CITIZENS’ implication in local public decision-making – CITIZENS

Since abstention has been a growing phenomenon for many decades, the ambition of this project is to study the institutional determinants of citizens’ implication in local public decision-making. First of all, we want to explore the impact of decentralisation on electoral participation and more precisely using quasi-experimental approach assess how the different forms of decentralisation and the different modalities of local governance could bring citizens and elected officials closer together at the local level. We also want to determine which electoral systems favour or infringe the perception of closeness between citizens and the administration or elected authorities, or which design of the deliberative process may improve citizens empowerment. The research team of CITIZENS will combine different approaches – quasi-experimental method, axiomatic and computational approaches, and experimental economics – to contribute to this rapidly evolving field of research on voters’ behaviour.