Welfare Citizens’ Assembly in Greve Municipality

The country’s municipalities are looking into a future where they cannot afford the level of welfare we have today, but where citizens’ expectations on most parameters remain the same. The expectation gap between what citizens expect and what the municipality can deliver will only widen in the years ahead. Rather than waiting and looking into a downward spiral, Greve made a decision to act proactively on the challenge. Greve City Council wanted the citizens’ input on what the future of welfare should look like, how they could find the balances in the future of welfare, and how they could have the difficult conversations locally in the future. Therefore, the city council decided to create the country’s first municipal welfare citizen assembly, where representative selected citizens across Greve would discuss and make recommendations for the future welfare in Greve Municipality.

The Welfare Citizens’ Assembly in Greve was conducted in the spring of 2024 based on the OECD principles and an agreed mandate for how the recommendations of the Citizens’ Assembly would be handled politically and administratively after handover. 364 citizens signed up with the desire to participate in the work of the Citizens’ Assembly. Through a stratified draw among all interested parties, 36 representative citizens were selected. The draw took into account that the members reflected the diversity of Greve Municipality’s geography, education, age and gender. The citizen assembly was initiated based on the core task: “We need your help to envision the future of welfare in Greve Municipality” The work in the citizens’ assembly was supported by an expert group and carried out in collaboration with Komponent – Kommunernes Udviklingscenter. The sessions were held on weekdays after normal working hours and on Saturdays, where stakeholders across the entire municipality were also invited to contribute to the work in a so-called Open Session. The city council was invited to participate along the way to ensure an early localization of the political challenges and to ensure links to the subsequent political decision.

The members of the citizens’ assembly came up with an overall welfare vision and guiding principles for future welfare in Greve. They also made five main recommendations for Greve Municipality’s work with welfare, including a number of welfare initiatives, such as focusing on increased use of welfare technology and the involvement of civil society actors in Greve in future welfare. The citizens’ assembly identified new paths to take in the future of welfare with an eye for finding the balance and moving away from the notion that everyone should have an equal right to everything all the time. Adaptations can be made and tasks can be left to those who are able and willing. In addition to recommendations, the members issued a clear call to the politicians: “We cannot solve the welfare of the future in the same way as today. We give the politicians in Greve our support to try out new approaches and set new priorities for future welfare.” Read the final recommendations of the Welfare Citizen Assembly here

The overall recommendations of the citizens’ assembly were presented to the city council in June 2024. In accordance with the mandate for the citizens’ assembly, Greve City Council will provide initial feedback on the recommendations in the fall of 2024 – and again after 12 months. The members’ evaluation of the citizens’ assembly shows, among other things, that:

• 87% would recommend other citizens to join a citizens’ assembly.
• 64% feel that participating in a citizen gathering has strengthened their experience of being a citizen in Greve Municipality.
• 67% gained a better understanding of others’ opinions on welfare than their own.
• 78% felt that the final recommendations reflected the diversity of people in the group.
• 75% would implement the recommendations themselves if they were the elected decision makers.