Author Margaret Wheatley once said...
“There is no power for change greater than a community discovering what it cares about.”
Throughout history, citizen engagement has indeed been the most powerful means of tackling local issues and achieving robust solutions. NGOs, specifically, have learned to utilize this power to its fullest.
Empowering community members to be the driving force behind change is the core motto of grassroots activism - and we believe every changemaker is capable of implementing its principles into their own operations. Starting... with you!
Step One: Identify a Problem and How Your Community Can Help to Solve It
To begin, identify a single community-based issue that your NGO wants to tackle.
- Pinpoint the specifics of the problem and how community involvement will help to correct it.
- Meet someone in your community who is directly affected to help you understand the magnitude of the issue. From this, you can more accurately map out potential solutions and a role for your community to play.
- Determine if there is a specific part of the community you want to target. Is it more beneficial to engage a neighborhood who will have a particular interest in the matter, or to engage the community at large?
- Establish what resources you have. How many volunteers, how much time, and how much of your budget can you allocate to this community engagement project?
- Form partnerships with interested stakeholders who can help support your initiative. That can include collaborations with other NGOs, movements or local interest groups.
Step Two: Choose What Type of Initiative You Want to Implement
The next step is to decide how you want to engage your community. There are four main ways of doing this:
- Provide your community with outlets to voice their opinions. Petitions are an invaluable tool to collect and turn public opinion into tangible political power. They allow your fellow community members to show their support for your initiative through a quick and low-stakes engagement - a signature. Local town hall meetings are also a great vector of expression, allowing your community to discuss and debate issues publicly, as they arise. Organize your meetings on a regular basis and ensure that each meeting has clear objectives.
- Involve your community every opportunity you get. This will make your NGO's work more visible and grounded for locals and stakeholders. Whether it's collection drives, clean-up events or volunteering days in local shelters, organizing actions is fastest and best done using a digital Action Platform like Qomon.
- Educate your community on the issue and the ways they can help. Host information evenings to bring your community together around the issue. Let people inform you and not the other way around - they probably have solutions in mind already! Organizing live events or passing around informative leaflets also helps getting your word out. Sounds nice? You'll need a volunteering team assembled, an itinerary all mapped out, and a killer flier design... well, we might know of a canvassing app that helps you with all of it.
- Offer training to your community so they can launch actions of their own. Not only will this strategy allow your movement to grow like bamboo - but it will also provide your community with a strong and authentic sense of empowerment. Organize workshops to teach people about the resources, skills and planning required to successfully orchestrate an action of their own.
Step Three: Consider Inclusivity and Accessibility
Accessibility and inclusivity are absolute must-dos in quality citizen engagement processes. According to Qomon sense, as well as the OECD Guidelines for Citizen Participation Processes...
"Any interested person (...) should be able to participate [in a citizen initiative], and the processes should reflect the diversity of the community"
Here's a couple of tips to build a citizen initiative that's both inclusive and extremely efficient.
- Be self-aware and keep inclusivity records. After any activity or project, assess which sectors of your community were underrepresented. Consider whether everyone, regardless of their difference, status or disability, had an equal opportunity to access and participate in your actions.
- When organizing an action, be mindful of people's other commitments. For example, hosting an event in the evening ensures that those who work 9-5 schedules can attend, but might put off parents with kids at home. Think of your target audience - who would you want attending?
- Allow your community to voice issues both in person and online. For example, for each town hall meeting, also provide an online forum for citizens to share their opinions and ideas. This will allow more people to participate.
- Include your community's youth! Access young people where they are - organize actions in schools and colleges to show them their opinion has value and can shape the world. After all, they represent your community’s future!
Step Four: Evaluate Your Efforts
At the end of any citizen engagement project, take the time to assess the overall success of your initiative.
- Consider data analysis software to evaluate the profiles of those who took part and were interested in your projects. This will help you to assess what demographic participated the most, which issues most concern your community, and who was underrepresented.
- Determine whether the project yielded your desired outcome, and whether it was doable within your timeframe. This information should inform your future efforts.
- Find a way to communicate your efforts to the wider community, not just to those who actively participated. Start a website or social media account to document your initiative, or reach out to local news outlets to cover your story.
- Determine how many of those who participated in your actions are interested in getting involved again. If large numbers are interested, create a system for communicating with these contacts in future. If not, work on a stronger plan for sustaining interest for future actions.
- Design a plan for implementing the ideas and concern your community has shared with you. Community members have an intimate knowledge of their local area, as well as technical, and cultural insights. Their opinion is valuable, so make the most of it!
- Institutionalize the practice of promoting citizen engagement within your organization. Incorporate it into all aspects of your work- it’s an important way to both promote your NGO’s efforts, and also to empower your community to take action!
Citizen engagement has long operated as a launchpad for meaningful change at the local level. It’s one of the most important ways to empower ordinary citizens to be the vehicles for improving the quality of their own lives, and the lives of their fellow community members.
As an NGO or movement, you should encourage citizen activism at every step of the journey. Doing so, you enable democracy to evolve at the pace of its people - and allow community members at the most local level to make a difference.
Sources
8 Tips on How to Encourage Citizen Participation - Commonplace
5 Ways to Improve Citizen Engagement Initiatives - GovTech
Executive Summary | OECD Guidelines for Citizen Participation Processes - OECD
6 Reasons Why Public Participation and Community Engagement are Important - Social PinPoint
