Need for research

This study focuses on the topic citizen involvement (also known as „citizen participation“, “citizen engagement“ or as „civic involvement“). The topic civic engagement is linked to the topics deliberation, empowerment and democratic learning. In addition, it is currently a central and rapidly growing task of local authorities in decision-making processes. The author Georg Weisseno notes, „Society and educational policymakers expect political education to contribute to the development of democratic attitudes and the associated on willingness to participate. This should be achieved in all areas in order to prevent illiberal, autocratic and authoritarian behaviour.“ (See Weisseno, G. 2023, Learning through political participation. p. 317). The concept of civic engagement is defined as „working to make a difference in the civic life of our communities and developing the combination of knowledge, skills, values and motivation to make a difference. It means promoting the quality of life in a community, through both political and non-political processes.“ (Ehrlich, Preface, p. vi, In: Oxford handbook of political participation, p. 382) In the study, reference is mainly made to participatory and informal areas and forms of participation in the information, consultation and co-decision (cooperation and decision-making) stages. These areas are designated to in the literature as less formalized or unconventional forms of citizen participation. Three substantial areas of political participation in democracy are distinguished:

• Participation in representative structures (e.g. elections),
• co-determination on direct issues (e.g. referendum),
• Participatory forms of participation (e.g. citizen dialogs).

The study focuses on the informal type of civic participation. Informal participation refers to dialog-oriented, consultative and freer procedures in which citizens come together to form opinions or make decisions. The concept of citizen participation is understood to mean both, a top-down as well as a Bottom-up strategy for political participation. The focus of the study lies on the practice of civic involvement and how municipalities deal with the challenges in this field.

Research Plan and Methods The data are obtained through an online-questionnaire study of municipalities throughout Germany (N=425). The data basis is a complete survey of the independent cities and municipalities as well as the districts in Germany. Target groups of the study are: • Social planners in municipalities • Administrative level in municipalities The study takes place from January to April 2024. The data collection takes place from January to February, data analysis from March to April. The responses of closed questions are scaled in four answer categories, from: strongly disagree to strongly agree). Open questions are designed with limited answer options of 1 to 3 words or word groups. Descriptive statistical methods and inductive methods in the form of factor analyses are used to analyse the quantitative data collected in the study. The results of the open questions are analysed using qualitative methods (qualitative and quantitative content analysis).

Expected findings The following findings are expected, firstly, new insights into the processes how the municipalities deal with the issue “citizen engagement and citizen involvement” in the practice of municipal work and social planning, secondly, to generate more knowledge about the organization of citizen participation in communities, this means how the communities handle this topic and how they organize themselves to guarantee the possibility and the quality of citizen participation across the communal work. Other expected results are new knowledge about the stages of citizen participation as well as the status of the institutionalization of citizen participation in social planning processes as well as the used methods, formats and processes of citizen involvement in the municipalities surveyed.

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