An international task force of researchers, urban planners, officials and advisors has released a report mapping how the world’s major cities can strengthen democratic participation in urban planning. We Do Democracy contributes expert knowledge.
The ‘who’ and ‘how’ of cities must be rethought in urban decision-making processes
Since spring 2023, the task force’s 15 interdisciplinary international experts have been working on the report, which aims to map out how to create better citizen-driven urban development and improve quality of life. Overall, the experts point to six ways to create better democratic urban development. The report identifies the cross-cutting challenges that policy makers and the general public face when it comes to urban planning in the world’s growing cities, where both space and decisions are under pressure.
The task force points out that we need to rethink the ‘who’ and ‘how’ of urban planning in decision-making processes. The world’s cities are at risk of falling apart as fewer and fewer people gain access to urban decision-making spaces and more and more people experience being run over by urban development. As an approach, a systematic strengthening of urban participation formats and the use of deliberative methods, such as citizens’ assemblies and citizen consultations, are identified as a key democratic approach in future urban development.
Danish contributions to the task force
The task force builds on experiences from cities such as Toronto, Bogota, Mexico and Copenhagen, as well as analysis of over 800 citizen gatherings across OECD countries conducted over the past four decades. Here, topics such as urban planning, mobility, pollution and urban climate adaptation top the list of citizen collections that have delivered the most citizen-driven responses to the world’s decision-makers. And Danish experiences and cases are joining the international agenda, including The citizens’ assembly on Lynetteholm is included in the task force’s report as an example case of how to try to recreate a democratic conversation in the midst of a conflict-ridden development project.
Copenhagen is at the forefront of several of the task force’s recommendations
Johan Galster from We Do Democracy has contributed as an expert in the task force together with Jesse Shapins from NREP.
“Danish cities are affected by many of the same challenges that the task force identifies. We don’t have a tradition of working with democratic quality goals for citizen participation in the city’s development or continuously innovating our participation formats. As a result, urban development becomes stalled and conflicted when we don’t activate the collective intelligence of cities and citizen co-ownership early in the development process,” says Johan Galster
At the same time, Johan Galster points out that a city like Copenhagen is leading the way internationally by making the use of citizen assemblies a democratic mainstay in future urban development. “Copenhagen is well on its way to complying with the task force’s recommendations to establish neighborhood citizen assemblies and permanent city-wide citizen things, such as the Copenhagen Parliament. Including experimenting with the use of both permanent and ad hoc citizen assemblies.” Johan Galster continues
Cities can apply to be part of a pilot project
The organization DemocracyNext is behind the initiative for the task force, the appointment of the 15 experts, and the funding for three cities across the world to receive support and advice to put the task force’s recommendations for democratizing urban development into practice. Cities can apply to join the pilot project in conjunction with the launch of the recommendations
Register for the online seminar and launch:
You can digitally participate in the Task Force’s global launches of the Task Force recommendations by signing up here:
- Sign up here, Tuesday the February 13, 17:00-18:30 or Wednesday, February 13, 17:00-18:30 14. 19:30-21:00
Read more: https://www.demnext.org/projects/democratising-city-planning
Facts:
- The organization DemocracyNext is behind the initiative for the task force with the appointment of the 15 experts, urban developers, civil servants and advisors.
- The 50-page report, the results of hundreds of conversations with urban planning stakeholders over nearly 9 months, suggests six ways in which citizen assemblies can democratize the decisions we make about the future of our cities.
- The report identifies several ways to create a deeper and more inclusive culture of participation in our cities and serves as a guide for policymakers, planners, developers and civil society organizations to reimagine how people can play a vital role in urban planning.
Members: International Task Force on Democratising City Planning
- Francis FukuyamaProfessor, Stanford University, Stanford, USA
- Flora Samuel: Head of Department, Professor of Architecture, Cambridge University, UK
- Jan BoelenArtistic Director, Atelier Luma, Arles, France
- Ifeoma Ebo: Founder, Creative Urban Alchemy, New York City, USA
- Zahra EbrahimCEO and Co-Founder of Monumental Projects, Toronto, Canada
- Daniel Fusca: Manager, Public Consultation, Parks, Forestry & Recreation, Toronto, Canada
- Johan Galster: Founding Partner, We Do Democracy, Copenhagen, Denmark
- Gabriella Gomez-Mont: Founder, Experimentalista, London, UK
- Jennifer KeesmaatFounding Partner, Markee Developments, Toronto, Canada
- Diego Luna Quintanilla: Senior Project Leader, BUUR, Brussels, Belgium
- Elisa De Los Reyes Garcia Lopez: Co-founder and Partner at Pezestudio, Bilbao, Spain
- Felipe Rey Salamanca: Founder, iDeemos, Bogotá, Colombia
- Jesse Shapins: Head of Urban Strategy & Design, Urban Partners, Copenhagen, Denmark
- Trivik Verma: Assistant Professor in Urban Science & Policy, TU Delft, The Netherlands
- Jane WeruExecutive Director & Founding Member, Akiba Mashinani Trust, Nairobi, Kenya