Open AccesseParticipation that Works. Evidence from the Old Europe
Author(s) -
Francesco Molinari
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
ejournal of edemocracy and open government
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.135
H-Index - 1
ISSN - 2075-9517
DOI - 10.29379/jedem.v4i2.152
Subject(s) - interoperability , archipelago , software deployment , spatial planning , information and communications technology , institutionalisation , public administration , plan (archaeology) , government (linguistics) , european union , public consultation , regional science , public participation , environmental planning , political science , business , geography , engineering , economic policy , computer science , linguistics , philosophy , software engineering , archaeology , law , operating system
This paper collects some evidence from a now completed EU-funded project, aimed at the localisation and institutionalisation of two eParticipatory tools, DEMOS-Plan and the Electronic Town Meeting, within real public administration processes. The independent or combined usage of the two tools, supported by the Living Labs approach has been tested in 18 local pilots across several regions of Europe, from Ulster (UK) to Sicily and Tuscany (Italy), from Turku Archipelago (Finland) to Voroklini (Cyprus). Selected policy domains include (among others): Spatial Planning, Socio-Economic Programming, Strategic Environmental Assessment, and Open Government. Deployment has led to a number of interesting implications for the European public authorities, such as: i) building up of a cost effective ICT platform that enables regular or occasional consultation of remotely and sparsely located citizens and stakeholders; ii) gradually migrating the whole administrative system related to spatial data infrastructure towards a full digitalisation of the “legally compulsory” exchanges between planning agencies, local stakeholders and the general public; and iii) setting the stage for these two facilities to become practically interoperable to each other and across different EU Member States.