their long-term success depends on how well they are embedded into the public administration and society.
This is why we conducted 17 in-depth interviews with senior civil servants across local, national, and EU governance levels across five European countries. Based on this qualitative, interview-based research, our report, “Governing with citizens: Embedding democratic innovations into societies”, drafted by Demos Helsinki’s Sahib Singh, maps key trends, persistent challenges, and actionable recommendations to better embed these innovations into our democratic systems, as well as indicating future policy directions.
Read the full report, or explore a snapshot of key findings below:
Trends
Diverging priorities: The use of deliberative and participatory tools to transform societal conditions, deepen democracy and address socioeconomic justice has receded. Today’s governments prioritise goals of policy efficacy or legitimation of existing representative institutions.
Slowing growth: Growth of deliberative innovations and participatory budgeting has been steady over decades but has receded since 2021.
Local governments lead the way: Most democratic innovations take place at the local level, although many now have a broader definition of what’s “local”.
Increasing institutionalisation: Participatory budgeting initiatives have become part of institutional practice for some time. Furthermore, the rate at which similar initiatives have become embedded into institutions has increased dramatically since 2020.
Uneven adoption across Europe: Innovations are asymmetrically embraced and clustered around certain political systems across Europe.
Addressing complex problems: Innovations are increasingly used to address long-term, complex, technical and politically sensitive topics, offering success in some cases and unclear results in others.
Recommendations
For policymakers, practitioners, advocates, civil society and politicians
1 – Policymakers at all levels of government need to build new, diverse alliances of participatory policymakers across institutions. Such alliances, when diverse, improve standards and best practices.
2 – Tactically advocate for democratic innovations through narratives that emphasise policy efficacy, legitimation of public institutions and resilience.
3 – Build robust evidence base for the efficacy of different democratic innovations to demonstrate their sustainability and long-term impact.
4 – Develop an understanding of the existing and often complex legislative environment in which these participatory tools are used.
5 – Build in-house capabilities, governance systems and financial resources for citizen participation across government administrations.
For policymakers, practitioners, social movements and civil society
6 – Effectively combine bottom-up and top-down approaches to embedding democratic innovations.
7 – Facilitate civil society and local actors in leading democratic innovations that challenge government policy by shaping public discourse.
8 – Ensure the effective integration of local civil society and community leaders in the design, governance and implementation of democratic innovations.
9 – Strategically combine democratic innovations to address problems of scale and to centre long-term socio-economic equity.
10 – Sustainably devolve decision-making and invest in a social infrastructure that empowers citizens and local communities.
