Democratic and inclusive governance is seen as key for fighting poverty, achieving sustainable development and social justice. There is now growing consensus that such a system of democratic governance has to involve ample opportunities for citizen and their organizations to engage with government – what is usually termed ‘participatory governance’.

However, in reality, such opportunities remain rare and citizens in both the North and the South express growing disillusionment with their governments – citing problems of lack of transparency, responsiveness and accountability. Human and citizen rights are not fully acknowledged nor respected and, as a result, ordinary citizens are largely excluded from governance processes and the making of decisions that directly affect their lives.

Around the world, citizens suffer from a lack of adequate information, lack of awareness and acknowledgement of human and citizen rights and inadequate opportunities for meaningful dialogue and negotiation with public actors. In many countries all over the world, civil society organizations have been at the forefront of advocating for greater citizen participation in public life.

Many courageous and dedicated government actors (at local and national levels) have also initiated efforts to create space and mechanisms for citizen participation in governance processes. The current phase of the CIVICUS Participatory Governance Programme seeks to make a contribution to these efforts through a combined focus on capacity-building, networking and knowledge exchange among participatory governance practitioners in the South.

The main objectives of the current phase of the Participatory Governance Programme launched in 2006 is to enhance the capacity of southern civil society practitioners (CSOs and government actors) as well as to promote participatory and accountable governance of public institutions at local and national levels.

The specific objectives are to:

• Promote innovation

Approach

Key Activities

• Development of a global “community of practice”, acting as an ongoing space for multi-stakeholder reflection, dialogue, mutual learning and action on participatory governance.

• Capacity-building support to approximately 200 southern participatory governance “champions” in terms of (a) greater knowledge about participatory governance principles, rights, benefits, issues and strategies and (b) stronger participatory governance skills and enhanced access to relevant practical information and tools.

• Direct operational support to a limited number of exceptionally innovative participatory governance initiatives (developed and implemented jointly by government and civil society practitioners), which is documented, analysed and shared.
• Provision of information, learning and dialogue/exchange support to about 2000 participatory governance practitioners worldwide.
• Generation of new knowledge, understanding, skills and tools in the area of participatory governance, e.g. publication on “How to Build Political Will for Participatory Governance”.

For more information on the CIVICUS Participatory Governance Programme please refer to the detailed concept note, or feel free to e-mail us at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it