On Friday 20 May, the REDRESS team visited colleagues at Ghent University who are working on a research project on participatory local government in Belgium. Their focus is on the following questions: Are the roles of local politicians, citizens, civil servants and civil society organisations changing? Are the relations between these actors changing? Does an increase in citizen participation lead to a higher trust in local government and a better quality of local policy-making? It was an inspiring meeting, during which we exchanged different insights that help both projects further. More information about their project can be found here.

NIG Colloquium

Together with the research group in Ghent, we received a grant to organize a colloquium within the Netherlands Institute for Governance (NIG). The upcoming years we will jointly organize a number of symposia to disseminate our research findings to a wider scientific and societal audience. This year, we organize a panel on ‘Democratic innovation and citizen participation’ at the upcoming NIG General Conference on October 13-14, 2022. It is still possible to submit paper abstracts until 1 July. More information can be found here (panel #11).