Talk:Participatory democracy

message: "The participatory democracy practised in the Council of Europe, the Home of Democracy, represents a unique and original form of citizen involvement in the European construction process." "participatory democracy to be established in Europe, as advocated by the President of the Conference of INGOs of the Council of Europe in her statement at the Warsaw Summit: “Participatory democracy means recognising citizens as players for the common good. Recognising them as players is the key to the future of our democracies.” http://www.coe.int/t/e/ngo/public/INGO%20Conf%202006%20CE%20EU.asp "In this context, the work of the CoE Forum for the Future of Democracy,2 to be established as part of the Action Plan adopted at the Warsaw Summit, will be of utmost relevance to the question of freedom of association in general and the participation of civil society in the democratic process more specifically. Through an “exchange of ideas, information and examples of best practices”, when created, the Forum will allow for addressing new challenges, such as the role of civil society and its organised part - the NGOs - in policy-making, the question of “participatory democracy” and the future of “Quadrilogue”. https://wcd.coe.int/ViewDoc.jsp?BackColorInternet=9999CC&BackColorIntranet=FFBB55&BackColorLogged=FFAC75&id=903359
=== Participatory Democracy in Albania ===
"Continued U.S. Government assistance will help to accelerate Albania's transition to a market economy, and a participatory democracy based on the rule of law, as well as support integration with the European Union (EU) and neighboring states." http://www.usaid.gov/policy/budget/cbj2006/ee/al.htmlReviewed Work: 
Postures and Politics: Some Observations on Participatory Democracy by Frank MacKinnon 
Author(s) of Review: H. B. Mayo Canadian Journal of Political Science Vol. 7, No. 3 (Sep., 1974), pp. 591-592
=== Participatory Democracy in Poland ===
=== Participatory Democracy in Kosova ===
=== NATO ===
"From a perspective of a long term and comprehensive strategy, the establishment of a pluristic and participatory democracy both in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and Kosovo, in particular, is a must, because if you think of all ethnic groups living in Kosovo, including the Turkish minority living in Kosovo, the most important thing is not who rules the Kosovo region. The most important thing, from our standpoint is whether there is a democracy there, whether there is a pluristic and participatory democracy there. Whether there is a tolerance in terms of a multi-ethnicity structure of that region." http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/kokkalis/nato/nato07.html
So, we can get much better references. The point is that while the US Green Party sits on their butts, Europe is seething with participatory democracy! Why stay focused on the US Green Party? Raggz 07:15, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Participatory Democracy and the Council of Europe 

message: "From a perspective of a long term and comprehensive strategy, the establishment of a pluristic and participatory democracy both in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and Kosovo, in particular, is a must, because if you think of all ethnic groups living in Kosovo, including the Turkish minority living in Kosovo, the most important thing is not who rules the Kosovo region. The most important thing, from our standpoint is whether there is a democracy there, whether there is a pluristic and participatory democracy there. Whether there is a tolerance in terms of a multi-ethnicity structure of that region." http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/kokkalis/nato/nato07.html
So, we can get much better references. The point is that while the US Green Party sits on their butts, Europe is seething with participatory democracy! Why stay focused on the US Green Party? Raggz 07:15, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  NATO 

message: "Be careful not to go too far on the side of not upsetting editors by leaving unsourced information in articles for too long, or at all in the case of information about living people. Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia, has said of this: "I can NOT emphasize this enough. There seems to be a terrible bias among some editors that some sort of random speculative 'I heard it somewhere' pseudo information is to be tagged with a 'needs a cite' tag. Wrong. It should be removed, aggressively, unless it can be sourced. This is true of all information, but it is particularly true of negative information about living persons." Raggz 08:10, 26 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Original Research

message: One of the key values of SDS in the 1960's (and today with its rebirth) was Participatory Democracy, as advocated in the iconic Port Huron Statement. Just google search "participatory democracy" and you won't have to search far to find an article related to SDS. I think leaving SDS out leaves this article without any accurate historical context.  --24.33.240.164 17:08, 1 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Students for a Democratic Society?

message: A new form of participatory democracy was proposed and publicly debated
this month (August 2007). Two institutions were proposed
1) open electoral system, and 2) open legislature.
I am wondering if there is room in this article (or anywhere on Wikipedia) for these.
Points I consider in favour of inclusion:
* Both systems were critiqued in public forums, and stood up well. Participating were political scientists, computer scientists, sociologists, and the general public. (So the forums could serve as references, for now.)
* The open electoral system was actually *designed* in public. In response to a paper recommended by a researcher, I did the initial design sketch. Then I refined it in response to criticism by researchers. (So it has been participatory from the start.)
* The open electoral system is simple; can be implemented in a matter of months; can be deployed without financial cost, entirely by participants; and would have immediate, arguably profound political effect. (So it is interesting.)
I looked at other, more specific articles (E-democracy and Open politics).
But I like the quality of this article (Participatory democracy),
so I'm knocking on this door first, and asking for opinions.
Should we describe this on Wikipedia? And where, exactly? -- Michael Allan 13:39, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Open institution democracy

message: I found a page on the web that suggests a potential distinction between 'participatory' versus 'direct'.  Or perhaps an alternative meaning?  The distinction would seem to be between inclusiveness (i.e. public participation) and openness (e.g. a show of hands, etc).  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.157.195.197 (talk) 14:41, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: 'Participatory' vs 'direct' democracy

message: I have removed the following text from the article, as explained above, as being about why the article is bad and should be deleted (in the opinion of the editor who added these words) rather than about the topic itself.  Further discussion here tending to improvement of the article is a good thing. Tb (talk) 00:00, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Vagueness of Term 

message: Another editor objects to the following text in the lead: However, traditional representative democracy tends to limit citizen participation to voting, leaving actual governance to politicians.  The editor seems to think I'm a communist or something, but regardless, I'm happy to discuss it.  His objection was: Exactly how is this not an opinion, albeit stupidly written? Wait, politician is dirty word, comrade. Maybe political officer is better, no? Or community organizer better still! No ref of course, even a scholarly one.
I agree that a reference should be provided; I can dig some up if you like.  Citizen participation in the United States, for example, is mostly confined to voting; small minorities write letters to politicians, though politicians are under no obligation to read, reply, or consider their contents.  It is extremely common in the United States for politicians of all stripes to lament low levels of citizen participation in decision making, and only a small minority of issues are the subject of newspaper coverage, town-hall meetings, and so forth.  About the vast majority of congressional legislation, citizens are unaware, uninformed, and unable to express an opinion; their only input is the vote they cast.  I'm not saying this is good or bad; I'm not saying there are any easy solutions, and I'm certainly not saying that a "political officer" or community organizer would somehow produce more participation.  A simple comparison, however, with direct democracy in Athens would show that an average Athenian citizen had vastly more participation in government decision making than any resident of a representative democracy today.
Now, the objection of the editor seems mostly confined to name-calling (apparently I'm "comrade", which is a ridiculous bit of red-baiting), and saying that there aren't any better ways to run a democracy.  I have no idea if that's true or not, but it's quite irrelevant.  I can point out that there are lots of homeless people in the United States, and that this is a problem, without needing to provide a better solution in order to simply report the fact.  Likewise, it seems pretty clear and obvious to me that citizens in the US don't participate much in political decision making, aside from voting, and that this is a situation which is lamented widely on all sides.  Tb (talk) 00:59, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I have no idea what "revealing" thing you think this shows; it's a way of speaking.  You seem to think I'm some totalitarian communist, and I can't figure out whether I should be offended or just laugh.  Regardless, it's irrelevant to the article; if I were a communist, that doesn't somehow disqualify me from editing Wikipedia, and your rather pathetic guessing about my political opinions is irrelevant here.  Tb (talk) 01:38, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

text: You have invented a whole fantasy of who I am, simply on the basis that I found the criticism you inserted into the article to be bad for an encyclopedia and invited you to write a better one.  I have no idea what you mean by "you and your kind", and your offensive statement that I am lying suggests that you are unwilling to have a productive discussion on the article.  I'll leave the POV statement up for a few days in the hope that you'll come back and work together, instead of inventing a fantasy of who I am on the basis of your imagined red conspiracy.  (The irony is that I'm about as anti-Bolshevik as you can get.)  Tb (talk) 18:40, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Questionable text in lead: limitation of citizen participation 

message: Another editor objects to the second paragraph's reference to small-world networks.  I addressed this above, and I'll repeat it here.  He said: Specifically, what does this mean in plain English? Effectively increasing the scale of participation, and translating small but effective participation groups into small world networks, are areas currently being studied.
I replied: I'm no expert, but it sounds like one way to increase participation is to find ways of getting more people involved ("increasing the scale of participation"). And, participation is easier in smaller groups, so "translating small but effective participation groups into small world networks" would seem to be a sensible way to have large-scale participation arise naturally out of small-scale participation.
He asked, Effectively increasing the scale of participation - isn't this called universal suffrage?  This clearly misunderstands the difference between participation and voting; I replied: No, voting is not the same as participation. Participation is about "meaningful contributions to decision-making" as the lead says, not merely about voting for decision-makers. Moreover, since it refers to "all members of a political group", I think it means all of them. So universal suffrage might be a necessary part of participatory democracy, but it isn't sufficient all by itself.
He asked, and translating small but effective participation groups into small world networks - how does one translate a small but effective group into a small world network? What is a small world network? What's the difference between a participation group and a group? And why would you want to "translate" small groups into small world networks in the first place?   If one understands what a small world network is (there's a wikilink) this isn't too complicated, but I replied, saying, A small effective group is, well, small and effective. Participation is easy in small groups where people know each other. But populations are huge. If we are all in a small-world network, then each small group will be only a couple people away from another small group, and the connectivity of the network will enable communication between the groups efficiently. Seems to me that's what it's talking about. Why would you want it? Well, you may think it's a stupid thing nobody should want; but that hardly makes the article defective. It's not an op/ed piece. But the article says that you want it because then you can increase the scale of participation--that is, you can have effective participation across a much larger population.
He asked about Shirky, saying, So these "areas" are currently being studied by someone called Shirky who's whereabouts are very murky. Anyone else engaged in "studying" these "areas"? and I replied, I have no idea who Shirky is. On the other hand, I found the book by typing "clay shirky here comes everybody" into google. If you want to ask about that reference, you should ask the person who added it to the article.  I invite whoever added Shirky to comment.  I think that to challenge the reference, one must at least obtain it and see.  Since the book is readily available on Amazon, I invite the editor objecting to review it and make a clearer objection than simply saying that because he's whereabouts are "very murky" (the book is on Amazon, for grief's sake) he doesn't count as anything.
I invite discussion here about this paragraph of the lead; I think it's perfectly clear, but this other editor seems to think it's very confusing.  Perhaps he now understands what it means, or perhaps there are still parts he doesn't understand.  Tb (talk) 01:06, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Questionable text in lead: second paragraph 

message: Another editor objects to the text, Some scholars argue (for a cause) for refocusing the term on community-based activity within the domain of civil society, based on the belief that a strong non-governmental public sphere is a precondition for the emergence of a strong liberal democracy.[2] These scholars tend to stress the value of separation between the realm of civil society and the formal political realm.[3]  He says, Doesn't arguing for a cause bias the neutrality of the "scholar"? I have never read such opaque nonsense.
Indeed, scholars arguing for a cause may well be biased.  They are good evidence for the claim that "some scholars argue XXX", but, if the bias is pernicious, not good evidence for simply asserting XXX.  Note that the article does not say the term should be refocused, nor does the article say that the separation of civil society and the formal political realm should be stressed.  Instead, the article reports that these are the opinions of some scholars.
As for whether it is "opaque nonsense", the question seems pretty clear to me.  These scholars note that participation can be formal political participation in formal political decision making, but it could also be non-governmental participation and other community-based activity.  The text says that these scholars think the term "participatory democracy" should be broadened to include things beyond only formal political participation, and that doing so would have beneficial effects on the ways those concerned value other, non-governmental, forms of participation.
I'm sorry that the editor in question doesn't understand; it doesn't seem that complicated to me, but then, I am far more neutral about the term than he seems to be.  Tb (talk) 01:12, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Questionable text in lead: third paragraph 

message: I was looking at the articles on participation, and I noticed that they are not very coordinated and they overlap quite a bit.  I'm starting a discussion about this at Talk:Participation#Overlap_between_participation_articles.  Any help is appreciated!  MakeBelieveMonster (talk) 16:25, 15 January 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Overlap between participation articles 

message: No Original Research is one of our core policies, and the policy page has a nutshell definition, ": Wikipedia does not publish original thought: all material in Wikipedia must be attributable to a reliable, published source. Articles may not contain any new analysis or synthesis of published material that serves to advance a position not clearly advanced by the sources." Please read our policy. If you want to use Shirky et. al. in this article, you must have a reliable source (see WP:RS) that uses the term participatory democracy in discussing participatory democracy. If you disagree, we have a discussion board where you can raise the issue, see WP:NORN.
Using Shirky as a source linking him with participatory democracy is original research, it is your interpretation, and as editors that's not our role.Vasser24 (talk) 17:20, 20 November 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I have reverted your edit as it is quite frankly pointy, and has been raised at ANI. There is no OR or synthesis in the content that you deleted.--Elen of the Roads (talk) 17:24, 20 November 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: To any readers who may wonder what this is all about, I removed some original research Vasser24 had added elsewhere, and his response was "I can  use this for deletion of many, many articles at Wikipedia.". His language above is more or less copied from what I wrote on the other article's talk page. Dougweller (talk) 18:57, 20 November 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Use of source material 

message: "In 2011 participatory democracy became a notable feature of the Occupy movement, a movement largely started by a Tumblr post (titled "We Are the 99 Percent") protesting and claiming that a few individuals held all the power."
The origins of the Occupy Movement are in the Arab Spring in Tunisia & Egypt. The Tumblr post to which the above sentence refers may have played an important role in spreading the Occupy Movement in the U.S. and around the world, but occupation as a form of direct action, as a strategy for changing public policy/discourse/leadership, and as an incubator for experiments in participatory democracy began in Tahrir Square. Mattathias Schwartz wrote an article for the New Yorker titled "Pre-Occupied" that mentions how the occupation of Tahrir Square inspired U.S. Occupy activists. Furthermore, the original Adbusters article calling for the occupation of Wall Street - an important catalyst for the U.S. Occupy Movement and probably the earliest call for occupation in U.S. public discourse - explicitly calls for New York City activists to model their protests on those of Tahrir Square activists. Incidentally, the Adbusters article also draws an important connection between Egyptian occupation and anti-government protests in Tunisia...  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2604:6000:1418:474A:E585:E5C2:CFDA:1D2A (talk) 10:23, 21 January 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Occupy Movement started in Cairo, not New York City 

message: Hello! I'm wondering about the passages in the lede that refer to technology. I feel it lacks sourcing. I was also curious as to why it was mentioned only three times in the article, all in the lede. Wouldn't something in the lede need to summarize larger points that we then refer to later on? If I'm mistaken and this materials belongs in the lede, I would be interested in reading any editing tutorials that address the kind of issues I'm raising. --47.144.151.55 (talk) 08:58, 26 May 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Hello there!  The guideline you're looking for is WP:Lede. And yes you're right; generally speaking the lede should summarise info discussed in more depth in the body.  On the other hand, tech is without doubt an increasingly important theme for the article's topic.  And the body does hint at this with the mention of social media. So there's no compelling need to delete the info IMO.  But if you want to, go ahead. Quite a few editors here have the knowledge to substantially expand the tech coverage here,  you might even inspire them to do so  . FeydHuxtable (talk) 09:25, 26 May 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: I appreciate your timely and courteous response! I've been treated poorly by other editors from time to time and your encouragement and contextualizing was constructive. Thank you! --47.144.151.55 (talk) 09:43, 26 May 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Technology discussion in lede 

message: From the article...
The theory of participatory democracy was developed by Jean-Jacques Rousseau and later promoted by J.S. Mill and G. D. H. Cole, who argued that political participation is indispensable for the realization of a just society.
From me...
Participatory Democracy was a reality long before this "theory" of it.  Therefore, it cannot be a theory, as it was already a well-defined, well-tried, and proven fact.  LOL.
Thibeinn (talk) 21:50, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  A Theory?  No.  A Fact. 

message: This article seems to need a section on the role of sortition in encouraging participatory democracy. I plan on using Bernard Manin's book in order to add to the history of participatory democracy to further elucidate the historical use of sortition, particularly in the "Origins" section under the history header. I will use Professor Landemore's book to add to the strengths section as well as the introduction of the piece, perhaps using it to add to the "Models of Democracy" section. In order to expound on the use of sortition in modernity, under the "21st century" section, I will rely on several articles discussing the successes of particular conferences including Irish, UK, and French assemblies. I hope to also add to the overview section, challenging the consent to power over the exercise of power using Van Reybrouck's work.
Manin, Bernard (1995). The Principles of Representative Government. Cambridge University Press.
Landemore, Hélène (2020). Open Democracy: Reinventing Popular Rule for the Twenty-First Century. Princeton University Press.
Wilson, Claire Mellier, Rich. "Getting Climate Citizens' Assemblies Right". Carnegie Europe. Retrieved 2021-02-28.
Giraudet, Louis-Gaëtan; Apouey, Bénédicte; Arab, Hazem; Baeckelandt, Simon; Begout, Philippe; Berghmans, Nicolas; Blanc, Nathalie; Boulin, Jean-Yves; Buge, Eric; Courant, Dimitri; Dahan, Amy (2021-01-26). "Deliberating on Climate Action: Insights from the French Citizens' Convention for Climate".
Farrell, David; Suiter, Jane (2019-12-31), Reimagining Democracy: Lessons in Deliberative Democracy from the Irish Front Lines, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, ISBN 978-1-5017-4934-6, retrieved 2021-02-28
David, Van Reybrouck (2013). Against Elections: The Case for Democracy. Random House UK. ISBN 978-1-60980-810-5. OCLC 1029788565.
Does this seem appropriate? Thank you. Zraerobertson (talk) 15:45, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lottocratic Democracy and Systems of Sortition 

message: In the subsection of Citizens' assemblies in Mechanisms promoting participatory democracy, the italicised part of the sentence '... the assemblies are more representative of the population than elected legislatures whose representatives are often disproportionally wealthy, male, and white' may only apply to white-majority countries, but it doesn't make that clear. This makes the quote seem biased for white-majority countries. Perhaps the quote must specify where the disproportional white legislatures are found to appear less biased. 
Thanks. Factthinker (talk) 19:41, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Potential bias in 'Mechanisms promoting participatory democracy' 

message: I've gone through bits of the history section and found copious amount of synthesis. In many cases, the sources are talking about something completely different and/or just flat out don't reference "participatory democracy" in any form. This article's sourcing is in desperate need of review. Any sources that don't verifiably reference "participatory democracy" ought to be removed, or else the article's factual reputation will remain dubious. -- Grnrchst (talk) 13:22, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: Ok, I've gone through and verified the sources in the "History" section, removing the ones that failed verification. Although bold, I attempted to be conservative in the removals, keeping those that referenced participatory processes, even though they didn't reference "participatory democracy" exactly. Other sections still need going over. -- Grnrchst (talk) 14:20, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[WP:SYNTH]]