India is rapidly urbanizing, with approximately 377 million or 32% of the population living in cities [1] and projected to be about 800 million and 50% of the population by 2046 [2]. The challenges of urban sustainability for India are immense, and effective decision-making – good governance, will be critical. Good governance here refers to decision-making that is participatory, inclusive (including the views of the disempowered), egalitarian, accountable and transparent, where corruption is minimized. In short, effective public participation – meaningfully involving the broad public in issues that matter – is key to good governance. UN Sustainable Development Goal 11 on sustainable cities and communities also incorporates enhancing capacity for ‘participatory, integrated and sustainable human settlement planning and management’ as a target. Public participation has instrumental value in improving democratic decision-making that supports sustainability [3, 4] as well as intrinsic value [5], and is recognized as a highly worthwhile endeavour [6,7,8,9]. It should be noted, however, that some authors have qualified such assertions in the case of highly stratified societies [10], or those characterized by corruption and patronage [11]. This is due to the danger of elite capture of participation processes and spaces, perpetuating inequity. Heller suggests that the exercise of citizenship can be subverted in societies where extraconstitutional forms of authority such as patriarchy and caste subordination over-ride public authority [12]. We come back to this thread in the discussion on organic participation later in this section.
Elections and universal adult suffrage are seen as a fundamental method of participation in representative democracies. Since Independence, India has had regular and relatively inclusive elections, separation of powers, an active and independent judiciary, apolitical military, and open press. On this basis, the country is said to be a successful, albeit an ‘unlikely democracy’ given poverty, illiteracy, socio-cultural diversity and deep structural inequity [13,14,15]. Varshney [14] also points out that “marginalized and oppressed groups are exercising their democratic rights to a degree that was unheard of in the 1950s and 1960s”. However, if democracy is judged according to broader effective governance measures, including meaningful participation of the people in governance, India’s democratic success is questionable. The founders of the Indian Constitution seemed to adopt the spirit of collective deliberation and action as a core principle of Indian democracy. Dr. B R Ambedkar, the Chairman of the drafting committee of the Indian Constitution, held that:
“There should be varied and free points of contact with other modes of association. In other words, there must be social endosmosis. This is fraternity, which is only another name for democracy. Democracy is not merely a form of Government. It is primarily a mode of associated living, of conjoint communicated experience. It is essentially an attitude of respect and reverence towards fellowmen.” [16] (p. 50).
However, this concept has not yet been realized in the everyday practice of democracy in India’s cities. Though India does have a wealth of experience and long traditions of participation in governance in various forms, in the following discussion we show that there is a space in India for deepening democracy beyond the range of the current participation processes.
Mansuri and Rao (2013) [17] have characterized participation as ‘organic’ and ‘induced’. ‘Organic participation’ includes social movements that fight for greater democratic expression and for the rights of the underprivileged, labour movements, unions, membership-based organizations to improve livelihoods and living standards (ibid). Others, like Miraftab [18] and Cornwall [19] describe the struggles of the poor as claimed, invented or insurgent spaces of participation. ‘Induced participation’ is ‘promoted through policy actions of the state and implemented by bureaucracies, … and comes in two forms: decentralization and community-driven development’ (Mansuri & Rao). These are not cleanly divided processes or spaces, and have some strengths and present some challenges, discussed further in this section.
Organic and claimed Participation
Social movements, claimed participation spaces, including organic NGO-led participation, are a strong shaping force in India, surfacing important issues of social and environmental justice, entitlements and equity. They have thrown new light on different aspects of the human condition, and followed up with the authorities, through to the judicial system, to secure rights and justice. In recent years, a range of rights-based initiatives have led to legislation and substantive gains on crucial elements of human rights and well-being in India, such as on the right to education, right to information [20], the Domestic Violence Act [21], the Street Vendors Act, the securing of livelihoods of waste pickers [22], and shelter for the poor in Mumbai [23]. Advocacy groups can provoke civic interest in and attention to issues, and in doing so, provide fertile ground for public participation initiatives. For example, the Pune urban design deliberative democracy initiative, described later in this article, emanated from organic participation and advocacy. Similarly, referring to the experiences in Mendha Lekha village in eastern Maharashtra, Mohan Hirabhai Hiralal suggested that abhyas gats or study circles could be convened on topics that emerge as ‘jivhalyachya prashna’Footnote 1 - issues that people felt strongly about. These would be the issues people voluntarily spend time deliberating, precisely because of their strong feelings. Additionally, leaders of organic participation initiatives often, though not always, develop considerable expertise about the issues they raise. They can bring new knowledge to the table and new resolve to ensure decision-makers take this seriously.
Organic participation plays an influential role in reaffirming democracy in India, irrespective of the substantive or normative views involved, depth of understanding, or perspective – holistic or fragmented. It is a demonstration and reaffirmation of people’s freedom of expression, the right to associate, and to raise issues of concern for examination, deliberation and action by the larger polity. Goswami & Tandon (5) suggested that this is what makes Indian democracy alive and vibrant [21].
Although organic participation is an integral element of meaningful participation, alone it cannot bring about good governance. It has been said that democracy is better sustained when there are community networks and a social fabric of trust and cooperation [24], neighbourhood organizations [25], and a tradition of discussion in society [26]. People living in such a society may feel more readily able to voice topics of concern, and for the neighbourhood associations to take these concerns forward. However, these societal qualities can malfunction when there are prevailing deep-rooted structural inequities like the caste system, and divisions among socio-economic classes. Hence, rather than cooperation, organically emerging issues have often tended to drive divisive behaviour, turning one group against another [27]. Such structural inequities prevent disempowered marginalized people from raising concerns organically [10]. Or, if they have been surfaced, the mostly elite groups responding have not listened and acted on them, or such concerns have been crowded out among issues raised by more vocal and powerful groups.
Inequities and exclusions may be exacerbated in certain types of elite-led participation [28, 29], while the poor are forced to access public services through political patronage [27]. While public resistance often supports more sustainable outcomes, in recent years in India, the nature of such resistance is changing, with middle-class and upper-class protestors becoming prominent, and the marginalized largely failing to make visible protests against decisions that affect them, exacerbating existing inequities [30]. Miraftab, highlighted that often planning and governance processes in the global South engage with certain types of community-based groups who are ‘celebrated as civil society representatives’ and invited into participatory processes while criminalizing and disengaging others from decision-making processes, who have to resort to insurgent practices to claim their rights and access to basic services [18].
For these reasons, and more generally in the interests of good governance, relying on organic participation or community bonds and associational life to achieve equity and sustainability is inadequate. Indeed, it could be said that both organic participation and elected government have distorted motivations (the former due to structural inequities, and the latter due to party political influences and the need to be re-elected).
Induced Participation
In India, the most consequential enablers of induced participation have been the 73rd and 74th Constitutional Amendment Acts (CAA), creating institutions of local self-government in villages and urban areas across the country, with elected councils. However, the elected councils or civic groups per se and the extent to which they deliberate is not the focus of this research, but rather whether the elected councils involve civic groups and the general public meaningfully in deliberation on difficult issues.
Much of the literature referring to empowered participatory governance in India refers to local self-government in rural India, especially in relation to gram sabhas (village assemblies). These include the well-known decentralized people’s planning processes in Kerala [31, 32] and also in Maharashtra [33] and Mendha Lekha (Mohan Hirabhai Hiralal, oral communication, September 2016), including deliberative democracy processes.Footnote 2
There are some efforts of induced participation in urban areas as well, such as participatory urban planning in Chhattisgarh, planning for street vending in Mumbai, for slums in Ahmedabad [34] and neighbourhood level and urban ward planning in Kerala [35]. An induced participatory method that has had success in reducing structural inequities is Participatory Budgeting (PB). PBs have now been implemented in around 3000 places across the globe [36]. A percentage of a government budget (usually around 10%) is allocated to projects by those living and working in the area. Civic groups develop proposals which are broadly disseminated, and then community members vote on their preferences [37]. This process is particularly effective when it is co-decisional (between the government and its constituents); and when it is supported by a mechanism to reduce inequity, e.g. an Index listing issues important to well-being, so during the budget prioritization process, additional weight can be given to those disadvantaged [38]. Though ideally, PBs foster more democratic and equitable decision-making, in Pune and elsewhere PBs are often more tokenistic than meaningful public participation. For example, in Pune, an independent review of the local PB process highlighted problems that it was inadequately co-decisional and unable to systematically address issues of inequity [39]. A deliberative initiative, described later in this article, developed recommendations to improve Pune’s PB regarding both empowerment and equity, however they were not taken up by Pune’s municipal government. Conversely, in areas with traditionally strong public participation, such as in Kerala and induced and externally supported participation in rural Maharashtra, specific processes are implemented to bolster empowerment and equity. For example, in both areas, a development report is made public prior to annual budgeting so the community is better informed about areas of strength and inequality.
Since the mid-90s, the Indian Government has promoted the formation of self-help groups (SHGs) for savings, credit and microenterprise activity, especially of urban poor women. In some cities these SHGs are also vehicles for prioritization of shortfalls in basic services provision in poor neighbourhoods and slums, and supervision of improvement projects [40]. Participatory micro-planning under Kerala’s similar Kudumbashree programme nests within annual municipal planning. Overall inclusion and equity are variable, particularly in relation to local patterns of formal and informal political power, which may also reinforce exclusion of the poorest. Nonetheless, these programmes have been successful in enhancing the presence of women in participatory governance processes [41].
However, there are critical deficits in the institutional reforms of urban governance: limited implementation of decentralization under the 74th CAA [42], disjuncture between planning, governance and poverty alleviation [34], the poor ratio of representation, the lack of structures in urban areas analogous to the village gram sabha [43, 44], and limited functional and financial autonomy for municipal governments even if participatory processes are undertaken [35]. Public hearings are provided for as part of Environment Impact Assessment legislation so people can voice their views, though experience shows that such inputs have unclear influence on the decisions made [45]. As part of master plan preparation processes, the public may formally record objections and suggestions, but the decision-making processes do not incorporate opportunities for public participation to evolve combined thinking about the issue that could reflect common ground [46].
Critically, unlike the 73rd CAA that created gram sabhas in rural areas, the 74th CAA has not created a structure for direct democratic participation in cities. Ramanathan (2007), Founder of the non-profit Janaagraha [43] proposed that area sabhas be created in urban areas with every registered voter in a polling station as a member. Subsequently, under the Government of India’s Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission that was launched in 2006 (to which Ramanathan was a Technical Advisor), state governments were asked to include a provision for community participation as a pre-condition for receiving funding from the central government. A provision for area sabha was enacted by at least 12 states but none have constituted these [47].
Thus, there is a near absence of inclusive, egalitarian, well-informed, induced participation forums in urban areas in India. Governments rarely seek public participation in urban issues, other than to provide information, allow for grievances and hearings, and sometimes to seek opinions through surveys, workshops and consultations. The aim of such participation is to inform or consult (receive public feedback) and sometimes to involve (understand and consider public views), but rarely, if ever, to collaborate or empower [48]. While the struggles of the urban poor and other organic participation efforts have led to major gains, in the absence of structured forums of direct participation underpinned by public authority, societal inequities continue to pervade access to formal governance.
Then there is the disjunction between the formal and substantive aspects of citizenship in India, especially in cities. Desai & Sanyal (2012) point out that the poorest are denied many of their fundamental rights in practice [49]. Luckham et al. [50] have described the distinction between democratic institutions and democratic politics. Democratic institutions are the formal structures and procedure of democracy, while democratic politics refers to the actual engagement of the public in decision-making. The levels of government decentralization achieved in Indian cities remains inadequate. Paralleling insurgent participation described by Miraftab and Wills [18] of the urban poor in South Africa, Harriss [27] suggests that the poor in urban India are left out of the new politics of participation, which spaces are occupied by middle class activists and associations who as ‘consumer-citizens’, speak the language of collaboration with local governments. For the poor, Harriss suggests, the principal possibility to obtain representation for themselves remains through political parties (ibid), which continue practices of patronage.
We suggest that the inadequacy of formal democratic institutions, procedures, space and capacity also results in the inadequacy of a deeper democratic politics in the city, for much of India. What then is the way forward for democratic deepening?
Miraftab and Wills suggest that planners, including planning professionals working outside government entities, need to work with the resources of the state as well as with the resources of citizens, and especially inclusive of those who are insurgent participants, who have invented their spaces of citizenship [18]. In this context, Heller’s view [12] gives some hope to urban India, that with the strengths of social mobilization, and structured, local, procedural democratic engagement for participatory planning such as in Kerala and some parts of Brazil and South Africa, it is possible for democracy to be built bottom up. The following section describes such a structured, participatory democratic practice, that of Deliberative Democracy.
Deliberative Democracy
Modern deliberative democracy initiatives and discussions have emerged, largely in Western democracies over the last four decades. This article defines deliberative democracy as inclusive public deliberation that influences decision-making by an elected representative government. We view deliberative democracy as Heller and Rao (2015) posit, as an ‘amalgam of deliberative process and institutionalized sanction’ and ‘that deliberation as such is not a substitute for electoral democracy but a necessary condition for deepening democracy’ [51] (pp 7–8).
A range of deliberative democracy initiatives have been developed in recent years. These have dealt with complex urban issues of city-wide planning [52], to the allocation of 100% of the infrastructure budget in the capital city of Melbourne in an ‘Australian Participatory Budgeting’ initiative [53], and to national issues such as constitution formation processes in Turkey [54] and constitutional reviews in Ireland [55]. Concomitantly, deliberative democracy academic and practitioner discourse has examined the nature of public deliberation in society: how it may be embedded within a political system, particularly within electoral representative democracy, gains from public deliberation by everyday people, potential pitfalls, tools to organize deliberation, what essential qualities make deliberative processes valuable, and how the quality of deliberation might be evaluated, as well as the longer term impacts of deliberative democracy initiatives [8, 9, 31, 56].
According to Gastil and Richards ‘(W)hen people deliberate, they carefully examine a problem and arrive at a well-reasoned solution after a period of inclusive, respectful consideration of diverse points of view’ [8]. While deliberation is essential in all types of democratic governments, representative, participatory and direct, Catt has suggested that deliberation within the community is the key characteristic of participatory democracy [57]. Fung (2012) proposed that the quality of democratic governance may be improved by considering three elements of institutional design: who participates in public deliberation; how they communicate and make decisions; and the connection between their conclusions and opinions on one hand and public policy and action on the other [58]. Further, as Mansbridge (2015) [59] suggested, democratic deliberation may be viewed as having epistemic, ethical, and political functions. The epistemic function relates to the generation of opinions, preferences, and decisions, informed by facts and logic. Participants in the deliberation consider, discuss and weigh a range of views and information. The ethical function refers to mutual respect and absence of coercion in the consideration of views or formation of decisions. The political function refers to inclusion and egalitarian nature of who participates in deliberation. This affects the quality and content of deliberation as well as its legitimacy. Carson & Hartz-Karp (2005) [60] suggested three essential elements of an effective deliberative process as: 1. Influence on policy and decision making; 2. Inclusion, of diverse viewpoints and values, providing equal opportunity for all to participate; and 3. Deliberation quality such that there is open dialogue, with access to information, space to understand and reframe issues, devise options, and search for common ground.
One of the cornerstones of deliberative democracy is participant inclusivity and representativeness. The method of ‘sortition’, or random selection, or selection by lot, has been proposed as ideal to ensure representativeness of the broad population involved, with stratified sampling to ensure the group selected mirrors the populations’ demographics [61]. However, other methods may be used to ensure inclusion, depending on the nature of the deliberative forum, and such that the broadest spectrum of the population is elicited to participate [62].
The underlying contention of the practice and discourse of deliberative democracy is that if value is to be added to government decision-making, public participation needs to be meaningful i.e. have real potential to shape decisions or policies. In short, it should have ‘influence’. This means that the decisions that emerge from a public deliberation are actually implemented, or integrated into the decisions and policies of the representative government. This ensures the deliberation has gravitas, which is important not only for those deliberating, but also for achieving implementable, sustainable, substantive outcomes [60, 63].
Meaningful participation does not imply giving less importance to expert and technocratic views. Rather, it highlights that the values and considered views of the community involved are also important, and should influence decisions made. Not taking them seriously is highly likely to result in public resistance when government tries to implement changes. Officials responsible for urban governance and infrastructure are often criticised for making notoriously bad infrastructure decisions: being blind-sided by political dispositions, not seeing the big picture, inadequately examining options, and failing to understand project risks [64]. Moreover, their ‘expert’ solutions regularly backfire when there has been inadequate involvement of the diverse community. This is relevant in India too, as the media has often highlighted botched projects, that range from ill-conceived slum rehabilitation [65], flyovers [66], metro [67], and monorail [68], to a whole township [69].
We suggest that inclusivity, quality and influence of public participation in civic governance in Indian cities may be greatly enhanced through deliberative democracy, leading to more substantive outcomes for the public, and especially the marginalized. Moreover, given the importance of accountability and transparency to accrue public legitimacy for such deliberative democracy processes, we suggest it is important to have an overseeing, independent third party.
An independent third-party
According to Stephens & Berner (2011) [70] “(T)he third party’s role is to assist in designing and managing a process that pursues a variety of goals beneficial to the stakeholders and decision-maker(s)”. In this instance, the goals are to achieve good governance. This is currently difficult to achieve given the noted prevalence of exclusionary organic participation, as well as the rising levels of public distrust in India’s democratic governance [71], and the unsatisfactory experiences with most government-induced participation in Indian cities. We propose that this could be resolved if there was an independent third party, tasked with overseeing good governance.
The need for an independent third-party has been evidenced in the Indian experience of public participation, where independent facilitation has been required, often provided by non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and educational institutes. For example, participatory budgeting in Kerala and other cities around the world, as well as participatory planning in rural Maharashtra have documented the importance of an independent facilitation team in public participation processes [32, 33]. When the provision for conducting gram sabhas (village assemblies) was legislated, this did not inevitably lead to village assemblies automatically deliberating and preparing their development plans. Recognizing this gap, in 2018, the Indian Government launched a federal programme (the Rashtriya Gram Swaraj Abhiyan, national campaign for rural self-governance) to strengthen the capacities of rural local self-government institutions for participatory planning. The programme recognizes that developing Gram Panchayat Development Plans may require intensive facilitation, and envisages professionals and educational institutions providing such support to villages [40]. This is relevant in urban areas as well. Meaningful participation requires that participants receive unbiased, comprehensive information and reports written in ways that can be easily understood, regardless of participant levels of education. Additionally, public participation data needs to be collected and maintained. This is currently a significant gap in existing participation forums, which could be taken on by an independent third party.
In the deliberative democracy discourse, it has been proposed that a collaborative countervailing power is needed [31], to help foster the integrity of empowered participatory governance, and reduce its susceptibility to various forms of corruption. Sources of collaborative countervailing power, Fung & Wright suggested [31], were NGOs or movements, with local groups potentially being best suited to this role. The recent formulation of the Forest Rights Act in India provided insights on the use of countervailing power via a different route - adversarial yet collaborative. Ganguly described the process as one that combined the utilization of formal deliberative spaces (in this case a Joint Parliamentary Committee) with mass mobilizations of tribal community groups and NGOs when those spaces were threatened, and then with NGOs playing mediation and facilitation roles [72]. Ganguly’s description also highlighted how arguments and points of view were crystalized, not by the political sphere but by the independent deliberative public sphere. National advocacy organizations as well as local community groups were able to come together to form a broad national coalition that advocated for the rights of the historically marginalized. This combination served as a strong counter to the ‘tiger versus people’ argument of the conservationist NGOs that aligned with the Forest Department (ibid). While this outcome was highly effective, it is not always the case that such coalitions supporting the disadvantaged will emerge. Hence the inclusion of an independent third party as an integral part of the public participation process could help to provide that countervailing power, and enable/ upskill marginalized people to form empowered groups [10].
Hence while the Indian experiences of traditional organic and induced participation provide a foundation for good governance, the considerable gaps in effective public participation institution and practice highlight the need for governance reform in urban India. Considering the success of deliberative democracy in other parts of the world [56] and similarly structured and facilitated participation in rural India [32, 33], there is reason to believe that Indian cities too could benefit from such reform. In particular, it is proposed that implementing deliberative democracy as an integral element of induced participation, and conjoining organic participation, would result in meaningful participation and bridge current gaps in good governance. If this conjoining was done synergistically, it would maximize the strengths of each, i.e., the commitment and energy of local organic participation with the authority and structure of induced participation. The claimed and invented spaces of participation would be important to broaden the base of those involved, bringing to the fore an understanding of the issues of those often excluded from government’s purview, and providing the advocacy needed to press governments to enact the commitments made to their constituents. To achieve this, organic, claimed and invented participation would need to be formally integrated within each stage of the induced deliberative democracy process (i.e. accepted by all parties), from the initial framing of the problem and implementation of inclusive, deliberative processes, through to championing the implementation of recommendations, and ongoing review of impacts. Additionally, to ensure the participation process would be comprehensive, transparent, egalitarian and influential, it should be overseen by an independent third party, which would foster process legitimacy, and in so doing, bolster public trust in the democratic system.
The next section describes an action research initiative in Pune, India that explored how the traditional and ongoing strengths and energy of organic participation, together with structured, meaningful, induced participation opportunities could be utilised and enhanced to enable good governance in Indian cities.