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Citizen participation is an important building block for a healthy democracy. Participation can take various forms and can be employed at different stages in the policy process. In 2018, the Minister of the Interior and Kingdom Relations (BZK) focused on modernising citizen participation and broadening its application beyond the right to be heard. This led to a bill that requires amendments to the Municipalities Act, Provinces Act, Waterschaps Act, and the Public Bodies (Bonaire, St Eustatius and Saba) Act ('the Decentralised Level Participation Strengthening Act'). The proposal aims to urge local governments to provide residents with clearer guidelines regarding their involvement opportunities and the applicable procedures. Additionally, local governments are encouraged to vary in forms of participation across different policy areas. The demand for a citizen participation monitor has emerged to capture the new developments in citizen participation policy. Although such a monitor was conducted between 2010 and 2018, no new measurements have taken place since then.
Commissioned by the Ministry of the Interior (BZK), Regioplan and Dialogic have conducted an exploration for a new Citizen Participation Monitor among municipalities, provinces, and water boards. This exploration resulted in a report on a baseline measurement and a guide reflecting on this baseline. This report covers the findings of the baseline measurement.
