Citizen Participation in Public Administration: Views from Lebanon

Abstract

This article examines citizen participation in Lebanon. Specifically, we apply the International Association for Public Participation Spectrum of Public Participation (2007) and use survey, interview, and archival data to understand how and why Lebanese government agencies use citizen participation. In addition to reviewing survey data, we present short cases about citizen participation in the three Lebanese agencies. Our findings indicate that the majority of public agencies in Lebanon use basic forms of citizen participation that span the inform-consult categories on the IAP2 spectrum. The article concludes with a discussion about the challenges of and prospects for citizen participation in the Lebanese public sector.

Keywords:

• citizen participation
• administration-citizen interaction
• Lebanon

Notes

¹For example, Arnstein's (1969) Ladder of Participation is not only dated, but also “improperly fuses an empirical scale that describes the level of influence individuals have over some collective decision with normative approval” (Fung 2006, p. 67). Cooper, Bryer, and Meek's (2006) model of citizen-centered collaborative public management conflates arenas of practice with design approaches and uses categorical sets that are not mutually exclusive. Fung's (2006) democracy cube has theoretical potential, but is conceptually confusing in practice. The NCDD's (2008) Engagement Streams Framework pertains only to dialogue-based or deliberative processes, and therefore does not capture the full range of participation processes used in administrative settings. Creighton's (2005) continuum has normative propensities and does not reach the level of conceptual distinction needed for theoretical development and analysis; however, he does refer readers to the IAP2 Spectrum for a better-developed example of the model.

²According to the International Religious Freedom Report (United States Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, 2007), there are 18 recognized religious groups in Lebanon; however, not all these groups (e.g., Jewish sects) have political representation.

³The majority of data were translated from Arabic to English—most of the archival data were in Arabic, and both the survey and the interviews were administered in Arabic.

⁴See: http://www.finance.gov.lb/en-US/finance/AboutUs/Pages/default.aspx

⁵ http://www.finance.gov.lb/Pages/index.htm

⁶ http://www.institutdesfinances.gov.lb/english/The-Library-of-Finance1

⁷For more information, see http://www.ces.gov.lb

⁸ http://www.ministryofdisplaced.gov.lb

⁹Lebanon ranked 128 among 182 countries on the 2012 corruption perception index.