Letter to the editor on “high level of citizen participation”

Letter to the editor on "high level of citizen participation", bnn karlsruhe from february 6th, 2014

dear ladies and gentlemen, i would be very happy about my letter to the editor being printed in the bnn.

the event by the heinrich böll foundation, which is close to the greens, in jubez raised really high expectations on the subject of citizen participation, as it was written in the article. in the introductory statements, state councilor gisela erler and mayor frank mentrup were able to extensively present a bouquet of results under the motto: "on the way, not yet at the finish line".
what bothered me, however, was that being "on the way" means that although more citizen participation is sought, the citizens' opinions are not necessarily verifiably used to find solutions to the problems. this means that citizens say what they think, have the courage, sit on the podium, join in the discussion, but don't expect that your ideas actually have to have an influence on the decision-making process. many who have already been involved in this type of “citizen participation” know what i mean. i also had to make this accusation to the heinrich böll foundation and received the following statement in response: "we are confident that the criticism and suggestions expressed will fall on fertile ground." but that's not how it works - we're tired of being told to "vent" and nothing happens or even the opposite or the result was already certain. for me, citizen participation means being able to demand promised commitments, making the decision-making process transparent and verifiable, taking subjective and qualitative opinions seriously (i made and distributed a suggestion on how this could work - keyword sensitivity model). we are the last people who would not understand if some well-intentioned contributions simply cannot be implemented - but we would like to know why. ms. annette goerlich from the heinrich böll foundation: “unfortunately, with our limited resources, we cannot process the event in your way.” is it just smoke and mirrors again? but one could demand that in such a discussion with the aim of talking about how citizen participation can be improved, one should provide information about how this will be handled in the future.

with kind regards

wolfgang oberacker