They do not participate in development planning or management of their fate. All this is due to the fact that the real goal of society is for the strongest among us to exploit resources for fast returns, regardless of effects of their action on other people, on other forms of life, on nature at large, etc., now and in the future. Under appearances of democracy, ordinary people are treated as subjects of the State and of its politicians and functionaries. As an effect of the above, only the transactions dealt with on the market are deemed worth consideration, and the rest is ignored in practices, despite claims to the contrary. Only the values quoted on the market are worth consideration, and they are labelled in money.
Money is in fact a yardstick to define one person's wealth by comparison to the others.
Relative wealth is a sign of power and a tool to power for the strongest. The premises of the system within which the above is happening are that the world can provide resources on demand, without limits. Our species is central to the whole system and owns it. The strongest among us have top priority on the resources and can access other people with the ingenuity and resourcefulness to invent replacements to those resources we may deplete, and to take care of any situation of ecological stress, regardless of the natural context. Reality, based on controllable observations, goes contrary to these premises.