Participation

(Image reproduced from gravis.org.in)

Participation is to take part, share and act together. In some forms it brings together multiple stakeholders and their views to a) help build consensus and b) help future decision making processes. It can:

• help build capacity, skills and motivation to contribute to sustainability
• empower communty groups, especially those with less power, to contribute to decision making
• recognise and involve indigenous groups and their knowledge.

Participation is different to consultation: consultation related to sharing information but not necessarily decision-making powers, and participation involves a more active level of engagement between groups and can give participants more significant control over decisions.

It has been recognised as part of Agenda 21 as a key component of sustainability, and is an important element of EfSD as it can allow for participation outside of normal power structures.

Participatory learning builds knowledge through dialogue, and shapes discussion and decision making to account for multiple viewpoints while acknowledging commonalities in perspective.

Challenges

Through our class activites, I've learnt that participation is time consuming, and I think it could be difficult, but important, to ensure sufficient time should be budgeted for a fully engaged process. Some higher levels of participation can also be resource intensive, especially financially.

It must be carefully thought out to ensure it takes place in an environment of mutual respect, where traditional power structures don't impede dialogue. Also, care must be taken to ensure that the participartory structure and processes chosen do not alienate the intended participants, and are dialogue based.

It is important that the intent of the participation exercise matches the process, and that care is taken to avoid promising levels of power that were never intended to be given to participants (see Pretty and Hine typology).

See also Typologies of participation.