There are many reason to use Participatory Budgeting. Such as to inspire citizens to take greater responsibility within their community, or to strengthen the democratic mandate of elected officials. A significant additional reason is to promote open and transparent government, at all levels. As a piece of municipal ‘graffiti’ in Brazil, the home of Participatory… Read More
International
What's happening in Participatory Budgeting internationally
A Process of Growth: The Expansion of Participatory Budgeting in the United States and Canada in 2015 – 16
A new report by Public Agenda explains how over 101,000 residents of the USA and Canada have been involved in deciding on over $60m of public funds through PB. In "A Process of Growth:The Expansion of Participatory Budgeting in the United States and Canada in 2015 – 16″ they explain how this is happening. Some… Read More
Participatory Budgeting in West Pokot: Hearing the voices of women
A film about participatory budgeting in Kenya was first shown to an international audience at the ‘lived experiences’ session of the Engage, Think, Do! PB fringe conference held in Edinburgh in October 2016. The film showed how PB worked in West Pokot in 2016. It looked at the history of this innovative process in that… Read More
Should sustainability be a factor within Participatory Budgeting
"Should sustainability be a factor in PB" is a blog by Jez Hall, reflecting on discussions on PB at the Lived Experience workshop of Engage, Think, Do!, and the presentations from Kenya and elsewhere on PB at scale. What does the famous picture of a load of sailors on a raft have to do with… Read More
Engage, Think, Do!… the conference report page
We’ve created this page to pull together a set of post conference blogs, presentations and resources. We had a great time at Engage, Think, Do! and want to share the love. Presentations: A highlight of the many powerpoint presentations given on the day (all PDF format): International Learning workshop presentation by Reema Patel, RSA Participatory… Read More
Portugal embarks on a national Participatory Budgeting programme and citizens may be able to vote at the local cashpoint machine!
Apolitical, a website that describes its mission ‘to make government great for citizens everywhere’ has reported on the exciting development of what is believed to be the first national participatory budgeting programme on a national scale. The project will let people submit ideas for what the government should spend its money on, and then vote… Read More
When East meets West. A view of Participatory Budgeting (PB) from the Far East
A guest blog by Susan Ritchie, describing her recent visit to China to exchange learning on PB. The Invitation PB Partners supports Participatory Budgeting as a method of improving democracy, community engagement, and wider social justice across the UK. PB in all of its forms (of which there are many emerging) enables communities or organisations… Read More
Seattle Youths Vote to Spend Nearly $300,000 of City Budget on Homelessness
In an earlier article on this site we described the $700,000 Seattle youth PB process. Since then its been reported that $300,000 of that money, nearly 50%, went on initiatives to help reduce the plight of homeless people in the city, including young homeless. The process started in January with several assemblies where the public… Read More
Can Children Take Part in PB?
This article is an extract from the full story on the website of the Center for Urban Pegagogy in the USA and was published in 2012. How can someone who is too young to vote have a say in the future of their neighbourhood? What does civics really look like in action? In the spring… Read More
Doing Democracy with Chicken Cutlets and Pearl Milk Tea in Taipei
The annual budget of the Taipei City Government is more than NTD 160 billion (£3.8b). City residents may not have a good understanding of how large this number is or how this budget is used. Providing such an understanding is key to promoting civic participation reports the About Taipai website. In Taipai they have been… Read More