How Participatory Budgeting Can Strengthen Civil Society & Political Participation

By Carolin Hagelskamp, Celina Su, and Nikhil Kumar

This is the third in a series of short articles on the impacts of participatory budgeting cross-posted with the Deliberative Democracy Digest.

Participatory budgeting (PB) brings people to the voting booth who have not previously participated in formal elections or been active with organizations in their community. Many civil society organizations (CSOs) use PB to better engage with government and further their interests.

But what comes out of such engagement by individuals and CSOs in the long term? Do PB participants remain politically active? Can CSOs build out their networks beyond the PB process? And what conditions are conducive to such developments?

In this dispatch, we provide promising answers to these questions, based on research  in the United States, Czech Republic, Canada, Brazil, the United Kingdom, Spain, Mexico, the Philippines, South Africa, Argentina, and Uruguay. These findings are meaningful not only for PB experts, but for anyone interested in strengthening the civic capacity of communities and ensuring that deliberative initiatives avoid domination by powerful interest groups.

PB encourages greater political participation, especially among historically disenfranchised constituents

Studying the effects of PB on turnout in regular elections is complicated and time-intensive. But recently, two projects did exactly that. In New York City, United States, PB participants were shown to be 8.4 percentage points more likely to vote in elections after their engagement, compared to similar residents in districts that did not offer PB. The difference was strongest for people under 30, residents of low-income neighborhoods, and ethnic minorities. In Prague, Czech Republic, districts that introduced PB saw voter turnout in local elections increase by 3 percentage points compared to those without PB.

Given these findings, it becomes crucial to understand what shapes PB participation in the first place. One line of research points to the per-capita funding allocated to PB projects as a factor motivating participation — perhaps because more can be achieved with more money, or because a larger budget signifies a greater commitment by officials. Studies on PB in the United States, Canada, and Brazil have found that PB processes with larger budgets per capita generated higher voter turnout. In addition, the greater the increase in the PB budget from one year to the next, the more voter turnout grew.

Other research points to communication and outreach as drivers of participation. In Brazil, an experimental get-out-the-vote campaign conducted via text messages and email increased participation in PB voting by 4.7 percentage points, without biasing voting preferences towards particular political parties.

In Canada and the United States, collaboration with CSOs in the design and implementation of PB was associated with greater voter turnout by traditionally underrepresented groups. CSOs can be key partners in informing and engaging low-income residents and people of color in ways the state alone cannot.

PB can also enhance non-electoral, individual-level political participation

In Rosario, Argentina; Montevideo, Uruguay; and Porto Alegre, Brazil, residents reported that after participating in PB, they became more politically active. For example, they monitored public budgets, attended or spoke at community meetings, contacted elected officials, and proposed solutions for community problems. PB participants in these cities also felt they gained deliberative skills and political capital, and as a result, were more likely to engage in civic life and politics in the future.

In New York City and Vallejo, United States; Edinburgh, Scotland; and London, England, PB participants said that through PB they had learned more about how governments work. They reported being more likely than before their PB experience to advocate for community needs (many of which were identified through PB) through other channels, such as community boards and elected officials.

PB can lead to better-organized civil society if designed to promote a collaborative rather than competitive spirit

In Brazil, PB seems to have given a boost to civil society. The number of CSOs across communities increased by an average of 8% after the introduction of PB. The most plausible explanation for this increase is that PB was designed in Brazil to encourage collective action through rules and incentives. For example, self-organized mobilization efforts, like driving voters to distant polling sites, could receive government funding. In New York City, Vallejo, Edinburgh, and London, CSOs also reported that PB helped them connect with organizations with which they hadn’t previously worked, and strengthened their relationships with government.

It’s clear that PB encourages participation by organized groups. But how can it be designed to avoid disproportionate influence by particularly well-organized interests? And under what conditions are residents and CSOs most likely to think collectively rather than individually about who should benefit from PB?

Specific process design features, such as the festive environment of a community fair and the requirement that participants vote on all projects, can encourage collaboration. In New York City, facilitating deliberation at meetings and a focus on equity in project development fostered broader participation and prevented domination by well-organized groups.

PB can also provide an important space for informally organized collective action. In the Philippines, where city residents are more likely than rural ones to be members of formal CSOs, local fisher groups implemented PB projects in low-income communities by promoting the meetings as social events and incentivizing attendance with free groceries.

In South Africa — where one political party dominates — PB creates a space for migrant workers and refugees from other African countries, HIV-positive individuals, and residents of informal settlements to relay concerns, access information, and advocate for neighborhood projects.

Research shows that without the active engagement of civil society, PB will lack broad and diverse engagement and oversight. In Spain, PB processes that didn’t engage CSOs led to frustration. Local governments lost legitimacy and PB ended. In Mexico City, the absence of strong civil society meant that local authorities could package their own ideas to look like citizens’ proposals, while winning projects submitted by residents went unimplemented.

Recommendations for practice and further research

Advocates and practitioners can leverage these findings in a number of ways. For example:

• Advocates can make the case to politicians that PB increases voter turnout, especially among historically disenfranchised residents, and that larger budgets will boost public interest and trust in the process.

• Practitioners should consider how to build partnerships with CSOs from the start, designing a process that allows them to connect, collaborate, and learn from each other and with residents.  

While these recommendations are most easily implemented when PB processes are first developed, later changes and improvements also make a difference. Still, more transnational research on how PB affects individuals and CSOs is needed. For example, there is a lot more to be learned about what types of CSOs are most likely to get involved in PB and which interests are over- or underrepresented. For more recommendations on practice and research, consult the research brief.

PB’s impacts on civil society and political participation also have broader implications for deliberative democracy. The ability of PB to engage a wide swath of residents and civic organizations, encourage participation in traditional elections, and build civic skills and networks lends clues as to how societies might build and sustain the capacity of minipublics. Widely different deliberative activities — ranging from neighborhood matters and public funds to those that concentrate on larger issues, such as reproductive choice in Ireland — may best be understood not as isolated events but in terms of their contributions to and interdependencies within a participatory ecosystem.

About the series

In this series of dispatches, members of the Global PB Research Board share key insights into the potential of participatory budgeting to drive social and political change, based on research conducted around the world. The series is the product of a collaboration between Deliberative Democracy Digest and People Powered: Global Hub for Participatory Democracy.

About the authors

Carolin Hagelskamp is a professor for social science and social science research methods at HWR Berlin/Berlin School of Economics and Law. She was previously director of research at Public Agenda, New York City, where she co-authored several publications on participatory budgeting in the United States and Canada. Carolin currently studies whether and how PB can affect a more equitable allocation of public funds. She holds a Ph.D. in community psychology from New York University. 

Celina Su is the Marilyn J. Gittell Chair in Urban Studies and a professor of political science at the City University of New York. Her publications include Streetwise for Book Smarts: Grassroots Organizing and Education Reform in the Bronx (Cornell University Press) and essays in Harper’s, n+1, and elsewhere. She has received several distinguished fellowships, including a Berlin Prize and a Whiting Award for Excellence in Teaching. Celina has served as an active participant on the steering committee and a district committee for PBNYC (Participatory Budgeting in New York City). She tweets @celinasu.

Nikhil Kumar is research and policy associate at People Powered: Global Hub for Participatory Democracy, where he develops courses and materials, produces online content, and curates resources for participatory democracy practitioners. Previously, he worked with the Eurométropole of Strasbourg, France and the City of Helsinki, Finland. Nikhil holds a master’s degree in public policy from the Harvard Kennedy School.