Citizen Engagement in Smart Cities

D1.16 Report on Innovative Citizen Engagement Strategies
REMOURBAN - GA No. 646511
Extract from REMOURBAN (REgeneration MOdel for accelerating smart URBAN
transformation) deliverable 1.16 ‘Report on Innovative Citizen Engagement Strategies’
In this document, you will find an overview of:
• Smart city and energy efficiency related citizen engagement
• Identified levels of citizen engagement
• Practical examples, tips and tools for each level
• Existing frameworks for citizen engagement
• Future perspectives
Content by Alec Walker-Love, commsalec@gmail.com, twitter: @ac_wlove
Part of the work presented in this paper is based on the research conducted within the
project “Regeneration Model for Accelerating the Smart Urban Transformation –
REMOURBAN”, which has received funding from the European Union Horizon 2020
Framework Programme (H2020/2014-2020) under Grant Agreement no. 646511.
Particular thanks to:
youris.com, youris@youris.com, REMOURBAN partner contracted for D1.16
Christelle Degard, AREBS, City of Seraing, Belgium
István Nagy, Miskolc Holding Plc. Miskolc, Hungary
Expert witness testimonials and sources

Table of Content
1 Development of a Model for Citizens and Consumers Engagement ......................................3
Building best practice: expert views and experience from Europe and beyond in1.1
citizen engagement.............................................................................................................7
1.1.1 Inform and consult..................................................................................................8
1.1.2 Include and collaborate ........................................................................................12
1.1.3 Empower and co-create .......................................................................................16
1.1.4 Evaluating engagement and social acceptance...................................................25
Better understanding and targeting the citizens we engage with......................................31 1.2
1.2.1 Segmenting actors within the community.............................................................31
1.2.2 Identifying behaviours, motivations and patterns of engagement........................34
Ladders, Spectrums, Toolboxes and Tactics: a model for citizen engagement?..............38 1.3
1.3.1 International Association of Public Participation (IAP2) .......................................40
1.3.2 European Innovation Partnership on Smart Cities and Communities (EIP-
SCC) 41
1.3.3 Citizen Driven Innovation: World Bank and Living Labs ......................................43
1.3.4 Sustainable Urban Mobility Planning ...................................................................45
1.3.5 Urban and Community Planning ..........................................................................47
1.3.6 Selected additional frameworks and resources ...................................................48
Citizens as consumers? Tensions and opportunities........................................................50 1.4
2 Conclusions ..........................................................................................................................52
Citizen engagement in the REMOURBAN Model.............................................................58 2.1
3 References ...........................................................................................................................59

1 Development of a Model for Citizens and Consumers
Engagement
Objective: The development of a model – or framework - for citizens and consumers
engagement based on innovative current practices developed by cities and stakeholders and
further enriched. The result is a set of principles and resources that aims to consider citizens as
actors of the regeneration model and involving them to improve and customize it to their specific
needs. The engagement and empowerment approach adopted towards citizens is intended to
accentuate the benefits brought by citizens to the regeneration model and ensuring energy
efficiency targets and smart city development are reached
i
.
Introduction
Citizen engagement, participatory democracy and budgeting, social and citizen-driven
innovation, accountable governance, co-creation… the number of terms are multiplying to try
and capture the emerging and significant shift towards a more balanced approach to actively
engaging with citizens to define the issues we face, to identify the solutions, and manage their
delivery together.
Within the scope of public policy, governance and urban development one can globally refer to
“processes by which public concerns, needs and values are incorporated into decision-
making
ii
”. Processes through which, citizens – at some stage of the process and development –
find themselves on equal footing as the person ‘in power’.
Of the many international and governmental institutions now focusing on social
accountability and citizen engagement, particularly active is the World Bank, whose President
Jim Yong Kim, put it that, "the citizen voice can be pivotal in providing the demand-side
pressure on government, service providers, and organizations such as the World Bank that is
needed to encourage full and swift response to citizen needs". For many this has a direct
equation with good governance and worldwide there is increasing recognition that citizen
involvement is critical for enhancing democratic governance, improving service delivery, and
fostering empowerment. It is the ability of citizens, civil society organizations and other non-
state actors to hold the state accountable and make it responsive to their needs.
For local authority officials and city projects, engaging effectively with citizens a way to build
trust and relationships and a source of democratic legitimacy and transparency. It is an
opportunity to listen and understand communities and individuals; crowd source and prioritise
ideas; and to inform and educate others about challenges, constraints and ambitions. Last, but
certainly not least, it is an effective way to ensure a more sustainable project, by not building or
creating something the community doesn’t want.
A two way dialogue with benefits for both:
For Officials For Citizens
Listen to and work with citizens directly Have a voice – make a change
Inform & educate about project(s) and
local government
Develop understanding and community
contact points
Increase transparency Accountability
Make a tangible commitment Gain trust and implication
Help realise a vision through sustainable,
successful projects
Foster a sense of community and civic
pride
Make local government work and finance
better
Smarter understanding of services and
how much they cost

For example, in lighthouse city Nottingham, the goal is to transform the environment and the
economy; and citizens are a partner in achieving this. Corporate Director of Development, David
Bishop stated the following at the second project meeting: “We are striving to transform our
economy within the framework of urban regeneration and sharing that with our citizens and
communities”. Elsewhere in REMOURBAN cities and across Europe, a new generation of urban
leadership attempting to embrace the opportunities of a sustainable, healthy and prosperous
twenty-first century and using citizen engagement actions to deliver solutions and achieve it.
From crowdsourcing and prioritising an entire city vision in Hamburg, to participatory budgeting
in Paris, this part of the report will explore these further.
These notions of citizen engagement, shared power and involvement travel particularly well
beyond the public policy sphere, and are remarkable in a multitude of contexts – especially in a
digital age of social media. Indeed, in the world of ‘business to consumer’, fast paced
electronics and personalised services, the key driver of citizen expectations and action in
engagement could easily be cited as a major high street brand, electronics company or internet
website. Across the board, our expectations to be solicited and engaged by whichever
organisation, community or persons we interact with are up.
For businesses, understanding a customers needs, values and desires is critical to commercial
success and brands are harnessing online and offline customer experiences to interact with
clients – increasing the expectations of citizens and society at large to be engaged with.
Companies today spend a huge amount of resources to help create and improve engagement,
not for a single interaction, but over time
iii
. Our favourite products and services are based on
extensive consumer research, testing, and revision; conceived with specific needs and desires
in mind. Brands seek to drive an emotional attachment, where we “love it!” and tell our family
and friends to love it as well.
Increasingly powerful communication technologies are driving a more open, transparent, and
collaborative relationship between them and their customers. In the commercial sphere,
consumers also have the possibility to research, review and plan a purchase or service with
peer-to-peer exchange and input. They will likely also have a series of performance guarantees,
right to return or exchange, give feedback and review the product and company publicly.
Growing expectation gap in service delivery of public services

City authorities and decision-makers responsible for delivering smarter cities must be aware of
the escalating expectations of citizens as consumers and the growing division between them in
a fast paced and consumer driven world. People appreciate having a voice, with the possibility
to make a change – with evidence to show a sense of satisfaction in being consulted, even if
the final decision is a different one.
In terms of citizen engagement delivery and effectiveness, initiatives from across the content
are fortunately growing in number and sophistication. Creatively speaking citizen engagement is
principally strong, using a mix of media, messages and delivery to reach public audiences. Even
if the conviction to address the topic is present, operational and tactical maturity in the delivery
and evaluation of citizen engagement however, yet to be fully established.
From a managerial standpoint, local authorities must add definition to issues of accountability,
financing and resources, data privacy, legality, ethics and ownership amongst other issues.
Tactically, leaders of citizen engagement are still learning to navigate some common pitfalls.
These can include special interest groups taking over the process, perpetual indecision, data
management, concerns over time and money spent and, ultimately, long-term effectiveness and
outcome changes. Precise evaluation indicators and performance measure of citizen
engagement effectiveness are also not set in stone yet. It is therefore important to plan and
propose strong visions of success – and failure – to be able to share internally and with the
community. For city officials, a future set of ‘key behaviour indicators’ and measures of social
cohesion and happiness may be a future set of measure.
For REMOURBAN specifically, it is important to recognise this context and expectations when
considering citizen engagement in the public sphere and urban regeneration. Difficult to make a
housing resident create an emotional attachment and affinity to a deep renovation that may
disturb their home and community for months. Difficult to have a trusting, transparent
relationship with precise deadlines and clear performance guarantees with local authorities,
housing trusts and engineering contractors. Informing, consulting, creating urban regeneration
projects with a deeper support from the community is a time-consuming, intellectual (rather than
emotional), transactional and tricky task.
In social housing, successful transition to low carbon communities requires and eco-orientated
neighbourhood development process in which residents are full partners. Deep renovation
energy efficiency measures, new mobility options and smarter appliances and applications will
only achieve their targeted carbon reductions if the tenants are conscious consumers of energy
and adopters of measures and technology. When privately owned, the same applies; but with
potentially more complex investment requests and diverse financing mechanisms. In private
housing owners may only decide to invest if others do too, or the whole row of housing must all
invest if the work is to be done at all.
The immediacy and impact on daily lives – particularly in the energy renovations – of this and
other similar projects places particular challenges for citizen engagement. The ‘Not In My Back
Yard’ (NIMBY) phenomena characterised by opposition of residents to a proposal for a new
development because it is close to them, often with the connotation that such residents believe
that the developments are needed in society but should be further away. ‘Nimbies’ may even
support the environmental and mobility improvements proposed; but oppose implementing it in
a way that would require sacrifice on their part. Additional investment in time, resources,
planning and clarity – as well as a range of tools and methods to engage – is needed when,
literally, this close to home.

With greater implication required from local authority, partners and residents on urban
transformation projects set to happen in the near future, citizen engagement initiatives need to
be highly developed and well executed.
Levels of implication, investment & proximity may dictate concerns, how engaged with and
urban transformation initiatives proposed: (illustrative)
Implications and investments requested from citizens in REMOURBAN and similar projects
might not only be financial or a disturbance – successful urban transformation may request
fundamental and long lasting changes to behaviour, adoption of new technologies. Put this
against a potential context of say, high-unemployment, low voter turnout, non-native speakers
and newcomers, low density, high motorization, significant ageing population, social or privately
owned housing and any number of combinations of these and the challenges are significant.
By examining a variety of best practices designed to achieve different levels of engagement and
feedback across projects with a range of scopes and objectives, this report hopes to guide
REMOURBAN cities and beyond. Originally tasked in ST1.3.3 in the development of a ‘model’
for citizens and consumer engagement, it was feared that with the unique set of ingredients
(people, place, culture, etc..) it would be impossible to predict an engagement outcome in the
mathematical sense.
However, these following pages are intended to be as loyal as possible to the dictionary
definitions of “a simplified description of a system or process, to assist calculations and
predictions” and “ an example to follow or imitate”.
Along the way a series of expert opinions are used to illustrate a variety of opinion and
approach. Thank you to them for their precious input.

Building best practice: expert views and experience from1.1
Europe and beyond in citizen engagement
The objective of delivering a range of best practices and tools from a wealth of contexts in
Europe and beyond is two-fold:
Firstly, citizen engagement is not yet a holistic and mainstream activity in our cities and
regeneration projects. Secondly, the range of situations, tactics and tools pieced together in
different cultures and communities to achieve a structured and effective citizen engagement
approach is vast.
This section of the deliverable seeks to identify best practice and streamline these resources in
a simplified three-level pyramid of inform and consult; include and collaborate; and empower
and co-create. In order to aid this and for coherence across REMOURBAN, the same three
‘levels’ of engagement selected to organise the inputs and inspiration in a search for a citizen
engagement model for others to replicate will be used again here:
Feeding into this will be the basic tenants of each engagement level, best practice examples
and tools, insight interviews and key take-aways relevant to urban regeneration and energy
efficiency – much as the city audits enabled this report to profile actions in REMOURBAN
lighthouse and follower cities. Although in each context, culture and community the recipe for
successful citizen engagement will be different, the principals established in this document are
designed to ensure REMOURBAN cities and beyond have the correct ingredients to elevate
and execute an improved citizen engagement.
LEVEL 1
Primarily 1-way. 'at distance’ - by mail Internet
LEVEL 2
Definitely 2-way. In person, collective experience
LEVEL 3
Active and evolving dialogue/interaction. Equal
power to decide outcomes at one or many parts of
the process
“…citizen engagement can be to help inform public policy, to help
deliver public policy, or to help people to better understand and support
public policy. It is cognitive, emotional and kinesthetic. It is strategic
and tactical. It is serious and fun.”
Crispin Butteris, Bang The Table, Australia

Before getting started on the three categories of citizen engagement explored here, some
universal principals can ensure a successful journey:
ü Be prepared to spend time and money
Transforming a citizen or community dynamic from apathy to engagement or suspicion to trust
is a time-consuming journey. One that needs to be approached with sincerity and even a certain
amount of skill, both on and offline. Shortcuts are few and successful engagement requires
resources as well as political and personal will.
ü Plan carefully and with transparency
What is the scope of the project and what will it change or achieve? Upon what will citizens be
able to decide, how and when? How are opinions received, treated and acted on? Is feedback
given regularly and widely shared? How will citizen’s online data, ideas and opinions be
managed? Citizens have to overcome a number of barriers to bring real value to the process.
Make it easy for them to navigate with clear signposts and robust processes.
ü Ensure you have internal buy-in and political commitment
Beyond the buzzwords and quotes, is there a broad consensus and understanding of the long-
term benefits and need to use citizen engagement? Is the local authority and its partners
prepared to loose control at some point, embrace new and potentially time-consuming
processes that could be derailed or refused? Are true actions up for mutual debate and
discussion? It can be a culture shock, so make sure people are on-board.
ü Mix tools, methods and messages
One size certainly does not fit all – and ways to engage are the same. Decide how you want to
interact and engage. Cross-reference with the goals and scope of the project before deciding on
a mix of initiatives to achieve it. Perhaps an online tool with rich content and proactive
facilitation can be a backbone; but more vocal and interested members of the community will
give a great deal more input at a co-creation workshop.
1.1.1 Inform and consult
Although good communications does not mean citizen engagement – it certainly needs good,
excellent even, communications to succeed. Before starting out with any initiative, it is important
to know where you are going, what the terrain will be, and whom you will meet there. Although
entitled ‘inform and consult’, there is much that can be done to inform the citizens of an initiative
and also inform oneself before attempting to execute it.
ü Understand civic assets and attitudes
Before any journey, assess the terrain. How big is the mountain to climb? Are there friends and
resources along the way? Knowing the density, level of activity and maturity of associations and
social organisations in a district, mapping social ‘connector points’ for the community such as
schools, places of worship, healthcare centres and the like is precious. Equip yourself with voter
turnout, levels of unemployment and literacy, crime rates and aggregating opinion and
sentiment online and in local media

In the REMOURBAN city audits, this included:
• Mapping on and offline media channels, including
their reach and use.
• Understanding density and footprint of civic and
social associations and bodies
• Profiling the city’s socio-economic and
demographic attributes in detail
• Noting voter turnout in different districts
Further insight could be collected by mapping social connector points, such as schools,
places of worship, leisure, shopping centres, businesses and voluntary organisations.
In addition, local authorities and agencies can assess the level of use of online and e-
services by district to, for example, define if a primarily online or offline awareness and
engagement plan is more appropriate.
A common way of understanding issues and monitoring social and mass media sentiment in
the business world is harnessing analysis of keywords and mentions. In turn, relatively
accessible software can identify negative, neutral and positive disposition and volume of
discussion. More advanced services identify key influencers, measures impact, highlights
content and sets a basis for interacting with an online audience.
Social media analysis dashboard (example):
Such analysis may be able to aggregate general opinions on pre-set topics; but also identify
new issues and sentiment. As such, this can be very valuable in conceiving and proposing
key messages to motivate action, maintain interest and increase participation.
Another useful tool is the classic survey. If citizen surveys and focus groups are already in
place, return to re-mine with specific citizen engagement or urban transformation actions in
mind. With larger budgets, focus groups are also excellent sources of more detailed insight.
Specific surveying can be expensive; perhaps neighbouring cities, regional agencies or other
departments have conducted this work. Elsewhere, the CITYKEYS project interviewed cities
and citizens in multiple European cities to establish their awareness, priorities and expectations
from smart cities projects.

CITYKEYS Deliverable 1.1
Online survey tools such as SurveyMonkey or SurveyGizmo can make reading where people
stand on a particular issue with less time, effort and expense than traditional polling.
A consideration, however, when assembling insight from principally online sources, may be
susceptible to a “digital divide” – that is to say not be entirely representative of the larger
population due to technology, age or language issues.
In more specific development and planning zones, take stock of the skills in the neighbourhood
and make a checklist of who to involve.
Finally, don’t forget to also map and recognise the cultural assets of a community. Heritage,
trends, mind-set and other dynamics can be powerful forces for urban transformation, important
in the tone and take-up by residents and value to visitors and businesses.
ü Clarity and simplicity
Well before, during and after any proposed works or citizen engagement initiative, leave the
bureaucratic babble behind! Tone and languages is important in bridging the distance between
administration and citizen. Equally, use visual tools and aids where possible. Info graphics,
maps, visualisations and models are to be privileged over reams of text.
These might include large scale visual and 3-D models at points of confluence for the
community, simplified fact sheets, clear and motivating messaging.
“A picture tells a thousand words…” is never truer than when sharing potentially technical
assessments and initiatives. Mapping heat loss and equating to savings for the pocket or
the planet can be particularly effective when informing residents about energy efficiency
measures or canvasing buy-in for long-term transportation projects:

ü Plan the promotion
In order to first participate, citizens must first be aware of the possibility. How will people hear
about your initiative and who will tell them are critical to making a good first impression.
Consider market research and analysis to find out where your target audiences gets their
information and be aware of literacy and numeracy levels in your target audience. If resourcing
levels will allow face-to-face interaction, online moderation can facilitate the task.
Use established, recognized and trusted media channels before attempting to set up
your own, which might drown in the sea of available content these days. Trust in local news
media is still high.
That said, in person, consider using different voices to introduce information and consult
opinion. Local NGOs and local businesses are highly trusted peers who will certainly have a
founded opinion on urban transformation initiatives. The old fashioned noticeboard can also be
a great ally, even in the digital age.
A small selection of tangible, printed materials remains an essential, especially when
supporting face-to-face visits and group meetings. If resources allow, consider following up on a
mass mailing with door to door visitors by housing officers, sustainable mobility advisors and
other relevant personnel.
Consider any barriers that might exist in the community when planning on and offline
information content. This could be linguistic, literacy, numeric, access to internet and more.
Incorporate instant and delayed feedback mechanisms from the start – a #hashtag
perhaps for the media savvy and the bold! Or more traditional channels from a centralised email
address to postage paid feedback forms. Track, catalogue and share feedback received
correctly and in a timely fashion.
The overarching goals in inform and consult are provide the public with objective information
to assist them in understanding the problem, plan, alternative, opportunity and/or solution. Take
advantage of this opportunity by giving possibility for feedback, analysis and source alternative
solutions. By taking this step towards residents, citizens, businesses and stakeholders, you
subsequently engage yourself to keep people informed, acknowledge their concerns and
aspirations and provide feedback on how public input has influenced decisions (even at this
stage).

1.1.2 Include and collaborate
This is where things start getting serious. ‘Working directly with the public to ensure their
concerns and aspirations are consistently understood and considered’. A big step for most local
authorities and their executing stakeholders. Beyond that, it means looking to citizens for
advice in devising and implementing solutions – and incorporating that feedback into
actual decisions as much as possible.
It could be considered the policy making equivalent of falling backwards and seeing if your
colleague will catch you! A relationship and trust building exercise and a way to test and
develop collaboration.
ü Work on location
‘Real people in real locations’ rather than convening a meeting in an unknown venue, with
probably unknown travel plans, inconvenient times of day for some. Rather solicit a citizen on
their terms and align with their choices, at a shopping centre, a school, a market and more. Use
multiple locations to target a range of segments, demographics and backgrounds. Apply the
same desire to meet on their turf online.
“…Citizen engagement provides access to knowledge that may otherwise
remain hidden. Time again citizen engagement reveals that 'lay' people have
local knowledge and expertise that is complementary to the 'experts'.”
Richard Bull, DeMontford University, UK
“The only sustainable growth lies in a paradigm shift: instead of serving the
population, cities must involve the population as solution providers. Moving
from top-down to bottom-up is the most sustainable urban transformation and
achieving smarter cities. On the other hand, it is also a smart political move!
Strongly believe we will observe this paradigm rapidly shifting in coming
years.”
Jorge Saraiva, EngageCitizen, Portugal

A “walkshop” is more than just a district tour—it can be a moving conversation, educated and
stimulated by looking around. Typically on foot or bike, walkshops allow community members
and planners to better understand their neighbourhood together; to document community
assets; and to showcase and discuss new and ongoing initiatives.
Organise a bike tour to help citizens discover the new cycle paths and mobility options,
highlighting current improvements, and – above all - future initiatives. The City of Vancouver
also used walkshops frequently and successfully in the creation of the award-winning Cambie
Corridor Plan.
Open house events allow those promoting development initiatives to present them to a wider
public and secure reactions in an informal manner. Less structured than a workshop and more
informal than a traditional exhibition, they can be organised at any stage of the design and
development process by any of the parties.
‘Pop up city halls’ can overcome issues of accessibility die to location or opening hours – two
major hurdles to engagement. Twin public hearing and feedback sessions with the provision of
useful key services to boost value and attendance. Schedule these carefully to reflect working
hour patterns and availability of residents and citizens.
Make reaching out and collaborating part of real life. Could it be a tattoo parlour, job center,
football league game or after-school meet-up? If that location is online – then go there too.
ü Put yourself in my shoes
Compromise, consensus and common ground each have a role to play in our decision-making
activities. Cultivate a deeper understanding and appreciation for the position and constraints of
each other with simulation games, role-playing exercises, citizen juries and more. Invite a
resident to juggle a biomass budget and heat a comfortable home; or a technician to discover a
child’s dream home renovation. Mutual understanding creates possibilities for complementary
action.
Citizen juries
iv
give a small group of ordinary citizens the charge of learning about an issue,
listening to experts, cross-examining proposals and making a report or recommendations.
Although non-binding, these give a deep understanding of the issues. Juries can be comprised
of concerned citizens and representatives of key stakeholder groups, best placed to assess and
multiply to audiences around the community.
School challenges allow the minds of the future to inspire and be inspired – and don’t forget
they are citizens too! Allowing the next generation to have their say in designing new urban
spaces and services can also safeguard their sustainability.

Role-playing can remove a great deal of risk and judgement, giving space for expression and
understanding of ideas and opinions that may otherwise be hard to reach. In a classic technique
of exchanging roles, citizens, planners, service providers and policy makers gain a clearer
understanding by seeing the situation from another perspective.
Gaming development can be both online and offline. Fundamentally, they are also supposed to
be fun or an ideal icebreaker! Held in a moderated group, played as a board game or even an
app they prepare people for a specific challenge ahead, increase awareness or even shape
preliminary proposals. Online games can be a tempting way to reach the touch screen
generation, but beware of development costs and low potential usage when asked to compete
for attention against established games, apps and online activities.
Consensus building decision-making and techniques are process used by groups seeking to
generate widespread levels of participation and agreement to achieve project decisions. Done
correctly, it can encourage compromised and provide structured and traceable decision-making.
Define levels of consensus, i.e. a group does not have to agree entirely upon a decision but
rather agree enough so the discussion can move forward. From unanimous vote to thresholds
or event person-in-charge decides, there are a range of options. Individual preferences should
not obstruct the progress of all – which can be an interesting exercise in itself.
There are a range of options to ensure that you can decide how you want to interact with the
community and its citizens. Formal, informal, playful, creative, structured, targeted or mass
participation.
“Under the right stimulus citizens become productive innovators who add
value to the city's core values and development. Real smart cities are co-
creations with their citizens.”
Jean-Paul Close,
STIR Foundation & AiREAS, The Netherlands

ü Assure feedback
Tell the community how their thoughts will be used and when and how you will get back to
them. Share what changed and how citizens and the community shaped it with regular,
transparent feedback. Translating small, high interest groups into wide-scale mobilisation and
networks is fuelled by information and pace of delivery. Consider sharing more detailed insights
according to segments and demographics. Breaking with bureaucratic tradition can reap reward
to accelerate engagement
Say thank you – its is not something residents and citizens hear from authority figures very
often, especially if they mean it. Recognising someone’s involvement can be as simple as an
email, postcard, letter or online posts and social media.
Plan with professionalism workshops and events: keep a precise track of who and what
organisations have been approached and who plans to attend. Be clear about what you want to
achieve and the issues to be raised. Decide who leads the event, how long it will be, persons
assisting and nominate someone to track and document outcomes, decisions and evaluate
delivery.
Think about how to deliver feedback. Will a 20-page report be bedtime reading for anyone
but the head engineer or councilor? Certainly not. They may watch a video, read an interview or
social media post though. Internally, consider some of the same principals, like this reporting on
participation and effectiveness in a Punjab anti-corruption program Citizen Feedback Monitoring
Program.
Citizen Feedback Monitoring in healthcare, policing, public services feedback video
Evaluate participation with web statistics, feedback forms, exit interviews or online surveys.
Ensure a range of participant profiles complete to get a range of opinions on the impact of the
event or initiative and its appropriateness to achieve results and outcomes. Be prepared to
change your delivery if it is not well received or effective.
Search for the hidden signals from your most important and complicated stakeholders – non-
participants. Double back and connect politely with those who will not attend or participate to
increase feedback received. Enquire whether you can connect with them in another way, time
or include them in the circle of information as a silent, but informed, observer.
Ensure transparency with detailed reports with effective well presented content and
summaries available publicly. Share the outcomes and decisions of any consultation process,
giving information about measures to be adopted (or not) and why.

1.1.3 Empower and co-create
In public participation circles, ‘Empower’ here has meant the placing of final decisions in the
hands of the public. Though no dispute that this is critical to ‘true’ citizen engagement, a multi-
level and complicated smart city project such as REMOURBAN, today, will likely only ever cede
a minimal set of real decisions to another (the summoning of political will to make this happen is
beyond the pages of this report). With this in mind, we take a broader definition of empower: to
make someone stronger and more confident, especially in controlling their life and
claiming their rights.
Not to be defeatist! Given how little citizens are currently consulted in smart city development,
empowering people even to be a recognised part of the decision-making conversation or
process seems appropriate and yet positive. More tangible opportunities to be addressed, heard
and included in the decision-making process to have a mature local-authority-citizen
relationship. Particular focus and thought is given to those who have never spoken out before;
never felt they could speak out; never thought it would make a difference. The most
empowering step in this context could even be the first one: from apathy and disinterest to
concerned observer. For this reason, some of the best practices covered in this section are not
only defined by the IPA2 definition of empowerment; but still represent an enlightened state of
citizen engagement ‘mind’ and the third, most advanced set of best practices profiled here. The
EIP-SCC ‘Citizen Focus’ group mission is nicely worded and pertinent to this position:
“Enabling citizens with the tools and opportunities to create and problem-solve and
facilitating conversation between stakeholders, so citizens’ voices are not only heard, but
instrumental in designing solutions.“
Citizens taking their place & finding their voice as part of a ‘Quintuple Helix
v
’
Co-creation as a way to jointly produce a mutually valued outcome is included unaltered
and a welcome nod to the increasingly business and market-driven development of cities,
regions and government services. It is a fundamental change to the historical ‘supplier and
consumer’ relationship between government and citizens. Co-creation can also be considered
in the terms of an emerging Quintuple Helix - the active flow of information and ideas among
five sectors of society: government, academia, business, non-profits and citizens – to tackle the
systemic change facing our cities and societies today
vi
.

ü Inclusive, inventive and accessible on & offline
Diversity is strength in engagement. It can bring additional quality and quantity of ideas; but also
credibility and legitimacy to initiatives. Although technology is the overwhelming driver, different
approaches are needed to address citizens’ various needs - including the technophobic. Be
respectful of the socio-demographic, linguistic and cultural diversity of a community, addressing
a wide range of ages, status, incomes and ethnicities both on and offline.
Take advantage of technology, mobile and online communications allow people to
communicate in a myriad of ways. Instant feedback on issues via an app, live broadcasts or
webinars to facilitate attendance, accessible content, SMS polls and social media. With most
European cities already highly connected, use them to break the cycle of poorly attended
meeting with the same faces and vocal opinions.
Bang the Tablevii
: illustrating how easily citizens can be or feel excluded
Open the data to drive digital, social and governmental innovation. It is freely available to use,
reuse and redistribute by the public. In that sense it is more ambitious than the concept of
transparency, because it allows citizens to not just access data but to analyze, visualize and
share it with others.
Really open the data: Think about bringing data to life for more than the code or excel literate
to curate, visualize and share data sets. It is an immediate way to sensitize researchers,
journalists, policy makers and citizens to real issues and constraints. An idea way to balance
and integrate expert and informal knowledge and insight. Partner with local sustainable
transport NGO to map traffic flow and pollution hotspots in the district for instance. Embrace the
European FIWARE standard for smart city data.
“Barriers (to citizen engagement) begin with the administration model which typically
comes from the previous century. In this frame, cities need to play the role of the
facilitator by initiating the dialogue that can result in the delegation of some decision-
making to the new or existing collective structures.”
Nikolaos Kontinakis, EuroCities

Open data using FIWARE: part of empowering citizen input and action on energy and transport
choices in London, UK and Santander, Spain
Devolve the data to a new social structure
viii
as part of a FabLab, LivingLab, cultural center or
other such organization with a focus activity on urban transformation, environment, new energy
services or mobility. Work with a non-commercial objective to harness a community sourced
approach to social spaces and services using ICTand Internet of Things (IoT).
Create a public dashboard, visual data-driven information is an idea way to share information
with citizens. Help them understand real data from their neighbourhoods and how it affects the
planet, the people who live there and public services.
Engage all five sectors of the community – business, government, citizens, academics,
NGOs. Take advantage of their unique needs, expertise and perspectives into account to
provide more opportunity for creative solutions. This also reduces the risk of implementing
solutions that are not relevant or appropriate for the communities involved.
Consult with voluntary and charitable organisations to make an informed assessment of
how to engage in person or online most effectively. Understand cultural or personal sensitivities
and overcome social divides. Be prepared to consider independent facilitation, need for
interpreters and signers, specific outreach activities and changes to format and content of
communication materials.
“#CivicTech” maybe technology driven, but its about “residents engaging in their communities,
including sharing their time, information and resources”
ix
– connecting citizens to services, and
one another. It can be inventive and inclusive by using data and devising services for public
good and bettering the lives of many, not just the few.
DecarboNet: a “Collective Awareness Platform” using social feedback to help decarbonize cities

ü What’s in it for me?
Quality information, benefits, incentives, entertainment, recognition, reward – or just the
pleasure of sharing or getting something done. Just some of the reasons citizens make the
choice to engage, stay motivated to do so, and encourage others to do the same. Tap into the
aspirations and interests of your audience as well as your practical constraints and budgets to
be creative in this aspect.
Fix it: The precursor initiatives of FixMyStreet were launched as early as 2007 by a not-for-profit
social enterprise. It gives people the power to get things changed, even if they don’t know who
is responsible. From powerless suffering to proactive part of the solution solving. End benefit
could be knowing a cyclist won’t fall due to a pothole, or the graffiti removed improves the urban
environment. Part of a range of ‘civic empowerment’ tools developed by MySociety and a
concept endlessly applied elsewhere.
Connect with the community, feel good, meet new people, share a skill, test yourself, give
something back, a sense of achievement…there are a thousand personal reasons for
contributing to or evolving our urban environment. Understanding some of them, being able to
identify key personal motivations and aligning actions to them is beneficial to all. Articulate why
a project is good for an individual and the community clearly – even if it’s also for the planet.
Share my ideas: crowdsourcing initiatives can give possibility to propose, share, select, rank
and reward proposals from across the community. Online tools enable reaching much larger
audiences, more effectively at lower cost than ever before. Crowd source for ideas on hyper-
local development, planning and spending, to national law making – all the way through to
saving the planet!
Competitions with incentives and prizes can drive participation; increase the appeal and
reward contributions. Whether the objective is a family taking less short trips by car, a school
reducing its CO2 emissions or moving public services online, an appropriate prize can be
delivered according to performance, by lottery or even just for participating.
Gamification can be an exciting and appealing way to explore issues and change behaviour
across multiple sectors. In a risk free environment, players can see the impacts of their choices
made. Games are not just for children either – and the experience can be designed to reward
novice, expert and master levels. They offer extensive opportunities for measurement and
tracking of use, even when results are shared on a users social media.
Give me a stake: equity sharing, community dividends, shared profits from selling energy back
to the grid at peak times. Successful projects can have an interesting financial value to share
and motivate participation.
“In many cases, the same citizens will participate and engage in many different
events and projects, while the majority of citizens will stay passive or indifferent.
This is especially true in the field of urban development as the topics often feel
abstract and far from the citizens’ own experience. Generating a greater
understanding of the issues at stake and a sense of community is crucial to induce
widespread engagement and effect.”
Bernd Kappenstein,
Director, Energy & Environement
Metropolregion Rhein-Neckar GmbH, Germany

Gamification in mobility: +10 points for not using the car: think its easy? European project
segmentproject.eu and partner keek.be explored attitudinal design before designing games
The collaborative consumption economy: peer-to-peer sharing and community organising is
one of the most mature, well financed and potentially biggest source of social revolution in our
cities today. It can represent technology at its finest – when it simplifies, connects and
empowers our lives. Sharing reinvented by technology is often illustrated by the block of flats
with 10 inhabitants. Each of them has paid €80 for a drill they use 1-2 times a year. A
collaborative consumption app allows them to share the resources, and have perhaps only 1
drill for the block. Less production, less environmental damage, closer communities, money
saved, etc. The same way a drill can be shared, so can knowledge, skills, time, finance, ideas.
AirBnB might be the most high-profile example; but the same principals are being turned to ride
sharing cars, land, office-space and more. “New urbanism”, creating more walkable,
environmentally friendly cities, making new patterns of consumption possible are all part of the
collaborative economy.
Sharing renewable energy through cooperatives, crowdfunding sustainable energy and
construction – people are doing it with and for themselves. Smart municipalities like Amsterdam,
with their Share.nl initiative are making sure they are part of it as an architect of public, private
and citizen activity.
Sharing and collaborating initiatives in the city of Amsterdam

Watch out cities: 4 key conditions for collaborative consumption disruption
ü Define and measure success
Citizen engagement success treads the line between key performance and key behaviour
indicators anchored deep in a community’s social fabric. In practical terms measures in
audience size, interaction, participation and satisfaction must be deployed to reflect the scope
and objectives of the specific initiative. Explore connection with broader economic, skills and
civic goals whenever possible.
Make the rules clear: when, where, how and with what potential outcomes is the citizen being
engaged? What resources and tools are available to the local authorities, organisations and
citizens to participate? Clarity of scope and objective should be shared and reinforced along the
way.
Gauge the interest from mass and social media. Use standard online practices to examine
visitor numbers to web resources, how much time they spend and how they consume and share
content.
Consider specialist platforms, designed for citizen engagement, for crowdsourcing ideas,
running participatory budgets or working to create online community and interest around an
“I expect a reconsideration of formal citizen engagement, towards a more focused
and professional approach, with an increased use of NTICs. I also expect a growth
in informal participation practices, caused by mistrust towards the public institutions
as well as by the possibilities offered by cheap NTICs. However, if we don’t achieve
a meaningful connection between both spheres, conflict will prevail over
collaboration.”
Ramon Canal Oliveras,
Autonomous University of Barcelona, Spain

issue. Use their technology to map strength of feeling, number of mentions and number of
interactions again geo-location to get a detailed idea of what matters where and to whom.
Beyond this extremely useful feature, many also incorporate ‘up’ and ‘down’ votes and other
such metrics.
Quality vs. quantity? Learn how to decipher pure numbers of feedback or interactions with the
quality of ideas received and comments received for instance. Does a small but very vocal
minority drown out other voices that showed interest? If the project was able to cultivate
meaningful input from a small number of citizens from a previously silent but dissatisfied group,
then the proportional success could be significant.
Create an idea generation funnel with targets and metrics appropriate to each step for
crowdsourcing actions. Number of ideas received yes; but how many received feedback or met
a threshold for ‘top’ idea to be explored further for instance. Perhaps taking just three initiatives
to a participatory budget vote is an outstanding success!
Connect engagement goals to broader key performance indicators, such as neighbourhood
CO2 emissions, emissions per inhabitant, private and public transport splits. Make them ‘talk’,
removing the technical jargon and putting into imaginable impacts; number of trees, reduction in
cars on the road and additional kilometers walked by residents or money saved.
Meaningful indicators to engineers are not the same to citizens and residents
Use existing city information to understand secondary and long-term benefits of citizen
engagement - like use of community facilities, voter turnout, online versus offline take up of e-
services, number of community organisations and examine over time. Look for different ratios
between KPIs that signal behavior change and adoption of new information and tools.
Look at secondary indicators It may be that the first engagement project did not meet its own
specific goals; but over time has contributed plenty to the regeneration and relations within the
community in another respect. Are private home renovations up, planning disputes down?
Perhaps anti-social behavior such as graffiti and tagging is also down? Very telling indirect
measures of civic engagement with direct and indirect connections.

ü Find your citizens’ voice and champions
Delivering urban transformation is a team exercise. Moving from core group, to early adopters
and making the leap to establish social proof may have its language roots in product innovation;
but reaching a ‘tipping point’ is critical in any domain. Recognise the players, steps and
language needed to spread awareness and create engagement. Initial community discussions
and tactics may be complex. Adapt messaging, delivery and decision-making power accordingly
once the initiative gains momentum amongst the many.
Malcom Gladwell’s ‘tipping point’ and social acceptance of ideas, innovations & services
Media ‘mavens’ and ‘brokers’ of information in the community is a way the national health
service in the UK and now housing and smart cities in Cologne, Germany have taken the bold
step of giving citizens a voice. Volunteers produce articles, videos, photos or podcasts with
simple resources, supported by technical know-how and equipment to share with fellow
inhabitants on issues of local concern. Reporters receive training, practice skills and get help
publishing their stories online. Although they operate under a code of behaviour and editorial
guidelines; they are, completely independent. Smart cities from a citizen’s perspective.
Civic hacking is hands on citizen-driven action, which produces civic innovations. It could be
an app based on open data, designing and building street furniture using a 3D printer at a

FabLab, or a re-think it workshop about social policy with councillors. The action could be
targeted solely at a highly skilled community to develop code and programs that will, in turn
benefit the many; or mix technical and non-technical to pair up, learn and accelerate wider
adoption.
It offers opportunities for citizens and governments to connect, skills to bloom, new products
and services to be generated for the good of the community – and even successful spin off and
start up businesses to be founded. GitHub is an open source community of civic-generated
code and more that facilitates collaboration in this field. Unlike the private sector, governments
and citizens come together to share their code without thinking about profit margins first; but
improving each other’s lives and services.
A self-sufficient, sustainable FabLab outside Barcelona and a code ‘Hackathon’ in Budapest
A citizen academy can be a week or weeks long immersion to teach interested and motivated
citizens about a particular area or set of initiatives. A town or regional smart city strategy for
instance. Courses can mix on and offline sessions, a professional syllabus and even accredited
learning certifications. Praise from participants, their confidence in services and future direction
is generally high, creating some highly informed and potentially influential ambassadors.
“(Citizen engagement) will definitely need to evolve from one off, occasional
engagement to substantial sharing, co-design and co-creation. City governance
needs to be radically and profoundly transformed, work across sylos. An ability to
delegate power will become crucial.
…Driven by the potential of mobile communication and Internet of Things, citizens
will take the lead in ICT design and adaptation more and more, and this will increase
dramatically in future generations as coding skills will become the basic grammar of
everyday life and communication.”
Maria Sangiuliano
ECWT (European Centre for Women and Technology) and
EIP SCC Citizen Focus Action Cluster

1.1.4 Evaluating engagement and social acceptance
Citizen engagement is a relatively young and evolving topic. It rests on the entirely unique
shoulders of citizens with their own values, perceptions, experiences, decisions and - on top of
that - within an increasingly complex urban environment. Hardly surprising then that
practitioners currently struggle to establish a common framework of ‘key performance indicators’
or evaluation. W. Edwards Deming is often incorrectly quoted as saying, "You can't manage
what you can't measure." In fact, he stated that one of the seven deadly diseases of
management is running a company on visible figures alone. When assessing people, there is
certainly plenty of invisible.
Worth noting that difficulty finding the right transversal evaluation measures in urban
transformation is full of difficulties. In the massive swelling of data collected and now available
across all aspects of our smart(er) cities, city leaders and others are struggling to get to grips
and make sense of it all. What does it all mean, how to analyse it, is it the right data, what to
share, when and with whom?
It is certain that REMOURBAN, along with many local, national and European projects are trying
to contribute to a greater common understanding. The EIP-SCC ‘Citizen Focus’ action cluster
has given itself the target of 2020 for proposing a working framework for evaluation.
However, in the meantime, we can be professional in the execution of a project, and define
targets, indicators and metrics for success (or failure) for an initiative based in best practice.
Most important to recognize, these are defined in function of the objectives and scope of the
engagement initiative.
Hence, an evaluation indicator for a crowdsourcing project requiring five minutes, ‘risk-free’ time
online; and a initiative requesting the energy efficiency of the entire district be address this year
and co-financed by the city and residents will be quite different! Immediacy, impact, investment
required from all parties (time and money at the least) and the project timeframe all come into
play.
Size of participation is often a first evaluation indicator; but what are citizens being asked to
participate in, how are they ‘recruited’ to participate – because they are highly motivated and
free to? Or by virtue that they have always lived in a house that has now been designated for
deep renovation? Is level of commitment an indicator? Are the citizens engaged representative
of their community, in socio-economic and demographic terms? By comparison, analyzing how
many visitors to a website, Facebook likes or tweets made is Childs play.
Some resources and thoughts have been shared on process in 4.1.2. under the ‘assure
feedback’ heading and evaluation in 4.1.3 on ‘inclusion’ and ‘define and measure success’.
Further evaluation and social acceptance are examined here.
“(Evaluating citizen engagement)…”That's the million euro question. We should
consider the right answer and not rush to find easy answers. Framing the question
properly will be important to finding and evaluating these metrics. The process is
more important than the goal in achieving progress and success.”
John Zib, Social Entrepreneur, Germany

In a 2012 publication ‘A Manager’s Guide to Evaluating Citizen Participation’, Tina Nabatchi of
Syracuse University, United States, evaluation is focused on the citizen engagement projects
and programmes themselves as a way of institutionalizing quality. They must be ‘useful, cost-
effective, ethical and beneficial’ it is stated. Two types of relevant evaluation are proposed:
• Process evaluations: to help managers better understand and improve implementation
and management;
• Impact evaluations: to help managers determine whether the citizen engagement
programme has reaches its intended audience and produced its intended effects
Professor Nabatchi proposes a range of tools to asses satisfaction, efficiency, reasons for lower
than expected performance, alignment and conformity. Notably, she underlines the importance
of a rigorous approach because of delicate issues of accountability, ethics, legality and
ownership that are intertwined with engagement.
Evaluation of the engagement itself though is hampered by several challenges, with no agreed-
upon methods and few reliable measurement tools. Its is “an inherently complex and value-
laden concept”.
For further insight into the process of citizen engagement, it is interesting to note the work of
Bull, Petts and Evans
x
on the importance of context as a determining factor in effective
public participation. Their rare comparative examination of engagement in the waste disposal
industry, identified the strength of partnership working between the public and private sector,
degree of political support for engagement, and the extent to which a traditional institutional
paternalism still dominates as critical to eventual engagement outcomes. Judith Pett proposes
five-fold criterion for evaluation:
(1) Representativeness of the participants
(2) Procedural fairness
(3) Compatibility with the objectives of the participants
(4) Degree of awareness and knowledge achieved
(5) Impact on the decision process.
This work enhances the first paper cited in this section and concludes despite best intentions in
effective and evaluated delivery, a policy shift towards greater community engagement can be
‘undone by complex and messy local contexts’. Of further interest to this report, they also
conclude that ‘public engagement is not a suite of methods that can be rolled out from place-to-
place regardless of local context’.
CITYKEYS is a horizontal and coordinating action to the smart cities and communities projects
of the European Union. Its aim is to ‘develop and validate, with the aid of cities, key
performance indicators and data collection procedures for the common and transparent
monitoring as well as the comparability of smart city solutions’.
Recognising the dangers and fallibility of being too prescriptive – particularly about an entity as
complex as a smart city. The project is rather seeking to provide a facilitating tool for cities that
flexible and modular. A workforce of keen minds from cities and institutions have analyzed so
far more than 40 smart city frameworks and conducted extensive citizen surveys about “smart
city” perceptions and needs.
Following this work, they have made some assertions that also address citizen engagement
within some broader assertions on the ‘state of play’ in an article for ‘Open your city’:

In CITYKEYS work to define appropriate indicators, a total 108 project indicators and 78 city
indicators have been selected across a framework of people, planet, profit:
For the project, a selection of six indicators in three categories - co-creation, community
engagement and multi-level governance - have a direct bearing on the topic of citizen
engagement:
o City performance indicators should not provide a fixed picture of a city, but rather
reflect and acknowledge its progress and direction
o Cities must define their own priorities and problems to tackle, chossing the right
KPIs from a wider palette of indicators
o More often than not, indicators should rely on open data published by cities, and
aggregate indicators should be open source, i.e. the calculations and formulas must
be publicly available and accountable.
o We still don’t know (and probably never will) what a smart city means, but we agreed
that it should encircle concepts such as inclusion, education, innovation, energy
poverty, social cohesion, enhanced participation and quality of public space.
Although they might seem common sense, not all of these are found in all smart city
definitions.

These provide some useful progress and recognition for citizens in smart cities performance
indicators; but remain heavily qualitative and based on a Likert scale assessment. Whilst not yet
a detailed and also quantitative mix of indicators a November 2015 in-depth report on indicators
for sustainable cities, published by the European Commission and based on research by the
University of West of England, UK reveals the near total absence of citizens in 12 indicator
frameworks and a further 10 indicators and assessment based tools.
The search for meaningful evaluation by the EIP-SCC ‘Citizen Focus’ action cluster has given
itself the target of 2020 for proposing a working framework.
In a first working meeting to ask members to consider this target in their variety work for EIP,
their own business, organisations and academic interests, the following elements were brought
to the fore. They are in no way binding, cited only at the beginning of a long conversation and a
personal report but hold value for REMOURBAN cities to consider nonetheless.

Work to follow closely and for REMOURBAN to contribute actively to the action cluster by
submitting ‘commitments’ detailing work, experiences and outputs in the field to add to these
efforts in establishing a transversal framework across multiple cities, regions and countries.
The Australian organization Bang the Table has developed a number of approaches, notably in
online engagement and consultations. As a starting point, their framework uses three indicators
to get a broad sense of citizen engagement with an issue:
(1) AWARE - how many people can you legitimately say are aware of your project?
(2) Informed - of the aware people, what proportion can you legitimately say are reasonably
well informed about the issues? This could be downloading online documents, watching videos,
calling into drop-in centers, having conversations with project staff etc.
(3) Engaged - of the aware people, what proportion has actually involved themselves in some
way? This could be anything from completing a survey, to joining a workshop, to helping to
implement a project, to uptake of a technology or a process.
Further enhancements to these broad categories may be found in connecting citizen
engagement indicators to broader innovation, skills and assets measures. For example in ICT,
this could include
xi
:
• e-governance tools and platforms coverage and use
• Open Data and Open Government embedded in policy making
• % smart services and solutions of co-designed and co-created
• Rates of inclusion in open start up and innovation ecosystems
Appropriate measures in mobility (i.e., modal share, trips by private vehicle under 5km) and
energy (i.e., CO2 emissions per inhabitant) likewise to be employed.
Increased maturity in evaluating citizen engagement will certainly mean better connecting to city
development strategies in skills, economic development and social indicators such as these, as
well as secondary and long-term benefits of citizen engagement - like voter turnout, use of
community facilities, reduction in planning complaints and minimizing anti-social Look for
different ratios between KPIs that signal behavior change and adoption of new information and
tools. This new generation of Key Behaviour Indicators may include more human topics and
metrics on subjects such as age-friendliness, community health, sharing, such as the recent
initiatives in Amsterdam, The Netherlands or even the mythical ‘happiness index’.
Looking to other sectors and initiatives to inspire more targeted evaluation should also include
work in ‘social learning’ – the theory that people learn by observing others, which is often
deployed in smart city pertinent areas such as sustainable development. The Research
Program on Climate Change Adaptation and Food Security have recently proposed framework
consisting of a theory of change and 30 primary indicators across four key areas: iterative
learning, capacity development, engagement, and challenging institutions. Elements of
consideration for citizen engagement in smart cities include:
• Power dynamics shaping relationships and decision-making between stakeholders
• Who is engaged, why and how
• Institutional opportunities and barriers to social learning
• Capacity of people to participate and contribute meaningfully

Finally, strong potential source for improved evaluation metrics and insight come from
emerging citizen engagement and crowdsourcing specific platforms, able to generate a
new range of insights and analytics. Already cited in section 4.1.3 of this report, these can
include;
• Up & down votes: instant peer-to-peer feedback on citizen ideas
• Social media shares: reach and virality
• Petition numbers, intensity of voting
• Content contributions
• Reports of service failures
• Mobile app usage
All combined with an ability to cross reference with
• Sentiment (i.e., positive/neutral/negative)
• Geo-location (i.e., which neighbourhoods rank which issues, with what sentiment &
level of participation)
Citizen engagement specific platforms such as CitizenLab.co might create new insights and
lasting metrics to consider
Evaluation of citizen engagement is, then, more a developing art rather than a science yet.
REMOURBAN and fellow cities should apply rigorous management to the tangible delivery of a
chosen process – such as surveys and event evaluation and incorporate indicators that reflect
the objectives and scope of a particular initiative to complement.
Although just coming into existence the EIP-SCC suggestion and Bang the Table approaches
display signs of potential for proposing KPIs in each category, to be imagined with local context,
data collection and relevance in mind. When matched with more easily available web and social
media statistics, citizen engagement strategies in a city may already be considered well served.
Further thought needs to be given in each city context to precise metrics and evaluation given,
reflecting the broader goals and strategies of a city and may consider developing some of the
other frameworks suggested above and following the work of CITYKEYS and eventual evolution
to platforms like the Smart Cities Information System.

Better understanding and targeting the citizens we engage with1.2
Humans are complicated and unique beings. Understanding them better before conceiving,
promoting and soliciting engagement is not an easy task; but surely one that will increase our
chances of success and help in the development of a model for citizen engagement.
What does participation mean to one citizen, and not to another? Are their commonalities to
different types of participation? Why do people get involved and, more importantly, how can we
keep them involved over time?
Social inclusion, moving beyond just the usual suspects and making a particular effort to
engage people on the first step of the ladder has already been cited several times as critical to
sustainable democracy, decision-making and urban transformation. If that is the case, which
people are currently out of the loop, why and how can they be reached? Not all these questions
will be answered here; but some schema and segmentation explored to better understand our
communities, the people within them, and ultimately how to connect with them in a devolving
and evolving urban ecosystem.
Firstly, three key categories of participation as defined by the UK National Council for Voluntary
Organisations in their ‘Pathways to Participation’ research that are useful to consider:
• Public participation: The engagement of individuals with the various structures and
institutions of democracy. Key to this is the relationship between individuals and the
state
• Social participation: The collective activities that individuals may be involved in. The
associations they may form between and form themselves are the heart of this
• Individual participation: The individual choices and actions that people make as part
of their daily life and that are statements of the kind of society they want to live in. For
example, donating money to a particular charity or boycotting a product
1.2.1 Segmenting actors within the community
The OECD ‘Focus on Citizens’ report recognised that there are many good reasons for people
not to participate in policymaking and public service design and delivery. However, they did
define two broad groups:
• People who are “willing but unable” to participate for a variety of reasons such as
cultural or language barriers, geographical distance, disability or socio-economic status;
• People who are “able but unwilling” to participate because they are not very
interested in politics or the community, do not have time, or do not trust the government
to make good use of the input.
They understandably argued in the report that to engage the “willing but unable”, governments
and local authorities must invest in lowering the barriers – with multi-lingual information, for
example. For the “able but unwilling”, the offer must be more attractive. This could be more
relevant issues, greater mix of tools and methods to express participation or increasing
proximity to seek their engagement, rather than coming to the government.
Elaborating further on these axes, a range of segmentation attempts has been made, assigning
personality traits and types according to means (financial, time, capacity…) and motivation
(interest, reward…) to different issues and concerns of the day.

In terms of a more general appreciation and engagement of societal issues, a ‘citizen matrix’
that is by no means prescriptive; but perhaps food for thought on some behaviours is here
below:
Motivation vs. Means: 4 personality types in terms of engaging with social causes, supporting
local communities and charities...
The analysis is narrow and even vast generalisations; but may be adapted and re-written for a
range of local contexts as part of a useful exercise: (therefore Illustrative)
Approval Seekers: Aged 15 – 35 across all social groups. Willing to learn, ambitious, energetic
and experimental, concerned about how they are perceived, keen sense of adventure, early
adopters. Claim to be willing to volunteer and may have strong views on ethical and
environmental issues.
Agents of Change: a person from inside or outside an organization or community who can help
them transform itself by focusing on improvement, and development, often taking a leading role.
Socially and perhaps environmentally committed, ethics and provenance are key buying criteria,
optimistic and creative.
‘Walled Gardeners’: Mostly aged 65 plus. Affiliated to places of worship and community
organisations but not necessarily an active participant support a charity and contribute to
fundraising initiatives. Believe in duty and tradition, don’t want responsibility, spend a lot of time
at home, with regular rituals and routines. Feel put upon by intrusion and irritated by change,
but rarely express their true feelings.
Social Skeptics: Mostly aged 35 plus, C2DE social groups. Spend a lot of time at home. Life is
a struggle, computers confuse them, have money worries, skeptical about ethical and
environmental issues but otherwise don’t have strong views about anything, disenfranchised
and disempowered.

The citizen matrix does serve to show that identifying different groups of a community or city is
not only a tangible exercise – looking at age, gender, income, renter, owner etc.; but essential
to consider the ‘emotional’ traits of the community – their perceptions, values, communication
skills, personality types, attitudes towards environmental and urban issues.
Several other areas of consideration for better understanding and targeting engagement actions
for the community may also consider:
Established vs. Transient Residents
The value proposition, motivation and even possibility to consider a medium-to-long term
financial package to fund energy efficiency measures will certainly not mean the same to either
group. If the ultimate objective is, say, CO2 reduction, then a series of behaviour-changing
rather than investment measures may be more appropriate.
Members of the community attempting to be engaged also posses – and react to different
personality types and communication styles. There are nine different temperament traits, which
shape personality and therefore affect thinking, behaviour, and developmental processes. The
nine different types of temperament can be placed into three main temperament trends or
categories. Worth considering, especially for more implied and face-to-face engagement.
Personality types and communication styles

1.2.2 Identifying behaviours, motivations and patterns of engagement
In looking further into this area, work dedicated to urban transformation – and even community
planning – appears scarce. Attempting to draw inspiration for developing a model of citizen
engagement, which might work for REMOURBAN and similar projects, we have had to look
further afield. This includes ideas and frameworks from the voluntary sector, business and even
gaming. Acknowledging motivations, including an individual’s personality and identity, and
values, beliefs and worldview is much stronger outside of the public sector and so there is much
to learn.
The excellent collaboration between The UK’s National Council for Voluntary Organisations
(NCVO) has, in partnership with the Institute for Volunteering Research (IVR) and the excellent
Involve developed a framework for understanding individuals’ pathways through participation:
It is particularly rich in exploring the multiple and unique combinations of context, perceptions,
values, formative experiences, place and relationships to name a few. These are the key
experiential elements that put participation in practice and influencing people’s actions. The
work also explores the intensity of engagement, for example, and whether an individual or
collective activity. Their work went on to propose a ‘participation equation’ exploring why
participation starts, continues or stops. Anchored in deep social science research, these
equations certainly hold value for engagement far beyond the voluntary sector:

Why participation starts:
And why participation continues or stops:
Away from the voluntary sector, and into behavioural economics and advertising, is the recent
“Nudge” phenomenon, after the book by Richard H Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein entitled
“Improving decisions about health, wealth and happiness”.
They outlined a ‘nudge’ as an intervention that preserves freedom of choice but that
nonetheless influences people’s decisions. Individuals are often heavily affected by behavioural
biases, referring to a default option and leading to predictable mistakes. They outline that this is
further reinforced by social norms.
So what if that default position is to use a car for a short trip, leave the heating on and walk the
house mid-winter in shorts or ignore the recycling bin? In some governments, the behavioural
phycology techniques have been used to improved tax collection, stemmed student dropout
rates and moved more people off benefits and into work. The technique is already used to
encourage more environmentally friendly behavior. High potential for cities and citizens to get
smarter together is outlined in ‘Nudge, nudge, think, think; experimenting with ways to change
civic behaviour’, available online. .
“Improving participation opportunities requires starting where people are and taking account
of their concerns and interests, providing a range of opportunities and levels of involvement
so people can feel comfortable with taking part, and using the personal approach to invite
and welcome people in”
Pathways to Participation report

This approach has given birth to the concept of ‘Civic Upselling’ to encourage incremental but
meaningful increases in engagement, challenging and overcoming the default position one step
at a time. It’s a bit like buying an airline ticket and being asked if you would like to reserve a car
or hotel at the same time as well – getting two transactions, or commitments, out of one.
Another “nudge” in the right direction, the journey from apathy to enthusiasm:
Some traits and behaviours to explain this segmentation further:
1. Uninterested/apathetic: amotivated
a. Because of social, physical, financial reasons, “out of the loop”
2. Consumer: extrinsically motivated
a. Open to information and ideas; but constrained/lacks opportunity
b. Can develop an awareness of the project
3. Contributor: extrinsically motivated
a. Gives an opinion
b. Prepared to criticize and participate
4. Commenter/leader: intrinsically motivated
a. May wish to see initiative flourish (or die!)
b. Potential leader/opinion former/advocate or ambassador

While the impulse to define on and offline interactions as fundamentally and un-reconcilably
different is thankfully dying away in a world where the two mix more seamlessly than ever, it is
interesting to make reference solely to the online participation. Particular skills and content
delivery are required and tools deployed according to whether it is a niche, high-intensity
community or a one-shot series of interactions. Dereck Wenmoths “4C’s and Bang The Table’s
100 ideas to engage your community online both offer some additional insight to online only
tools and techniques.
The ‘4 C’s’ of online community building
CONSUMER COMMENTER CONTRIBUTOR COMMENTATOR
Motivation:
• To gain insight,
information and
be exposed to
new ideas
Motivation:
• Share opinions
• Experiment with
making a
response to
someone else’s
initiatives or ideas

Motivation:
• Test new ideas &
opinions
• Receive critique
and feedback
• To publish & be
heard

Motivation:
• To see the
community grow
and flourish
• Provide leadership
within the
community
Outcomes:
• Develops
knowledge base
• Increases
understanding
Outcomes:
• Increased
confidence
• Greater
clarification
• Affirmation of
thinking

Outcomes:
• Contributes to the
knowledge base
• New ideas tested
& refined
Outcomes:
• Vibrant & self-
sustaining
community
• Leadership roles
are offered and
encouraged

“Linking” “Lurking” “Learning” “Leading”
Understanding, segmenting, targeting, interacting and encouraging as explored in the last two
sections is potentially fertile ground for tools and techniques to accelerate engagement. The
challenge remains to find the right framework for all these ingredients.
Involvement builds people’s confidence, capabilities, skills and ability to co-operate.
This enables them to tackle other challenges, both individually and collectively
Nick Wates, www.communityplanning.net

Ladders, Spectrums, Toolboxes and Tactics: a model for citizen1.3
engagement?
The three-level approach chosen to categorise and rationalise REMOURBAN citizen
engagement and best practice is heavily inspired by the IAP2 public participation spectrum and
a range of academic and practitioner attempts to make a definitive and insightful framework. To
benefit the project partners and replication cities and to support the search for an ‘urban
transformation model’ an overview of some of these is conducted here.
The REMOURBAN approach is inherently a positive model to much of the academic work on
the subject seeking to show a positive evolution to engagement. It is important to note that not
all engagement equals good engagement. Therapy, manipulation, tokenism, placation are all
words readily associated to attempts to engage with publics, communities, individuals and
groups. Strong language and potential dangers to address.
Earning trust, gaining a share of mind is an investment made over time – and as with any
relationship, it can be quickly lost. Whilst looking for the tools for success, one should not forget
either the slippery slope to failure as well.
Prieto-Martin & Ramirez-Alujas, Participation Schemas (2013)
For a group of residents, being consulted and engaged; only for nothing to be done with their
opinions and inputs may be more aggravating than if they were never consulted at all. Further
up our proposed scale, working to build skills and empower citizens might be considered
inflammatory by some if the proposed outcome is only superficial or patronising.
Engagement in the 21
st
century can also reflect an online world and services. Often the most
effective way of reaching a mass audience, these tools can induce a range of specific

behaviours that are certainly important to distinguish and consider. Ferro and Molinari devised a
new e-ladder of participation
xii
usefully mapped across Arnsteins ladder.
The prominent position of ‘critics’ reflects the ability of a loud minority to carve a substantial
presence online and often a fear of policy makers, business leaders and more when opening up
avenues for expression in a digital age. However, the ability to attract many new, less mobile
and broader audiences spread more broadly across a range of socio-demographic segments
online is a substantial asset. When properly curated, moderated and blended with offline
consultation, ‘e-participation’ exposes citizens to new ideas and insights, right the way through
to giving a platform for civic leadership able to inspire action and drive behaviour change.
Ferro & Molinari, e-ladder of Participation (2010)
Since 2010, the tools and platforms cited in the e-participation ladder have undoubtedly moved
on. Unrecognisable even; but the segment behaviours seem to have held relatively true. Today,
beyond Facebook and twitter, specialised engagement platforms like CitizenLab, Engage
Citizen, bang the table and more are harnessing the same online participation pipeline to source
ideas, define citizen priorities and shape collective action in an increasingly productive and
effective way.
An additional consideration for academics and experts is social inclusion. Waves of
iimmigration, illegal behaviour, unemployment, different cultures and social habits are a source
of problems in most cities. Citizen engagement is both a fundamental and interesting technique
to address this issue; and also potentially weakened or even undermined by it. These elements
are addressed in more detail in the segmentation section of this part of the report.

Moving away from the academic expert roots to the ‘practitioner’ experts and local government
leaders in citizen engagement is a young but emerging competence. A body of knowledge is
developing with the input of academics; but also non-governmental organisations, institutions,
associations, open data advocates, technology platform developers, living labs, digital
incubators, alliances of like-minded practitioners, private companies and more. These can vary
in scope and reach from hyper-local, entrepreneurial and informal ‘Meet Up’ groups on civic
tech and engagement to ‘action clusters’ of the European Innovation Partnership on Smart
Cities and Communities (EIP-SCC), which shapes formal proposals and directives at the
European policy level.
With the objective of building best practice and capacity – here are a selection of resources for
REMOURBAN to consider from some such organisations:
1.3.1 International Association of Public Participation (IAP2)
The most widely acknowledged framework among these different groups is the one from which
REMOURBAN has taken so heavily, the International Association of Public Participation
(IAP2):
IAP2 ‘Spectrum of public participation’
IAP2 was founded in 1990 in response to a growing interest in the field and defines itself as ‘an
international association of members who seek to promote and improve the practice of public
participation in relation to individuals, governments, institutions, and other entities that affect the
public interest in nations throughout the world’.
The full spectrum, core values, and toolbox are excellent resources for REMOURBAN’s mission
to turn citizens from passive to active – making them actors in the urban regeneration model.
Especially valuable is the pragmatic and concise advise for each engagement channel or
technique. ‘Always think it through’, ‘What can go right’ and ‘What can go wrong’ are universally
appreciated words of advice. The full spectrum also outlines ‘goals’ and ‘promises’ associated to
the level of engagement sort after.
IAP2 Public Participation Toolbox

1.3.2 European Innovation Partnership on Smart Cities and Communities
(EIP-SCC)
The European Innovation Partnership on Smart Cities and Communities (EIP-SCC) has
conducted some excellent work to frame, share and advance the work of citizen engagement in
smart cities through the ‘Citizen Focus’ action cluster.
For the action cluster – compiled of experts, practitioners and interested parties from around
Europe - “‘Citizen Focus’ is about industries, civil society, and different layers of government
working together with citizens to realize public interests at the intersection of ICT, mobility and
energy in an urban environment.”
The mission they have set themselves is to amplify the positive signs and initiatives bubbling
away to build a more relevant and structured approach for smart cities. The most relevant
approaches are both statements REMOURBAN can quickly identify with and align their actions:
• Projects that create an enabling environment for citizens to solve the problems they
identify. Additionally, projects that help the most successful citizen-led projects scale – in a city
or internationally.
• Projects that facilitate a conversation between stakeholders, where citizens’ voices are not
only heard, but instrumental in solution design, allowing for better results and creating faster
and more targeted improvements
A number of excellent resources to build case studies detail the citizen focus commitments
made, goals, level of maturity (from planning phase to advanced implementation) and
outcomes. A complete list of these commitments is available on the EIP-SCC site.

Most practical and full of insight for any smart city project is the smartly titled handbook
“Principals and Enablers for Citizen Engagement”, a publication full of hands on advice and
insight for getting engagement right. A jointly presented webinar also gave personal testimony
to the content and can be consulted online. Specific reference to each of the ICT, energy and
mobility sectors as well as city-specific themes such as social inclusion, make this work
indispensible for REMOURBAN. The cluster is also very attentive to a topic not treated in detail
in this report: data and privacy. A holistic issue for smart cities, topic with mixed perception by
citizens, and potential ‘trust-breaker’ if not properly attended to.
The on-going work should also be critical to building best practice moving forward. Especially
the setting up and agreement on the EIP high-level qualitative and quantitative
targets. The cluster has established 2020 as a deadline to provide inputs regarding qualitative
targets, leaving time for initiatives to continue working and a broad, effective consensus to
emerge.
With REMOURBAN work to define indicators, horizontal initiative CITYKEYS and general
demand to be able to collect data, measure and evaluate with precision – the fact that the EIP-
SCC cluster are not yet ready to define clear and functioning indicators for citizen engagement
is both reassuring and revealing. This report has already attempted to reference in more detail
practices to evaluate engagement and social acceptance and further evaluation criteria –
according to the scope and objectives of each strategy – are developed in D3.15, Citizen
Engagement strategies for each city. (ST1.3.2)
Three thematic initiatives of the action cluster will no doubt provide more resources and insight
along with concrete targets. They are:
• Start from existing habits and identify the needs
• A citizen-centric approach to data; and
• Citizen and stakeholders communication platforms
REMOURBAN continues to follow these initiatives and the development of any indicators
closely and will feedback to the action cluster about experiences in this area, including a range
of surveys collected as part of this report.

Extract of EIP-SCC handbook
1.3.3 Citizen Driven Innovation: World Bank and Living Labs
Citizen Driven Innovation is a coproduction of two organisations well versed in the art of
engagement and collaboration, the World Bank and European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL).
Conceived primarily as a guidebook for city mayors and public administrators, it also addresses
the range of players and ‘change-makers’ collectively changing the perception and place of
citizen engagement in decision making.
It is a particularly interesting resource for REMOURBAN because of its international inputs,
thoughtful structure innovation driven focus – both in terms of policy as well as competivity,
business and skills. Both organisations are interesting to discover further in the quest to develop
a model for citizen’s engagement and explore European and international best practices.
The World Bank is a mature and long-standing advocate of engaging with citizen’s for
improved results and merits consideration by REMOURBAN. As part of their strategy review in
2013-14, a wholesale framework for mainstreaming citizen engagement across its operations
took place, creating a ‘strategic framework’ and advisory council to this effect. More recently,
they have even taken to delivering Mass Online Open Courses (MOOC’s) on its benefit for
development aid impact and worked closely with the Open Government Partnership – dedicated
to making governments more open, accountable, and responsive to citizens.
For this powerful institution, dedicated to improving lives sustainably, they are convinced that
under the right conditions, citizen engagement can help governments achieve improved
development results. Their framework includes a comprehensive review of existing literature,
which finds positive links between citizen engagement and improved public service
delivery, public financial management, governance and social inclusion and
empowerment. They are cautious, however, to advise that the outcomes of citizen engagement
are highly context specific and sensitive to government and citizens’ capacity and willingness to
engage. Other factors for success cited can also be equally pertinent for REMOURBAN,
including social, political, economic, environmental, cultural, geographic and other factors, such
as gender dynamics.
Good to know: Identified good practice principals from EIP-SCC Citizen Focus:
Simple | Aim to facilitate understanding and usage
Reciprocal | ‘Give for getting’ to create fair and lasting relationships
Participative, balanced, representative | Understand benefits and limits of approaches
Inclusiveness | Ensure solutions that are representative of the whole population
Push approach not pull | Go where people are instead of assuming they will come to you
Online – Offline balanced interventions | Understand benefits and limits of different settings
Conscious of privacy and rights | Build trust from the start
Conscious of citizens’ emotions | Understand the feelings that flow on or under the surface
Change-enablers with city stakeholders | Make the municipality a partner
Wallet-savvy | Use citizens’ own funds in smart ways that benefit citizens

A living lab has its roots as a research concept, in ICT and usability testing. Today, they
represent a collaborative, user-centred, open-innovation ecosystem fueled by
collectively created ideas, content and applications. Focused on citizen-centric innovation, living
lab’s helps to prototype ideas, concepts, products, services and processes in a highly
decentralized manner.
This approach has, in their own words been particularly useful in exploring the concept of smart
cities, used to ‘mobilize resources to respond to urban innovation challenges in a variety of
situations, objectives and governance structures’. The principals of ‘open and agile’ processes
and project management are liberally applied to issues of co-production, interoperability and
open data through the sister initiative Connected Smart Cities Network which represents 75
cities in 15 countries. The living lab structures are very strong on Internet based technologies
but certainly also extends to manage smart city conundrums of maps and data, sensors,
technology and market readiness for example.
Living Labs: citizen driven innovation with a focus to tackle smart city ‘dilemmas’
Back to the best practices explored by the two organisations – it provides readers and
REMOURBAN with a mix of international case studies, emphasising the need for
experimentation with multiple methodologies rather than a model. Experimentation
between city administrators, citizens and key stakeholders, based on some central tenants.
Freedom within a framework: ‘Citizen Driven Innovation’ handbook building blocks

Citizen Engagement in Smart Cities

Citizen Engagement in Smart Cities

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