4-2 Short Paper Public Participation Helpful or Harmful to a Municipal Government

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Southern New Hampshire University *

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Political Science

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Dec 6, 2023

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4-2 Short Paper Public Participation Helpful or Harmful to a Municipal Government William Hunter Southern New Hampshire University PAD 332 John Kleinhans November 19, 2023 1
4-2 Public Participation Helpful or Harmful to a Municipal Government In the beliefs of Yang and Callahan in that public participation is more harmful than helpful in addressing municipal issues. Yangs research into citizen involvement is centered around the study of trust, as it is identified as a state at which enables them in placing their trust in obtaining or the expected positive outcomes. There is also a perception that citizen involvement is time consuming and could also be costly to those city governments with limited resources, and that there will be chaos (Yang, 2006). In my reading of public involvement, I have learned that citizen involvement is critical as well as being the very essence of our democracy as the words “We the People” in our constitution establishes a foundation of the citizens right to be involved in governance. Also, in this research citizen involvement in local government assists in increasing accountability not just with local government officials but the citizens are also held under the same accountability. There are a number of citizen involvement programs which are used outside of public meeting as in our day of technology citizens can be involved through electronic networks such as virtual meeting. There are programs which also encourage citizens engagement in participatory processes which include creating tasks force or focus groups which assists in strengthening citizens role in decisions being made within their communities (ICMA, 2012). In addressing this issue of Yang and other researches of the opinion that citizen involvement would lead to conflict. They are correct that human emotions could occasionally, flare up during these meeting in which the members of the committee have to be able to manage or control the meeting to reduce the amount of stress involved. The committee members are responsible in gauging the audience of the topics which may become heated in which they must 2
be able to conduct the meetings that the most productive rather than those that are not (MRSC, 2023). In my opinion community involvement is the most effective way for local governments to gain the trust of the citizens they serve. Furthermore, local governments can also engage citizens of the community as well in gathering the needed information from them as well as providing them information such as city finances. 3
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References ICMA. (2012). Citizen Involvement. https://web.archive.org/web/20120907142430/http://icma.org/en/international/expertise/citizen_i nvolvement MRSC. (2023). Community Engagement Resources. https://mrsc.org/explore-topics/governance/engagement/community-engagement- resources#frameworks Yang, K. (2006). Trust and citizen involvement decisions: trust in citizens, trust in institutions, and propensity to trust. Sage Pub. https://journals-sagepub-com.ezproxy.snhu.edu/doi/pdf/10.1177/0095399706292095 4