Resident (Non)Participation in Croatian Housing Estates
In many cities around the world, there’s a growing concern: people aren’t participating in decisions that affect their everyday lives. Whether it's fixing a local park, building new roads, or improving public services, citizens are often missing from the conversation. Our recent study looked at four Croatian cities (Zagreb, Split, Rijeka and Osijek) to understand why this is happening. The findings were striking but not surprising: most people feel left out, unheard, and unsure of how to get involved.
Producing and Contesting Meanings of Participation in Planning
When Sherry Arnstein published the seminal article “A Ladder of Citizen Participation” in 1969, she conceptualized participation in terms of varying rungs of power – the power to make planning decisions. In her worldview, participation was inherently political. Today, public participation is part and parcel of many planning and development processes and can be used in conflicting ways, subverting existing power structures and relations in some instances, while affirming them in others. The question then is, what does it mean to “participate”? What and whose objectives and interests does participation serve? What are the democratic principles guiding participation?