Citizen Participation, There Are Several

¶ … Citizen Participation," there are several models of citizen participation that discuss and map out the relationship between citizens and public officials, all of which help us better understand the public participation process and how citizens and public officials interact. While all the models differ, each contains three elements: completely unengaged and passive citizens, passionate and engaged citizens, and a middle ground, where most form of participation happen. The genesis and characteristics of the extremes of each model (completely unengaged citizens and passionate engaged citizens) are clear to the authors, but what happens in the area between the extremes is more unclear -- there is little empirical evidence or theory here.

The authors first discuss one of the earliest and best known models of citizen participation -- a "ladder" created by Shelley Arnstein (p. 175). The rungs of this citizen participation ladder are as follows: "citizen authority over decisions or delegated authority," "negotiated decisions," "shared partnership in decision making," "opportunity to offer advice," "opportunity to develop self-confidence," and "opportunity for citizen support of programs already planned" (p. 175).

Arnstein's ladder shows one extreme -- passionate and engaged citizens -- at the top rungs, enjoying decision making positions with certain amounts of authority. Here, citizens are also in partnership with public managers to the extent that it can result in "full citizen governance" (p. 175). The model shows the other extreme -- completely unengaged and passive citizens at the bottom rung of the ladder, "manipulated into thinking they have real influence in the decision-making process" and being notified of policy after it's been implemented (p. 175). Finally, Arnstein's model shows the area between the extremes -- citizens invited to come to meetings and fill out surveys that have been meticulously created by public administrators.

In sum, the authors assert that Arnstein's research is meaningful in that it indicates that "administrators rarely relinquish enough control to allow citizens to share in the decision-making process, let alone reach the top of the ladder" (p. 176).

In a similar model of citizen participation, but from an administrative perspective, John Clayton Thomas explains five ways public managers use citizen participation. At one extreme, Thomas describes public administrators as making decisions without consulting the public. At the other extreme, public administrators make decisions only after an extensive discourse and consultation with citizens. Between these extremes, public managers use citizen participation a number of ways -- "from the input of a select group of advisors to a more open and inclusive process" -- but in all five cases, the administrator has the final say and determines how and when to involve the public (p. 176).

The authors summarize the five ways public administrators can involve the public as described by Thomas. The level where citizens are most active is called public decision. Here, the administrator shares the issue with the public, and together they come to an agreement or solution. The level below public decision is unitary public consultation, in which the public official "shares the problem with the public "as a single assembled group" (p. 176). In this way, the manager gathers the public's ideas and advice and makes a decision that reflects them. At this level, not everyone needs to participate -- what's necessary is that the public has the opportunity to participate, as in the case of a well-publicized public hearing. The following level is segmented public consultation. Here, the administrator again shares an issue with the public, but only segments of it. The administrator takes their suggestions and advice and makes a decision that reflects group influence. "Segments," in this case, can include advisory committees or advisors. The next, second-to-last level is modified autonomous managerial decision. At this level, the public administrator seeks out opinion from segments of the public, but alone, and in a way that may not have any influence on his or her decision. The manager also only takes the suggestions of those that he or she respects. The final, bottom rung of Thomas' model is autonomous managerial decision, in which the public administrator addresses the issue without any participation from the public.

Thomas offers this advice to public administrators: open decision-making to the public "when broad consensus is needed" and close the decision-making to the public "when the decision has to be based on technical expertise that the public may not possess" (p. 176).

The authors next describe a model of citizen participation by Richard Box, who places the public on a continuum where free riders, who "prefer the comfort of their easy chair" and believe that public managers will make decisions on their behalf that are in their best interest, are at one end of the continuum (p. 176). Citizen activists, who are always involved because they have a sense of personal responsibility to be informed, engaged, and to hold their elected officials accountable for their actions, are at the other end of the continuum. In the middle of the continuum sit the watchdogs that involve themselves only in the case that they are personally affected by whatever issue there may be.

The authors begin a case study to further illustrate Box's continuum of types of citizens as they relate to public participation. In this case study, public managers are concerned with the need to begin implementing a fee for an extremely well-run and successful preschool initiative managed by the city. The administrators hope to discuss this issue with citizens at a series of public meetings convened by the Board of Education and the city council. In this case, the authors tell us that the free rider, who is not invested in the program in the slightest, does not attend any of the associated public meetings and instead is glad to allow the public administrators decide on whether or not there will be a fee, and if so, how much. The authors stress that the free rider indeed does not care what happens with this issue because they have no vested interest, and that the free rider truly trusts the managers to make the right decisions on this issue. The middle ground on this issue -- the watchdogs -- will represent both sides of the argument: the parents and caregivers of the children who benefit from the initiative by attending the programs it supports, and members of taxpayer groups or individual taxpayers who wish to limit government spending and are in favor of putting an end to the initiative or charging fees for the initiative. In the case study, these watchdogs are involved because they feel that whatever decision is made will have a direct impact on their lives. The citizen activists in the authors' case study, who are on the opposite end of the continuum, attend every public meeting associated with the daycare initiative. However, it is not the case that citizen activists attend because they feel the decision will have an impact on them. Citizen activists attend these meetings because "they want to ensure that the decision made is a fair and just one" (p. 177).

The next three participation models that the authors cite are all created by Mary Timney. They are characterized as active, passive, and transitional. Timney's main argument, with these models, is that governmental agencies can only reach effective decisions by "giving up top-down control and turning power over to citizens" (p. 177). To illustrate this point, Timney offers Lincoln's famous Gettysburg Address and asserts that this is "government by the people," where there are active citizens that control processes, decision-making, and put to heavy use their wide expertise (p. 177).

In Timney's active model, citizens are certainly active. The public is the owner of the issue, developing the policy, implementing the service, creating the agenda, and controlling the process. Timney's active model necessitates the delegation of total control to the citizens, while public agencies only serve the role of consultants.

In Timney's passive model, the individual citizen is described as a "customer or client," and closely resembles Box's free rider (p. 178). Timney's passive model shows citizens "sitting back and waiting for services to be delivered and decisions to be made" (p. 178). These free riding citizens envision decisions made by public administrators as what they have paid for with their tax dollars and user fees. The citizens in Timney's passive model evaluate their government and elected representatives on the basis of what each individual receives, rather than how the entire community fares. In the case that participation actually happens in Timney's passive model, it is only a formality. Purely symbolic.

Timney's transitional model has the citizen as a "coproducer," who is active in that he or she takes part in a "broad, open process" that comes to a solution based on consensus building and collaboration (p. 178). Timney's transitional model links "the knowledge of expertise and the knowledge of experience" (p. 178).

The authors next introduce the customer-owner model, created by Hindy Schachter and discussed in her book, Reinventing Government or Reinventing Ourselves. Schachter explains that the name given to this model -- "customer-owner" -- is a metaphor that describes the different roles and responsibilities assumed by citizens in their relationship with those that govern them. A metaphor is used to describe this relationship, Schachter says, because it creates a situation where we can see if a different way of viewing citizen roles shifts the emphasis to necessary changes for improving the effectiveness of government.

One of the major topics Schachter addresses in Reinventing Government or Reinventing Ourselves is the semantic and methodical framing of reform efforts. She speculates about how effective reform efforts would be in the case that their focus was on modifying the structure of government, rather than modifying the patterns of the behavior of the public. Schachter additionally wonders if administration reform efforts should aim at modifying people's perceptions of themselves, and suggests that if people were taught to perceive themselves as true "owners" of the government, "efforts to improve government efficiency and responsiveness [might] be more successful" (p. 179).

H. George Frederickson is a scholar at the forefront of the public administration field, and was one of the first academics to question and criticize Schachter's model for using a metaphor that didn't quite fit. Frederickson held that it was wrong to assert that citizens are customers in the public-government relationship. Instead, he argued that the citizenry owned the government and elected its leaders to represent the public's interests. Frederickson further argued that Schachter's metaphor was inappropriate by pointing out that the customer-owner model places citizens in a reactive role, "where they are limited to liking or disliking services and hoping that the administrators will change delivery if enough customers object" (p.179). Citizens as owners, on the other hand -- which Frederickson feels is a more appropriate characterization -- play an active role, and indeed decide the government's agenda through voting powers and participation.

The authors appear to have brought this debate over semantics into their discussion of citizen participation models because they hold that the language we use to classify our interaction and relationship with public administrators and elected officials has a strong influence on our behavior. It further has a strong influence on informing the general ways in which we interact with government. Language, the authors point out, can influence whether citizens' relationship with government is passive, engaged, confrontational, or cooperative.

David H. Rosenbloom, another distinguished academic, also takes slight issue with Schachter's term. In Schachter's customer model, she views the public as passive benefactors or consumers of governmental services, interacting mainly by complaining or transacting. The relationship is largely a one-way street -- the citizens merely looking for what the government can offer them. But if citizens are indeed customers, says Rosenbloom, they might not be very good members of the public. Further, encouraging citizens to see themselves as customers of their government may lead to "poor civic health," because if a citizen is viewed not as an active individual in a citizen community, but instead as a potential free rider, "then comity and cooperation may be put at greater risk" (p. 179).

The authors argue, conversely, that focusing on citizens as owners of government may be an effective way of maintaining good civic health because in this model the public sees itself as having the responsibility to be active in creating more effective government services, solving issues and taking part in the decision-making process, challenging the actions of their elected representatives, and holding their government accountable.

But there are critics to the owner model. They hold that stressing a moral duty to take responsibility for government does not align with what's necessarily practical for the average citizen. So, in theory, citizens may own the government, but in reality, it can be difficult for citizens to act as the owner in the model that expects active, continuous participation and interaction with public officials.

The authors move on to a citizen as a shareholder model of participation. This model of citizen participation is an alternative to the customer and owner models just previously discussed. It is value-centered and focused on the value of government and elected representatives to the public. In the citizen as a shareholder model of participation, both public administrators and the public play active roles. They are engaged and concerned with creating value for citizens. Seen as investors and shareholders in the public trust and community well-being, citizens "are intelligent... [and] co-invest their resources in the community and government, from which they expect to receive value" (p.180). This co-investing may take the form of financial support for the maintenance and improvement of a recreational park, time spent on serving for a school committee because it benefits their children, and support of quality education after their children have stopped using the educational system because they care to maintain a positive education tradition for the community's children. This shareholder metaphor insinuates that the creation of wealth and well-being in a community is a participative venture "that involves partnership, co-investment, common interest, cooperation, and sharing among citizens as co-owners of government" (p. 180).

Gerald Smith and Carole Huntsman were among the first to promote this value-centered model, and it builds on the strengths of both the previously mentioned owner and customer citizen participation models. But in Smith and Huntsman's model, the public consists of shareholders of the community enterprise while the government acts as the shareholders' trustee. This role of government as trustee does delegate to it a certain amount of ethical responsibility and moral character. Indeed, in Smith and Huntsman's model, citizens view their elected representatives not only as effective managers of collective resources, but as respected and trustworthy administrators of the public trust.

The authors speculate: if we view citizen participation through the lens of the citizen as a shareholder model of citizen involvement, it may be the case that both the public and its elected officials begin to change their view of their relationship -- from one party overseeing the other or serving the self-interested needs of the other, to a collective group of stakeholders or shareholders with the common interest of increasing the net worth of the community as well as the value of the government.

The authors next describe an "evolutionary continuum" of public administrator and citizen interaction as developed by scholar Eran Vigoda (p. 181). On one end of Vigoda's continuum, the public is composed of subjects whom elected officials hold coercive power over. The public on this end of Vigoda's continuum are forced to follow the directives of the government. The other end of the continuum has citizens as owners of the government. On this side, the public owns its elected officials and has coercive power over them. Their elected officials must do as they direct.