On the 26th October 2015 the PB Network held our national Participatory Budgeting(PB) conference. Over 70 people gathered for a stimulating day of workshops, debates and presentations. The conference was held at Studio Innovate rooms in the heart of Birmigham city centre, as well as a range of breakout spaces. Providing us with a modern… Read More
Well London uses Participatory Budgeting to improve health and wellbeing
Running over a number of years the Well London health and wellbeing initiative has been using participatory budgeting styled events to select projects for support, using money from the National Lottery and other local funding sources. Across a wide number of areas hundreds of people have been engaged in projects that bring wellbeing. As reported… Read More
Up2Us Oldham Big Local… £14,000 up for grabs
People from Clarksfield, Greenacres and Littlemoor were invited to Big Local Oldham’s Up2us event on Saturday 27th June 2-5 at Elim Fountain of Hope Church, Greenacres Road. This was an exciting opportunity for local people to find out about activities in the area and decide how funding will be spent in their own neighbourhood. At… Read More
£18,000 for YOU to spend in the Gallatown area
Gallatown YOU Decide is a new opportunity to increase, continue and support community activities in the Gallatown area. Gallatown is a suburban village outside Kirkcaldy, Fife. In June this year residents of Gallatown had the chance to decide how to spend £18,000 to support opportunities for people to become more creative and take part in… Read More
Democracy has become the political version of kale, almost everyone says its good, but few want to eat it
In a new blog entitled ‘let them eat kale’ by Peter Bryant, PB Partners associate and head of community engagement at Our Life, he argues that DevoManc is an excellent opportunity to practise devolved democracy. In a memorable quote by Josh Lerner, director of the North American PB Project: "democracy has become the political version… Read More
Tunisia is re-building democracy through Participatory Budgeting
Tunisia has been in the news recently for all the wrong reasons, including a horrific terrorist attack on the beach, in which many British citizens were killed. However the Arab Spring of 2011 sparked a change of government and the story of Tunisian democracy is not all bad. In a detailed blog and interview there… Read More
Iceland adopts participatory democracy over austerity as its solution to the banking crisis… and it works
Iceland was one of the worst hit countries of the international banking crisis of 2008, with many of its major banks bankrupted. Since then, whilst going through some hard times it has been recognised as bouncing back. Participatory democracy, including forms of participatory budgeting, has been at the core of its strategy to re-engage citizens… Read More
Scotland’s Community Empowerment Bill opens the door to participatory budgeting
On the 17th June 2015 the Scottish Parliament passed the long awaited Community Empowerment Bill (Scotland), with a strong focus on devolving power to communities and citizens. Among a raft of proposals around asset transfer, land ownership and strengthening the role of citizens in the work of community planning partnerships were new ministerial powers that… Read More
Boston engaging thousands of young people in democracy
The City of Boston is making history for a second consecutive year as the city has allocated $1,000,000 of Boston’s capital funds for the youth to spend as they see fit! This process is called Youth Lead the Change: Participatory Budgeting Boston. Participatory Budgeting in Boston started with a series of public events in January,… Read More
Another City is possible! Alternatives to the city as a commodity.
Yves Cabannes and Cecilia Delgado published Another City is possible! Alternatives to the city as a commodity. Their central argument is that "PB is the practice that connects best with other alternatives to radically transform the way cities are ill produced and achieve systemic changes. PB seems the most promising avenue that leads to “another… Read More
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