Public participation in policymaking: exploring and understanding impact

Executive Summary

This report has been written for Open Government as part of a Scottish Graduate School of Social Science (SGSSS) PhD internship in summer 2024.

It is informed by the previous work of the Institutionalising Participatory and Deliberative Democracy Working Group (IPDD) (Scottish Government, 2022b) and seeks to build on existing knowledge and practice within Scottish Government related to public participation.

Overview of report

Through a review of contemporary academic literature and engagement with expert stakeholders in the field of participatory and deliberative democracy and democratic innovations, this report explores how impact from public participation processes is conceptualised, occurs in practice, and might be better evaluated in a Scottish Government setting. Understanding the various impacts which can arise from public participation processes was revealed to be both complicated and necessary. The findings are grouped into four sections and detailed below.

Key insights: conceptualisations of impact

Academic and stakeholder accounts demonstrate that impact must be thought of as multifaceted and occurring in different areas of life. Various typologies detail the different pathways to impact across political / policy, civil society and public spheres. Whilst ambitions and aspirations to directly influence policy feature strongly in literature and stakeholder reflections, there is broad recognition that achieving this form of impact is challenging. That said, one of the primary motivations for pursuing a participatory governance agenda is that it is believed to produce better policy and legislation as a result of more informed policy decision-making processes. Understanding impact in the context of public participation is considered to be crucial, particularly at a policy level, as is understanding the individual impacts on participating citizens^[1] and the relationships which exist between policymaking institutions and the people they serve.

Key insight 1: There is consensus across academic and stakeholder accounts that impact occurs across different spheres and at multiple levels. This includes impacts within public, political / policy and civil society areas of life.

Key insight 2: Influencing policy is a common aspiration for public participation processes, but there is widespread recognition that direct policy change is difficult to achieve and evidence.

Key insight 3: Impacts which can arise from public participation processes are varied and interconnected. Achieving better policy outcomes via more informed policymaking processes and institutional culture change feature strongly in stakeholder conceptualisations of impact.

Key insight 4: Individual impacts on citizens as a result of participation are important, particularly in terms of reciprocal learning between policymakers and citizens as well as (re)building trust. It is important for citizen impact to be considered alongside other forms of impact within social and political systems.

Key insights: challenges and facilitators

There are a number of challenges and facilitators to achieving impact as a result of public participation. Understanding the complex social and political systems in which public participation is taking place is a necessary prerequisite to ensuring impact, particularly at a policy level. This means that public participation has to be properly located within policymaking processes via adequate and resourced preparatory and follow-up work with relevant policy actors and departments; facilitating robust, transparent and honest feedback loops between citizens and institutions; and ensuring the participation process is operating in sync with the existing policy cycle. Underpinning all of this is the need for systemic, reliable support and buy in from political representatives and senior leaders within the public administration. Without this 'political licence', achieving impact at a policy level is considered very difficult, if not impossible. Linked to this, academic and stakeholder accounts cautioned against the proliferation of 'tokenistic' citizen participation processes which were thought to contribute to further erosion of public trust in institutions.

Key insight 5: It is necessary to challenge ‘simplistic’ narratives about how participation and policymaking occur and interact. It is important to view public participation processes as part of a broader, complex, policymaking system.

Key insight 6: Ensuring that there is appropriate preparatory and follow-up policy work built-in to and resourced within the design of participation processes is likely to ensure that any outputs are taken seriously and reduce claims of tokenism. This involves locating the process within the existing policy cycle.

Key insight 7: Robust and detailed feedback loops are a crucial component of understanding and achieving impact in policymaking. This can enable meaningful ‘exchange’ between decision-makers and citizens.

Key insight 8: Senior leadership support from political representatives and within the public administration is crucial for achieving impact. Without this ‘political licence’, impact at a policy level is considered very unlikely.

Key insight 9: It is important that public participation processes are not too ‘tightly coupled’ or controlled by decision-makers. This can result in the outputs of the participation processes being ignored, cherry-picked to fit existing agendas or abandoned, all of which undermines the value of citizen participation.

Key insights: spotlight on Scottish Government

Public participation is considered to be currently happening across Scottish Government in a variety of policy areas and in a variety of modes. Despite this widespread activity, there is a lack of monitoring, tracking and sharing of learning at an organisation-wide level. This means levels of consistency, quality and impact in the context of public participation is relatively unknown. Creating communities or networks of practice, expertise and knowledge would enable better understanding of current participatory activity, and this echoes previous recommendations made by the IPDD Working Group. A persistent challenge described by expert stakeholders was the perceived lack of support from senior leaders within Scottish Government and from political representatives. This was thought to have stalled participatory ambitions across the organisation. With greater political and administration buy-in, Scottish Government was considered to have the potential to better embed public participation within the decision-making of the organisation and, as a result, increase impact at a policy level.

Key insight 10: There is a lot of participatory activity happening across Scottish Government, some of which is considered to have impact across a variety of areas, including on policy. There is a lot of potential to evolve, improve and innovate current participatory practice.

Key insight 11: Whilst many recognised that Scottish Government has previously pursued a strong participatory agenda, this was thought to be currently stalled by a lack of senior leadership support, and as such limited resource and capacity for public participation.

Key insight 12: Interviewees strongly advocated for a dedicated, resourced participation unit, or network, to provide (or share) advice, guidance, knowledge and expertise across the organisation. This was believed to support consistency in quality and approach as well as facilitate impact in policy settings.

Key insight 13: Many interviewees viewed the previous Scottish Climate Assembly as disappointing thanks to a perceived lack of impact at a policy level. However, others considered it impactful in other ways. There is a need to conduct an in-depth impact assessment of the Scottish Climate Assembly, as already committed to by Scottish Government (2023).

Key insights: developing an evaluation framework for Scottish Government

Evaluating impact in the context of public participation was considered complicated but necessary work for Scottish Government. There was strong support for developing tools or frameworks which supported better understanding of where and when public participation was / is impacting on policymaking processes (or not). The responsibility for developing and resourcing this work sits with Scottish Government with ample opportunity to draw on existing networks of expertise from outwith the organisation.

Key insight 14: Developing robust evaluation of the impact of public participation processes is considered urgent and essential work. The responsibility for this sits squarely with Scottish Government, particularly when understanding how and if public participation processes influence policymaking.

Key insight 15: There is a lot of enthusiasm and interest in developing evaluation framework(s) which might be helpful in a Scottish Government setting. Expert stakeholders from both within and outwith the public administration are able, and willing, to support the development of this work.

The key insights identified in this study build on the existing recommendations from the IPDD Working Group. Whilst the insights are wide-ranging, this study has also identified some suggested next steps to consider the learning included here and the different ways that Scottish Government and its partners could continue to explore how public participation processes might better influence and impact policymaking:

Suggested next steps

1. Convene a working group of civil servants, including senior officials, to consider the findings from this report, and how to better secure 'political licence'.

2. Continue conversations, via internal and external workshops, around developing an evaluation framework for understanding impact of public participation processes.

3. Use this knowledge to conduct an impact assessment of the Scottish Climate Assembly.