June News: Participatory Democracy in Campaigns, PB Impacts, New Web Address

We’re working to support you with new training opportunities and resources, and our community is growing! Read about how to practice participatory democracy in campaigns, new resources on the impacts of participatory budgeting (PB), a new featured member and guide, and three ways to take action.

How to Practice Participatory Democracy in Electoral Campaigns

Election campaigns are a huge part of democracy, but they’re generally not very democratic. Integrating participatory democracy into political campaigns can help everyday people be in charge of campaigns, build skills for participatory governance, and identify and train new candidates who believe in open and participatory politics.

At People Powered, we’re supporting our member organizations in putting this approach into practice, to build more political support. In May, we organized a workshop on two programs leading the way on participatory democracy in electoral campaigns: “Ocupar la Política,” a program of Extituto de Política Abierta, an organization leading democratic innovations in Colombia, and ‘West Virginia Can’t Wait,’’ a movement in the US that has built massive electoral organizing infrastructure focused on enabling community members to decide policies and write laws. Check out the top three lessons we learned!


Impacts of Participatory Budgeting

In our two recent online seminars on the impacts of PB, leading researchers shared key findings on how PB creates change in governance, well-being, civil society, and political participation. Government practitioners and civil society advocates then translated those findings into practical recommendations. The seminars will continue this autumn, on national PB laws and the impacts of PB on education and learning.

To learn more, you can watch recordings of the seminars, download research briefs summarizing key findings and practical recommendations, and access additional resources on our website.


We moved, to peoplepowered.org!

People Powered has a new web address and new emails! We cut out a few letters, to make our domain name and email addresses shorter and easier to find. We’re now located at peoplepowered.org (previously, we were at peoplepoweredhub.org).

Find out what this change means for you!


Featured Member: German Participatory Budgeting Network

The German Participatory Budgeting Network connects 250 practitioners from more than 100 German communities currently working on participatory budgeting (PB).

The network hosts monthly digital "Participatory Budgeting Coffee Chats" to foster informal exchanges among community leaders, PB project planners, and experts. Participants share how their projects are going, new ideas that have emerged, and how they overcame challenges. The network is also planning to make these experiences into a “user’s manual for activation,” a guide on how PB managers  can navigate politics and bureaucracy, and activate, include, and empower different communities.


Featured Resource: How to Run a Civic Lottery

Civic Lotteries make it possible for governments and public agencies to assemble a broadly representative sample of people to discuss and decide on an issue, free from the pressures of outside influences. This guide from People Powered member organization MASS LBP sets the standard for organizations and governments inviting and selecting individuals to become a part of a deliberative decision-making process.


What You Can Do

  • Share the blog post “How to Practice Participatory Democracy in Electoral Campaigns” with politicians and activists.

  • Download the research brief “Impacts of Participatory Budgeting on Civil Society & Political Participation” and watch the seminar recording.

  • Apply to become a member organization of People Powered, to join our global community of organizations providing direct support for participatory democracy programs.