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Citizen engagement: from promise to practice

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  1. Chapter 1: Introduction
    2 Paragrafen
  2. Chapter 2: Start with the right questions
    5 Paragrafen
  3. Chapter 3: Designing the participation process
    6 Paragrafen
  4. Chapter 4: Making participation succeed
    6 Paragrafen
  5. Chapter 5: Understanding the impact of participation
    4 Paragrafen
  6. Chapter 6: Skills, capacity, policies and governance needed
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  7. Chapter 7: Final thoughts
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Hoofdstuk vooruitgang
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So far, we’ve focused on getting politicians and people in the organisation on board. Now it’s time to think about everyone else: the residents, civil society groups, and other people who actually have a stake in the issue. 

1. Who is directly affected?

Start with the people who’ll actually feel the impact in their everyday life. If a decision affects you directly, that’s usually reason enough to have a seat at the table.

2. Who has useful knowledge or expertise?

This includes professionals, researchers, or specialists who understand the technical or practical side of the issue. Their input helps ground the conversation in what’s realistic and what’s already known.

3. Who has lived experience that matters?

Some people don’t need to study an issue, they’ve lived it. That kind of knowledge counts just as much as expertise, and it often shows things that experts alone would miss.

Dia 1 van 3 wordt weergegeven

Think broadly! Depending on the topic, you this includes: residents or inhabitants, community groups, civil society organisations, academic experts, public officials, political actors, local businesses, service providers, or people with specific lived experience.

Who's often left out?

Meaningful participation requires extra effort for those often left out: newcomers, young people, residents from vulnerable socio-economic backgrounds, people with disabilities,  time-poor parents, and people who feel that showing up rarely changes anything. Without that effort, the same familiar faces tend to show up again and again. And since every community looks different, it helps to actually know yours, rather than assume one pattern fits all.

Go to

For more on how to reach those people in practice and how to remove barriers to participation, see: 4.2: Bring in diverse voices.

Engaging youth

Ever tried to get a teenager excited about a city council meeting? Good luck, you might be thinking. And yet, somehow, it’s possible. Give young people the right stage, the right questions, and enough time, and they turn from too-cool-for-school into unstoppable.

In this video, Urban, Joe and Sophie from IYTT share their experiences on inviting young people to the table.

1. Young people see what others miss.
They bring fresh, creative perspectives. Fewer years inside existing systems means fewer assumptions about how things "have to" work.
2. Young people are experts in their own lives.
They understand their peers' needs firsthand. They carry raw, passionate energy that adults often underestimate or dismiss.
3. Avoid the kids' table.
Engagement becomes tokenism when it's designed only for the young participants' sake. Frame participation initiatives as valuable for the whole community, not just for those involved.
4. Give young people room to grow.
The process creates rare political engagement, both for the youth and the public they interview. Reserved participants often grow into confident, empowered voices.

Youth engaging in democracy

The case of the International Youth Think Thank

IYTT Summer Camp

Discover how the IYTT Summer Camp trains young civic leaders to turn citizens' voices into concrete policy proposals for local decision-makers.

Neighbourhooding Democracy

Discover how young people turned neighbourhood observations into a public exhibition on urban democracy in Gothenburg.

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