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Project title

Public Participation in the Environmental Field: Models and Prospects

Primary Funding Agency

Environmental Protection Agency

Co-Funding Organisation(s)

n/a

Lead Organisation

University College Cork (UCC)

Lead Applicant

Patrick O'Mahony

Project Abstract

The two reports of this project main and synthesis are a sustained and empirically informed set of reflections on public participation with particular reference to the Irish case. To crystallize the research public participation under the Water Framework Directive was selected. The case materials on public participation in Ireland are not extensive and the emphasis of the project proposal carried through in the project research was on the opportunities and barriers to participative innovation. The reference to i'innovationi which normally has positive connotations is not to assert that it may simply be assumed that extended participation is necessarily positive at all times and places. However it is the viewpoint informing this project that contemporary societal conditions have added considerable weight to the strong normative argument for more public participation even if the forms and implications of that participation remain to be fully explicated. This viewpoint is advanced in a manner respectful of the problems of organizing participation and ensuring equitable and responsible outcomes by means of that participation in contemporary differentiated distracted and complex societies. The effort of the project has been primarily though not exclusively directed at public participation as a problem of culture. Most of the scholars who have given attention to the issue converge on the viewpoint that Ireland is a relatively low participation society. In recent years there have been significant developments that point to more participative political structures with greater vibrancy of public debate a more active civil society and improved institutional provision for consultation information and participation. Nonetheless the ethos that corresponds with these improvements does not embrace the scale expansion of citizen participation as a political philosophy. There is something reluctant about the positive assessment of active citizens in a political culture emerging from the effects of highly restricted political networks the moral hegemony of an institutionalized religious worldview and a public sphere that was an unreliable vehicle for developing mature and influential public opinion. For these reasons the effort of the project is directed at the question of why participation is not conceptualized more positively and at making a case for considering it more seriously on both normative grounds of responsibility transparency and equity and on functional grounds of effective governance.

Grant Approved

�53,172.00

Research Hub

Sustainability

Research Theme

Socio-Economic Considerations

Start Date

01/12/2004

Initial Projected Completion Date

01/03/2007