**3. Theoretical foundations**

134 Social Sciences and Cultural Studies – Issues of Language, Public Opinion, Education and Welfare

the citizens. There is a need to move into broader frameworks that give more relevance to

The AWARE Citizens' Declaration and the final conference where it was presented raised the question of environmental democracy. Science launched the AWARE project (amongst other Science-Policy Interface initiatives), but now the initiative and decision should be social. This claims for more action research focusing on sustainability challenges and aimed

From the AWARE experience, it seems that policy-makers and water managers form the most difficult group to engage in public participation processes, unless such activities are part of their agendas. The policy and water managers community would find a summary of guidelines or best practices based on the AWARE experiment a very useful resource for future initiatives and activities. In addition, an overview of the current status of implementation of the EU Water Framework Directive Article 14 on public participation would be very useful, covering all Member States. While the scope of the public consultations run under the Water framework Directive vary a lot between countries, they usually failed to involve individual lay citizens, which is where the AWARE project has demonstrated a new and effective approach. Additionally, a policy agenda that focuses on each step of education - from early stage to long life learning, in formal and informal

It is clear that only by reaching the majority of the society - not just a small elite of concerned people as the AWARE citizens panel - can societal challenges effectively be addressed. For this purpose, social networks and mass media are becoming essential tools. Despite the number of persons who agree with this statement, many have already tried – unsuccessfully – to apply social networks in similar initiatives. Very good skills on modern communication, dedicated time and resources, and a very specific target group seem indispensable for such tools to be truly successful. The AWARE citizens' panel, for instance, rejects that kind of approach and communication experts confirm that face-to-face methods are required when

The Science-Citizens-Policy projects must deal with - and fight against - an excessive fragmentation of institutional roles and competences, both within the water sector and between the water sector and other related sectors such as agriculture and tourism. Coordination of main decision-makers, better and more efficient use of funds, and more efficient circulation of best practices are perhaps more important than further funding. The main problem with multi-level governance is however that the lower levels (e.g. municipalities) that can work close to the citizens and organize local participation processes usually do not have the financial resources for implementing what the citizens propose. Often the funds are available only at higher levels of government and not easily/immediately accessible for local decision makers, with the result that the expectations

Strengthening the connectivity between researchers, policy-makers, key stakeholders, and civil society can certainly improve the water quality and ease the water management in Europe. This kind of participatory approaches can be more easily implemented in water

such socio-economic aspects, like the Integrated Coastal Zone Management.

settings - should promote a larger up-taking of scientific results by the public.

**2.3.3 Highlights from the water manager and policy makers** 

to deliver environmental and social change.

dealing with challenging and complex issues.

of the citizens are eventually not met.

The nature and scope of democratic politics in modern societies has been a subject of academic and political debate since the early days. A key issue has always been the extent to which it is possible to sustain active and dynamic democratic practices in a large and complex polity. Already in the Federalist Papers, the founding fathers of American democracy Madison, Hamilton and Jay writing under the pseudonym "Publius" debated the importance of federalism for a large, multi-lingual, heterogeneous and divided country like the United States at the time. One of their main arguments was that within a large polity federalism was a facilitator – and not an inhibitor – of democracy because only federalism with its many levels of government could ensure that there were enough checks and balances on central government but also on powerful interest lobbies. A few centuries later, the European Union finds itself facing similar, even if more complex, challenges as it seeks to advance beyond economic integration towards political integration within a multi-level governance framework.

Whether the European Union will evolve into a full federal state remains an open question (as this could imply a significant loss of national sovereignty it is evidently not favoured by either citizens or political elites). But even if the future of the European Union lies rather in inter-governmentalism, which delineates a regulatory model of loose coordination (Majone 1996) rather than a political model of institutional convergence, one thing is certain: that in a multi-level government polity it is no longer possible to rely alone on representative democratic institutions (such as the parliament) and procedures (such as voting) to obtain citizen input into decision-making. A complex democratic polity requires a multi-faceted *public sphere* (Habermas 1991, 1998) and this, in turn, calls for more stakeholder involvement in decision-making (hence governance rather than government – see EC 2002) as well as more latitude for deliberative processes (Schmitter 2000, Giorgi et al. 2006).

Unlike representative democracy which is conceptually based on the model of delegation, deliberative democracy calls for "active"citizenship (Barber 1984, Held 1996). Active citizens are those who mobilize within communities or social movements and who thus endeavour to impact on policy-making. "Activated" citizens are those who take part in citizen deliberative forums organized by national or, principally, local governments for tapping on citizen views on specific policy proposals. Policy forums, insofar as they are organized by public authorities, are a form of top-down citizens participation, different from bottom-up active citizenship (as in community or social movements).

Sustainability Science and Citizens Participation:

methods (Fisher, 2005).

originally intended in Western democracies.

translate abstract propositions into particular contexts?

Building a Science-Citizens-Policy Interface to Address Grand Societal Challenges in Europe 137

contribute a kind of knowledge – in particular, local knowledge – that the professional expert requires. Challenging the scientific expert's methodological emphasis on "generalizable knowledge", post-positivist theory underscore the importance of bringing in the local contextual knowledge of the ordinary citizen. To be usable, knowledge has to be applied to a particular situation or context. In this sense, the case for participation is seen to be as much grounded in epistemology as in democratic politics. Appropriately framed citizens participation might best thought as a way to solve a translation problem: how do we

Broadly speaking, therefore, participation contributes to three important goals. First of all, citizen participation and its normative rationale, deliberation, give meaning to democracy. If we are to take seriously a "strong" form of democracy, all citizens need to deliberate at least some of the time on the decisions that affect their lives (Barber, 1984). Second, citizen participation contributes normatively to the legitimization of policy development and implementation. And third, but not least important, citizens participation can contribute to professional inquiry. Participatory forms of inquiry have the potential to provide new knowledge – in particular local knowledge – that is inaccessible to more abstract empirical

These three goals are the core objectives of the Science-Citizens-Policy Interface and the integrated adaptive management at the core of the AWARE method and pilot applications presented above. However, the issue is scarcely new. Eighty years ago John Dewey (Dewey, 1927) asked how citizens could participate in political decision making dependent on knowledge experts. Indeed, Dewey identified a paradox. As the importance of the citizen grew in the political realm - thanks to the expansion of basic rights in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries – the phenomenon was paralleled by the growth in power of large corporate and governmental organizations directed by managerial and technical expertise. Thus just in the period in which the political influence of the citizenry was taking shape, it was undercut by the rise of bureaucratic organization and technical expertise. For Dewey, the answer to the challenge posed by an unprecedented level of social and technical complexity was a division of labour between the citizens and the experts. On the technical front, experts would analytically identify basic social needs and problems. On the political front, citizens could set a democratic agenda for pursuing these needs and troubles. To integrate the two processes, Dewey called for an improvement of the methods and conditions of debate, discussion, and persuasion. Debate would require the participation of experts, but they would act in a special way: instead of rendering judgements they would analyze and interpret. If experts, acting as teachers and interpreters, could decipher the technological world for citizens and enable them to make sensible political judgements, the constitutional processes designed to advance public over selfish interests could function as

Since Dewey's time, the question has only grown in importance. What was then a forwardlooking philosophical polemic has emerged today as one of the most pressing questions of contemporary democracy theory. The progress of democracy has been disappointing. Although Western democracies exhibit high degrees of interest group involvement, levels of individual citizen participation have declined rather than expanded. Over the same period, moreover, professional experts have failed to ease the problem. Rather than adopting the role of teacher or educator, as Dewey had hoped they would, experts have largely set

Both forms of participation, but especially bottom-up community or social movements, are often criticized for the single-issue orientation: their objective is to bring change in one policy area – and often within a strictly delineated sub-component – and this goal is pursued without due consideration to other effects or other groups of users. Top-down citizen participation is further criticized for being more prone to manipulation given its dependency on public authorities or "the policy-maker" for infrastructure and funding. Even though these are dangers that must be borne in mind, it is equally important not to fall into the trap of magnifying them beyond proportion. The conception that democratic politics can ever be "free" or "pure" in the sense that they involve no strategic considerations – hence the possibility of manipulation – is misplaced as is well-known from studies about strategic voting, lobbying or populism in representative politics or studies of the civil society in deliberative politics (Giorgi et al. 2006).

Within the realm of top-down deliberative politics much, in fact, depends on the organizational format and procedures followed. The form of deliberative processes is thought to influence the content – and indeed, like in democracy more generally, this is known to be the case (Move Together, 2009). Citizen participation differs in terms of its objective (why is citizen participation being sought? What will the final output be?), design/methodology (who will participate and how will participants be selected? What instrument will be implemented to achieve the objective?), as well as scope (how many citizens should participate? How long and how often will meetings take place? What resources are available?). Despite the various forms citizen participation can take, the underlying purpose should be the intensification of effective participation in and influence of ordinary citizens on policy development and formulation, particularly when their lives and communities are impacted by these policies. Ideally citizen participation should also be experienced as "empowering", meaning that citizens emerge out of the participatory experience with greater knowledge and the feeling that they wish to continue to actively contribute to policy-making in their role as citizens (Fung et al., 2003).

Despite the enthusiasm for promoting democracy, most of the calls for more democracy and citizens participation occur at the same time that we witness the disturbing decline of democratic practices in the Western democracies. Many factors explain the wane of the citizen's role. Among the most important is the social and technical complexity of modern societies (Fisher, 2005). What are the possibilities, many ask, of the ordinary (that is, non expert) citizen deliberating intelligently on the policy issues confronting the decision makers of such societies? Are not these issues better addressed by the professional experts? What evidence supports any contention that citizens can effectively participate in helping to make the complex decisions facing contemporary policy makers?

Hard evidence demonstrates indeed that the ordinary citizen is capable of a great deal more participation than generally recognized or acknowledged (Fisher, 2005). Citizens participation is not to be seen as a magic cure-all for economic, social and environmental problems, nor is deliberation meant to direct attention away from questions of interest and power. But it does hold out the possibility of bringing forth new knowledge and ideas capable of creating and legitimating new interests, reshaping our understanding of existing interests, and, in the process, influencing the political pathways along which power and interest travel. Deliberations of ordinary citizens, if appropriately framed, can help not only in searching solutions to pressing environmental and social problems, but they can also

Both forms of participation, but especially bottom-up community or social movements, are often criticized for the single-issue orientation: their objective is to bring change in one policy area – and often within a strictly delineated sub-component – and this goal is pursued without due consideration to other effects or other groups of users. Top-down citizen participation is further criticized for being more prone to manipulation given its dependency on public authorities or "the policy-maker" for infrastructure and funding. Even though these are dangers that must be borne in mind, it is equally important not to fall into the trap of magnifying them beyond proportion. The conception that democratic politics can ever be "free" or "pure" in the sense that they involve no strategic considerations – hence the possibility of manipulation – is misplaced as is well-known from studies about strategic voting, lobbying or populism in representative politics or studies of

Within the realm of top-down deliberative politics much, in fact, depends on the organizational format and procedures followed. The form of deliberative processes is thought to influence the content – and indeed, like in democracy more generally, this is known to be the case (Move Together, 2009). Citizen participation differs in terms of its objective (why is citizen participation being sought? What will the final output be?), design/methodology (who will participate and how will participants be selected? What instrument will be implemented to achieve the objective?), as well as scope (how many citizens should participate? How long and how often will meetings take place? What resources are available?). Despite the various forms citizen participation can take, the underlying purpose should be the intensification of effective participation in and influence of ordinary citizens on policy development and formulation, particularly when their lives and communities are impacted by these policies. Ideally citizen participation should also be experienced as "empowering", meaning that citizens emerge out of the participatory experience with greater knowledge and the feeling that they wish to continue to actively

Despite the enthusiasm for promoting democracy, most of the calls for more democracy and citizens participation occur at the same time that we witness the disturbing decline of democratic practices in the Western democracies. Many factors explain the wane of the citizen's role. Among the most important is the social and technical complexity of modern societies (Fisher, 2005). What are the possibilities, many ask, of the ordinary (that is, non expert) citizen deliberating intelligently on the policy issues confronting the decision makers of such societies? Are not these issues better addressed by the professional experts? What evidence supports any contention that citizens can effectively participate in helping to make

Hard evidence demonstrates indeed that the ordinary citizen is capable of a great deal more participation than generally recognized or acknowledged (Fisher, 2005). Citizens participation is not to be seen as a magic cure-all for economic, social and environmental problems, nor is deliberation meant to direct attention away from questions of interest and power. But it does hold out the possibility of bringing forth new knowledge and ideas capable of creating and legitimating new interests, reshaping our understanding of existing interests, and, in the process, influencing the political pathways along which power and interest travel. Deliberations of ordinary citizens, if appropriately framed, can help not only in searching solutions to pressing environmental and social problems, but they can also

the civil society in deliberative politics (Giorgi et al. 2006).

contribute to policy-making in their role as citizens (Fung et al., 2003).

the complex decisions facing contemporary policy makers?

contribute a kind of knowledge – in particular, local knowledge – that the professional expert requires. Challenging the scientific expert's methodological emphasis on "generalizable knowledge", post-positivist theory underscore the importance of bringing in the local contextual knowledge of the ordinary citizen. To be usable, knowledge has to be applied to a particular situation or context. In this sense, the case for participation is seen to be as much grounded in epistemology as in democratic politics. Appropriately framed citizens participation might best thought as a way to solve a translation problem: how do we translate abstract propositions into particular contexts?

Broadly speaking, therefore, participation contributes to three important goals. First of all, citizen participation and its normative rationale, deliberation, give meaning to democracy. If we are to take seriously a "strong" form of democracy, all citizens need to deliberate at least some of the time on the decisions that affect their lives (Barber, 1984). Second, citizen participation contributes normatively to the legitimization of policy development and implementation. And third, but not least important, citizens participation can contribute to professional inquiry. Participatory forms of inquiry have the potential to provide new knowledge – in particular local knowledge – that is inaccessible to more abstract empirical methods (Fisher, 2005).

These three goals are the core objectives of the Science-Citizens-Policy Interface and the integrated adaptive management at the core of the AWARE method and pilot applications presented above. However, the issue is scarcely new. Eighty years ago John Dewey (Dewey, 1927) asked how citizens could participate in political decision making dependent on knowledge experts. Indeed, Dewey identified a paradox. As the importance of the citizen grew in the political realm - thanks to the expansion of basic rights in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries – the phenomenon was paralleled by the growth in power of large corporate and governmental organizations directed by managerial and technical expertise. Thus just in the period in which the political influence of the citizenry was taking shape, it was undercut by the rise of bureaucratic organization and technical expertise. For Dewey, the answer to the challenge posed by an unprecedented level of social and technical complexity was a division of labour between the citizens and the experts. On the technical front, experts would analytically identify basic social needs and problems. On the political front, citizens could set a democratic agenda for pursuing these needs and troubles. To integrate the two processes, Dewey called for an improvement of the methods and conditions of debate, discussion, and persuasion. Debate would require the participation of experts, but they would act in a special way: instead of rendering judgements they would analyze and interpret. If experts, acting as teachers and interpreters, could decipher the technological world for citizens and enable them to make sensible political judgements, the constitutional processes designed to advance public over selfish interests could function as originally intended in Western democracies.

Since Dewey's time, the question has only grown in importance. What was then a forwardlooking philosophical polemic has emerged today as one of the most pressing questions of contemporary democracy theory. The progress of democracy has been disappointing. Although Western democracies exhibit high degrees of interest group involvement, levels of individual citizen participation have declined rather than expanded. Over the same period, moreover, professional experts have failed to ease the problem. Rather than adopting the role of teacher or educator, as Dewey had hoped they would, experts have largely set

Sustainability Science and Citizens Participation:

program serves the interests of the public?

(Freeman, 2008; Rawls, 1999, 2005).

Building a Science-Citizens-Policy Interface to Address Grand Societal Challenges in Europe 139

citizens with multiple and varied participatory opportunities to deliberate basic political issues. Against this state of affairs, there is the need of a more "collaborative" or "participatory" model of expertise and policy making. Decision making procedures, in this respect, must take into consideration the authority and influence that different actors have on the final choices. Should such decisions be left to the experts? What level of influence, for example, should the views of the general public carry when compared, for example, to those of scientists, administrators, elected officials, engaged community leaders, and activists? Who is more capable of judging – for instance – whether a power plant or a new regulatory

How we devise solutions to these questions is structured by our assumptions about citizens' cognitive abilities to participate in discussions about complex issues, including their methods of assessment (Fisher, 2005). And here we come to the last, and more basic, theoretical foundation of the citizens conference method and the AWARE experience, which can be found in the John Rawls Theory of Justice and its concept of "Original Position"

We contend that citizens juries, if their members are appropriately selected, and the citizens conferences, if appropriately conducted, are the best real life approximation of the original position, the core concept of the Rawls' theory of justice as fairness. A popular summary of this theory is provided in the box overleaf. In the following we will discuss more in detail the rationale and features of the original position, while its relationship with the sustainability topics and the AWARE experience will be discussed in the next section.

The Original Position has often been compared to the "state of nature" or the pre-political condition of humanity, which was important in the philosophies of early modern social contract theorists. According to philosophers such as Thomas Hobbes and John Locke, in order to understand political obligation, we should 1) first conceive what human beings were like (or would have been like) before the creation of organized societies under government and laws, and then 2) ask a) what reasons would have motivated people to form an organized society and b) what principles human beings in this pre-political condition would have chosen to guide their interaction in a society under an established government. Hobbes argues that in a pre-social state of nature it would be rational for all to agree to authorize one person to exercise the absolute political power needed to enforce norms necessary for social cooperation. Contrariwise, Locke argued against absolute monarchy by contending that no existing political constitution is legitimate unless it could be contracted into without violating any natural rights or duties from a position of equal

rights and equal political jurisdiction within a (relatively peaceful) state of nature.

Rawls follows the social contract tradition, whereby there are three items to keep distinct: (1) the pre-political condition, (2) the political order established just as people were coming out of the pre-political conditions, and (3) the actual – and possibly flawed – order under which we all live. Stage (2) of this sequence is thought to reveal what arrangements are just or fair, and it could then be used as a basis for critically evaluating to what extent the actual society (stage 3) is fair. Rawls' idea of the original position is similar to that of social contract philosophers, except that he is under no illusions that the original position was ever a reality or a "state of nature". It is a model, a thought experiment, i.e. an abstract mental device to help us understand the principles of justice that would govern the basic structure of a just

themselves off from the mass citizenry (Fisher, 2005). Instead of facilitating democracy, they have mainly given shape to a more technocratic form of decision making, far more elitist than democratic. To make the matter worse, over the past decades against the increasing complexity of social and environmental problems the experts themselves became increasingly incapable to provide answers and solutions to those problems. In recent years, this concern with both complexity and uncertainty of our problems has lead influential political theorists to rethink their positions on the prospects of democracy. For instance, complexity is one of the main issues that troubles Habermas in his ongoing effort to spell out a theory of deliberative democracy. In his view, "unavoidable complexity" imposes the need for important qualifications in the elaboration of participatory democracy.

Indeed, in this age of complexity, the need of specialized expertise to formulate policies and take decisions bears directly on how much citizens can know about the choices they confront. It becomes increasingly clear that in many policy domains, politics more and more becomes a struggle between those who have expertise and those who do not. Indeed, access to technical knowledge and skill has allowed those with the power to legitimate their political decisions. Conversely, the lack of access to such knowledge hinders the possibility of an active and meaningful involvement on the part of the large majority of the public. For instance, technical languages used by the experts provide an intimidating barrier for lay citizens seeking to express their disagreements in the language of everyday life. Speaking the language of science, as well as the jargon of particular policy communities, becomes an essential credential for participation. Not only does this directly involve the technical dimensions of policy questions, but it concerns the value trade-off and other consequences that follow from the implementation of such policies (Hill, 1992).

The point to be made here is that complexity will continue to ensure the need for professional expertise, but this only brings us to the other side of the problem; namely that the experts themselves are not without their own difficulties. Not only do the experts have their own professional ideological commitments, often conflicting with the public interest, but they possess no analytical wizardry capable of resolving most of the pressing societal problems. Expert judgement, at least in the field of social science, provides few uncontested solutions or answers. So, while we still need experts, expertise cannot stand alone. Especially in social matters, normative assumptions and values are as important as technical analysis. No demonstration of efficiency can ever suffice to convince citizens to accept a social program that they don't believe to be *good*, *right*, or *fair*. When it comes to the basic normative assumptions and social understanding that underlay social and policy research itself, the expert can have no privileged status. Rather than providing technical answers designed to bring political discussions to an end, the task for them is to assist citizens in their efforts to examine their own interest and to make their own better informed decisions (Hirschhorn, 1979). Beyond merely providing analytical research and empirical data, the expert should act as a "facilitator" of public learning and empowerment. As a facilitator, he or she becomes an expert in how people learn, clarify and decide for themselves. In choices about how we want to live together – or how to solve the conflicts that arise in the struggle to do so – the experts are indeed only fellow citizens. And it is here that the case for citizens involvement start to become apparent.

More precisely, what does it mean to say that citizens (should) have a role here? Missing from Western political systems are well-developed political arrangements that provide

themselves off from the mass citizenry (Fisher, 2005). Instead of facilitating democracy, they have mainly given shape to a more technocratic form of decision making, far more elitist than democratic. To make the matter worse, over the past decades against the increasing complexity of social and environmental problems the experts themselves became increasingly incapable to provide answers and solutions to those problems. In recent years, this concern with both complexity and uncertainty of our problems has lead influential political theorists to rethink their positions on the prospects of democracy. For instance, complexity is one of the main issues that troubles Habermas in his ongoing effort to spell out a theory of deliberative democracy. In his view, "unavoidable complexity" imposes the

Indeed, in this age of complexity, the need of specialized expertise to formulate policies and take decisions bears directly on how much citizens can know about the choices they confront. It becomes increasingly clear that in many policy domains, politics more and more becomes a struggle between those who have expertise and those who do not. Indeed, access to technical knowledge and skill has allowed those with the power to legitimate their political decisions. Conversely, the lack of access to such knowledge hinders the possibility of an active and meaningful involvement on the part of the large majority of the public. For instance, technical languages used by the experts provide an intimidating barrier for lay citizens seeking to express their disagreements in the language of everyday life. Speaking the language of science, as well as the jargon of particular policy communities, becomes an essential credential for participation. Not only does this directly involve the technical dimensions of policy questions, but it concerns the value trade-off and other consequences

The point to be made here is that complexity will continue to ensure the need for professional expertise, but this only brings us to the other side of the problem; namely that the experts themselves are not without their own difficulties. Not only do the experts have their own professional ideological commitments, often conflicting with the public interest, but they possess no analytical wizardry capable of resolving most of the pressing societal problems. Expert judgement, at least in the field of social science, provides few uncontested solutions or answers. So, while we still need experts, expertise cannot stand alone. Especially in social matters, normative assumptions and values are as important as technical analysis. No demonstration of efficiency can ever suffice to convince citizens to accept a social program that they don't believe to be *good*, *right*, or *fair*. When it comes to the basic normative assumptions and social understanding that underlay social and policy research itself, the expert can have no privileged status. Rather than providing technical answers designed to bring political discussions to an end, the task for them is to assist citizens in their efforts to examine their own interest and to make their own better informed decisions (Hirschhorn, 1979). Beyond merely providing analytical research and empirical data, the expert should act as a "facilitator" of public learning and empowerment. As a facilitator, he or she becomes an expert in how people learn, clarify and decide for themselves. In choices about how we want to live together – or how to solve the conflicts that arise in the struggle to do so – the experts are indeed only fellow citizens. And it is here that the case for citizens

More precisely, what does it mean to say that citizens (should) have a role here? Missing from Western political systems are well-developed political arrangements that provide

need for important qualifications in the elaboration of participatory democracy.

that follow from the implementation of such policies (Hill, 1992).

involvement start to become apparent.

citizens with multiple and varied participatory opportunities to deliberate basic political issues. Against this state of affairs, there is the need of a more "collaborative" or "participatory" model of expertise and policy making. Decision making procedures, in this respect, must take into consideration the authority and influence that different actors have on the final choices. Should such decisions be left to the experts? What level of influence, for example, should the views of the general public carry when compared, for example, to those of scientists, administrators, elected officials, engaged community leaders, and activists? Who is more capable of judging – for instance – whether a power plant or a new regulatory program serves the interests of the public?

How we devise solutions to these questions is structured by our assumptions about citizens' cognitive abilities to participate in discussions about complex issues, including their methods of assessment (Fisher, 2005). And here we come to the last, and more basic, theoretical foundation of the citizens conference method and the AWARE experience, which can be found in the John Rawls Theory of Justice and its concept of "Original Position" (Freeman, 2008; Rawls, 1999, 2005).

We contend that citizens juries, if their members are appropriately selected, and the citizens conferences, if appropriately conducted, are the best real life approximation of the original position, the core concept of the Rawls' theory of justice as fairness. A popular summary of this theory is provided in the box overleaf. In the following we will discuss more in detail the rationale and features of the original position, while its relationship with the sustainability topics and the AWARE experience will be discussed in the next section.

The Original Position has often been compared to the "state of nature" or the pre-political condition of humanity, which was important in the philosophies of early modern social contract theorists. According to philosophers such as Thomas Hobbes and John Locke, in order to understand political obligation, we should 1) first conceive what human beings were like (or would have been like) before the creation of organized societies under government and laws, and then 2) ask a) what reasons would have motivated people to form an organized society and b) what principles human beings in this pre-political condition would have chosen to guide their interaction in a society under an established government. Hobbes argues that in a pre-social state of nature it would be rational for all to agree to authorize one person to exercise the absolute political power needed to enforce norms necessary for social cooperation. Contrariwise, Locke argued against absolute monarchy by contending that no existing political constitution is legitimate unless it could be contracted into without violating any natural rights or duties from a position of equal rights and equal political jurisdiction within a (relatively peaceful) state of nature.

Rawls follows the social contract tradition, whereby there are three items to keep distinct: (1) the pre-political condition, (2) the political order established just as people were coming out of the pre-political conditions, and (3) the actual – and possibly flawed – order under which we all live. Stage (2) of this sequence is thought to reveal what arrangements are just or fair, and it could then be used as a basis for critically evaluating to what extent the actual society (stage 3) is fair. Rawls' idea of the original position is similar to that of social contract philosophers, except that he is under no illusions that the original position was ever a reality or a "state of nature". It is a model, a thought experiment, i.e. an abstract mental device to help us understand the principles of justice that would govern the basic structure of a just

Sustainability Science and Citizens Participation:

one another as members of the same ongoing political society.

contract or agreement.

a conception of the good.

Building a Science-Citizens-Policy Interface to Address Grand Societal Challenges in Europe 141

and fair society. Representative (of all adult) persons in the original position are to choose principles of justice. These representatives represent every human being that belongs to the political association of free and equal persons. Due to the profoundly social nature of human relationships, Rawls sees political and economic justice as grounded in social cooperation and reciprocity. For this reason he eschews the idea of a state of nature wherein pre-social but fully rational individuals agree on cooperative norms (as in Hobbesian views), or where pre-political persons with antecedent natural rights agree on the form of political constitution (as in Locke). According to Rawls, we are all "social beings" in the sense that in the absence of society and social development we have but inchoate and unrealized capacities, including our capacities for rationality, morality, even language itself. However, this does not mean that people do not have "natural" moral rights and duties outside society or in non-cooperative circumstances – Rawls clearly think that there are certain human rights and natural duties that apply to all human beings as such – but that they do not provide an adequate basis for ascertaining the rights and duties of justice that we owe

The Original Position perspective of justice is that, rather than representing the judgement of one person (as in the Hume's account of the "judicious spectator"), it is conceived socially, as a general agreement by representatives of all adult members of an ongoing society. There are three fundamental features of the representatives in the original position that need to be qualified to ensure that justice is represented as a general social

First, the representatives in the original position are *rational* in the sense that they wish to secure for those they represent the kind of goods that would enable them to work out (including to revise if necessary) their own conceptions of the good and then try to realize this good. This feature recognizes that each person has a set of interests which are of his or her own. These interests are linked to the person's moral power to form, revise, and pursue

Second, they stand behind a *veil of ignorance*. That is to say, they do not know the following about the persons they represent: their sex, race, physical handicaps, social class, or conception of the good. They rightly assume that the persons represented have these features but they do not know what it is. This veil of ignorance deprives the parties of all the knowledge of particular facts about themselves, about one another, and even about their society and its history. The parties are not however completely ignorant of facts. They know all kind of general facts about persons and societies, including knowledge of the relatively uncontroversial laws and generalizations derivable from economics, psychology, political science, and biology and other natural sciences. They know then about the general tendencies of human behaviour and psychological development, about biological evolution, and about how economic markets work. As discussed in the box below, they also know about the circumstances of justice – moderate scarcity and limited altruism – as well as the desirability of the primary social goods that are needed to live a good life and to develop their moral powers. What they lack however is the specific knowledge of any particular facts about their own lives or other persons' lives, as well as other specific facts about their society and its population, level of wealth and resources, etc. Rawls think that since the parties are required to come to an agreement on objective principles that supply universal standards of justice applying across all societies, knowledge of particular facts about any

#### *Rawls' Mature Theory of Social Justice (Garrett, 2005)*

John Rawls is widely regarded as one of the most important political philosophers of the second half of the twentieth century. Rawls' theory provides a framework that explains the significance, in a society assumed to consist of free and equal persons, of political and personal liberties, of equal opportunity, and cooperative arrangements that benefit the more and the less advantaged members of society. Rawls' initial concerns with justice is related to relationships between persons within an association. Rawls' theory urges us to conceive a society as a fair system of cooperation over time, from one generation to the next. He says that the relationship of citizenship is a relation of citizens within a basic structure of society, a structure we enter only by birth and exit only by death. The "basic structure of society" includes the basic social institutions, such as the political constitution and framework for the legal system; the system of trials for adjudicating disputes; the norms of property, its transfer, contractual relations, etc. which are necessary for economic production, exchange and consumption; and finally norms that define and regulate permissible forms of the family. No society could exist without certain rules of property, contract, and transfer of goods and resources, for they make economic production, trade and consumption possible. Nor couls a society long endure without some political mechanism for resolving disputes and making, revising, interpreting, and enforcing its economic and other cooperative norms; or without some form of the family, to reproduce, sustain, and nurture members of its future generations. This is what distinguishes the social institutions constituting the basic structure from other profoundly influential social institutions, such as religion; religion and other social institutions are not basic because they are not generally necessary to society and social cooperation (even if they may be ideologically necessary to sustain particular societies and to maintain their status quo). The "first subject of justice", Rawls says, is principles that regulate the basic social institutions that constitute the basic structure of society. What makes basic institutions and their arrangement the first subject for principle of social justice is that they are all necessary to social cooperation and moreover have such profound influences on our situations, aims, characters, and future prospects.

John Rawls develops a conception of justice from the perspective that persons are free and equal. Their freedom consists in their possession of the two moral powers: a capacity for a *sense of justice* and for a *conception of the good*. Insofar as they have these to the degree necessary to be fully cooperating members of society, they are equal. A "sense of justice" is the capacity to understand, to apply, and to act from the public conception of justice which characterizes the fair terms of cooperation. This sense express a willingness to act in relation to others on terms that they can also publicly endorse. A "conception of the good" includes a conception of what is valuable in human life. Normally it consists of a more or less determinate scheme of final ends, that is, goals that we want to realize for their own sake, as well as attachments to other persons and loyalties to various groups and associations. A political conception conceives of persons as having the two moral powers mentioned above, as being responsible for their actions, etc., but does not address whether persons have more comprehensive moral conceptions, including non political values, virtues and beliefs, e.g. whether persons are immortal souls or immaterial substances as, say, Plato and most medieval Christian theologians held. A political conception of justice, says Rawls, has three basic features: 1) it is a moral conception worked out for a specific kind of subject, namely, for political, social and economic institutions (the basic structure of society); 2) it is presented as a freestanding view, and neither as a comprehensive doctrine, nor as derived from a comprehensive doctrine applied to the basic structure of society; 3) its content is expressed in terms of certain fundamental ideas seen as implicit in the public political culture of a democratic society.

The political conception of justice points to a notion of *reasonable citizens*. Citizens are reasonable when, viewing one another as free and equal in a system of cooperation over generations, they are prepared to offer one another fair terms of social cooperation, and they agree to act on those terms, even at the cost of their own interests in particular situations, provided that others also accept those terms. For those terms to be fair, citizens offering them must reasonably think that those citizens to whom they are offered might also reasonably accept them. They must be able to do this as free and equal, and not as dominated or manipulated, or under the pressure of an inferior political or social position. Rawls call this the "criterion of reciprocity". The second aspect of "being reasonable" is recognizing and being willing to bear the consequences of the *burdens of judgement*. The latter imply that regardless how impartial and altruistic people are, they still will disagree in their religious, philosophical and moral judgments. Disagreements in these matters are inevitable, but reasonable persons can disagree without being prejudiced or biased or excessively self- or group interested or wilful. This is "the fact of reasonable pluralism", which recognises different sources of disagreement – conflicting nature and complexity of evidence, differences about weighting of considerations, vagueness of concepts and borderline cases, disparate experiences of diverse people – as well as the potential conflicts of human interests, due to the "limited altruism" of human beings (whereby we are naturally more concerned with our aims and interests - including our interests in the interests of those nearer and dearer to us than we are with the interests of strangers with whom we have few if any interactions). Reasonable persons think it is unreasonable to use political power, should they possess it, to repress comprehensive views that are not unreasonable, though different from their own, and so they endorse some form of liberty of conscience and freedom of thought.

The Rawls' political conception of justice holds under some objective *circumstances of justice*, including physical facts about human beings, such as their rough similarity in mental and physical faculties, and vulnerability to attack, as well as conditions of moderate scarcity of resources. The latter means that the political conception of justice is applicable in social contexts where there are not enough resources to satisfy everyone's demands, but there are enough to provide all with adequate satisfaction of their basic needs; unlike conditions of extreme scarcity (e.g. famine) cooperation then seems productive and worthwhile for people. Under such circumstances, the John Rawls account of justice, "justice as fairness", affirm the following principles: I) Each person has an equal right to a fully adequate scheme of equal liberties which is compatible with a similar scheme of liberties for all, and II) Social and economic inequalities are to satisfy two conditions: a) first, they must be attached to offices and positions open to all under conditions of fair equality of opportunity; b) second, they must be to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged members of society. Principle I is named "equal liberty principle", whereas principles IIa and IIb are respectively called "equal opportunity principle" and "difference principle". The equal basic liberties include: the freedom of thought and liberty of conscience; the political liberties and freedom of association, as well as the freedoms specified by the liberty and integrity of the person; and the rights and liberties covered by the rule of law. The equal basic liberties have a priority, as they cannot be denied to certain social groups on the grounds that their having these liberties may enable them to block policies needed for economic efficiency and growth. For instance, a desire to increase the Gross National Product or make airlines run on an efficient schedules cannot alone justify the limitation of basic liberties. The Rawls' second principle means that society may undertake projects that require giving some persons more power, income, status etc. than others – e.g. paying accountants and upper-level managers more than assembly-line operatives – provided that: a) access to the privileged positions is not blocked by discrimination according to irrelevant criteria (e.g. race or gender) and b) the project will make life better off for the people who are now worse of, for example by raising the living standards of everyone in the community and empowering the least advantaged persons (difference principle). What the difference principle does not permit is a change in social and economic institutions that makes life better for those who are already well off but does nothing for those who are already disadvantaged, or make their life worse.

John Rawls is widely regarded as one of the most important political philosophers of the second half of the twentieth century. Rawls' theory provides a framework that explains the significance, in a society assumed to consist of free and equal persons, of political and personal liberties, of equal opportunity, and cooperative arrangements that benefit the more and the less advantaged members of society. Rawls' initial concerns with justice is related to relationships between persons within an association. Rawls' theory urges us to conceive a society as a fair system of cooperation over time, from one generation to the next. He says that the relationship of citizenship is a relation of citizens within a basic structure of society, a structure we enter only by birth and exit only by death. The "basic structure of society" includes the basic social institutions, such as the political constitution and framework for the legal system; the system of trials for adjudicating disputes; the norms of property, its transfer, contractual relations, etc. which are necessary for economic production, exchange and consumption; and finally norms that define and regulate permissible forms of the family. No society could exist without certain rules of property, contract, and transfer of goods and resources, for they make economic production, trade and consumption possible. Nor couls a society long endure without some political mechanism for resolving disputes and making, revising, interpreting, and enforcing its economic and other cooperative norms; or without some form of the family, to reproduce, sustain, and nurture members of its future generations. This is what distinguishes the social institutions constituting the basic structure from other profoundly influential social institutions, such as religion; religion and other social institutions are not basic because they are not generally necessary to society and social cooperation (even if they may be ideologically necessary to sustain particular societies and to maintain their status quo). The "first subject of justice", Rawls says, is principles that regulate the basic social institutions that constitute the basic structure of society. What makes basic institutions and their arrangement the first subject for principle of social justice is that they are all necessary to social cooperation and moreover have such profound influences on our situations, aims, characters, and future prospects.

John Rawls develops a conception of justice from the perspective that persons are free and equal. Their freedom consists in their possession of the two moral powers: a capacity for a *sense of justice* and for a *conception of the good*. Insofar as they have these to the degree necessary to be fully cooperating members of society, they are equal. A "sense of justice" is the capacity to understand, to apply, and to act from the public conception of justice which characterizes the fair terms of cooperation. This sense express a willingness to act in relation to others on terms that they can also publicly endorse. A "conception of the good" includes a conception of what is valuable in human life. Normally it consists of a more or less determinate scheme of final ends, that is, goals that we want to realize for their own sake, as well as attachments to other persons and loyalties to various groups and associations. A political conception conceives of persons as having the two moral powers mentioned above, as being responsible for their actions, etc., but does not address whether persons have more comprehensive moral conceptions, including non political values, virtues and beliefs, e.g. whether persons are immortal souls or immaterial substances as, say, Plato and most medieval Christian theologians held. A political conception of justice, says Rawls, has three basic features: 1) it is a moral conception worked out for a specific kind of subject, namely, for political, social and economic institutions (the basic structure of society); 2) it is presented as a freestanding view, and neither as a comprehensive doctrine, nor as derived from a comprehensive doctrine applied to the basic structure of society; 3) its content is expressed in

The political conception of justice points to a notion of *reasonable citizens*. Citizens are reasonable when, viewing one another as free and equal in a system of cooperation over generations, they are prepared to offer one another fair terms of social cooperation, and they agree to act on those terms, even at the cost of their own interests in particular situations, provided that others also accept those terms. For those terms to be fair, citizens offering them must reasonably think that those citizens to whom they are offered might also reasonably accept them. They must be able to do this as free and equal, and not as dominated or manipulated, or under the pressure of an inferior political or social position. Rawls call this the "criterion of reciprocity". The second aspect of "being reasonable" is recognizing and being willing to bear the consequences of the *burdens of judgement*. The latter imply that regardless how impartial and altruistic people are, they still will disagree in their religious, philosophical and moral judgments. Disagreements in these matters are inevitable, but reasonable persons can disagree without being prejudiced or biased or excessively self- or group interested or wilful. This is "the fact of reasonable pluralism", which recognises different sources of disagreement – conflicting nature and complexity of evidence, differences about weighting of considerations, vagueness of concepts and borderline cases, disparate experiences of diverse people – as well as the potential conflicts of human interests, due to the "limited altruism" of human beings (whereby we are naturally more concerned with our aims and interests - including our interests in the interests of those nearer and dearer to us than we are with the interests of strangers with whom we have few if any interactions). Reasonable persons think it is unreasonable to use political power, should they possess it, to repress comprehensive views that are not unreasonable, though different from their own, and so they

The Rawls' political conception of justice holds under some objective *circumstances of justice*, including physical facts about human beings, such as their rough similarity in mental and physical faculties, and vulnerability to attack, as well as conditions of moderate scarcity of resources. The latter means that the political conception of justice is applicable in social contexts where there are not enough resources to satisfy everyone's demands, but there are enough to provide all with adequate satisfaction of their basic needs; unlike conditions of extreme scarcity (e.g. famine) cooperation then seems productive and worthwhile for people. Under such circumstances, the John Rawls account of justice, "justice as fairness", affirm the following principles: I) Each person has an equal right to a fully adequate scheme of equal liberties which is compatible with a similar scheme of liberties for all, and II) Social and economic inequalities are to satisfy two conditions: a) first, they must be attached to offices and positions open to all under conditions of fair equality of opportunity; b) second, they must be to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged members of society. Principle I is named "equal liberty principle", whereas principles IIa and IIb are respectively called "equal opportunity principle" and "difference principle". The equal basic liberties include: the freedom of thought and liberty of conscience; the political liberties and freedom of association, as well as the freedoms specified by the liberty and integrity of the person; and the rights and liberties covered by the rule of law. The equal basic liberties have a priority, as they cannot be denied to certain social groups on the grounds that their having these liberties may enable them to block policies needed for economic efficiency and growth. For instance, a desire to increase the Gross National Product or make airlines run on an efficient schedules cannot alone justify the limitation of basic liberties. The Rawls' second principle means that society may undertake projects that require giving some persons more power, income, status etc. than others – e.g. paying accountants and upper-level managers more than assembly-line operatives – provided that: a) access to the privileged positions is not blocked by discrimination according to irrelevant criteria (e.g. race or gender) and b) the project will make life better off for the people who are now worse of, for example by raising the living standards of everyone in the community and empowering the least advantaged persons (difference principle). What the difference principle does not permit is a change in social and economic institutions that makes life better for those who are already well off but does nothing

*Rawls' Mature Theory of Social Justice (Garrett, 2005)* 

terms of certain fundamental ideas seen as implicit in the public political culture of a democratic society.

endorse some form of liberty of conscience and freedom of thought.

for those who are already disadvantaged, or make their life worse.

and fair society. Representative (of all adult) persons in the original position are to choose principles of justice. These representatives represent every human being that belongs to the political association of free and equal persons. Due to the profoundly social nature of human relationships, Rawls sees political and economic justice as grounded in social cooperation and reciprocity. For this reason he eschews the idea of a state of nature wherein pre-social but fully rational individuals agree on cooperative norms (as in Hobbesian views), or where pre-political persons with antecedent natural rights agree on the form of political constitution (as in Locke). According to Rawls, we are all "social beings" in the sense that in the absence of society and social development we have but inchoate and unrealized capacities, including our capacities for rationality, morality, even language itself. However, this does not mean that people do not have "natural" moral rights and duties outside society or in non-cooperative circumstances – Rawls clearly think that there are certain human rights and natural duties that apply to all human beings as such – but that they do not provide an adequate basis for ascertaining the rights and duties of justice that we owe one another as members of the same ongoing political society.

The Original Position perspective of justice is that, rather than representing the judgement of one person (as in the Hume's account of the "judicious spectator"), it is conceived socially, as a general agreement by representatives of all adult members of an ongoing society. There are three fundamental features of the representatives in the original position that need to be qualified to ensure that justice is represented as a general social contract or agreement.

First, the representatives in the original position are *rational* in the sense that they wish to secure for those they represent the kind of goods that would enable them to work out (including to revise if necessary) their own conceptions of the good and then try to realize this good. This feature recognizes that each person has a set of interests which are of his or her own. These interests are linked to the person's moral power to form, revise, and pursue a conception of the good.

Second, they stand behind a *veil of ignorance*. That is to say, they do not know the following about the persons they represent: their sex, race, physical handicaps, social class, or conception of the good. They rightly assume that the persons represented have these features but they do not know what it is. This veil of ignorance deprives the parties of all the knowledge of particular facts about themselves, about one another, and even about their society and its history. The parties are not however completely ignorant of facts. They know all kind of general facts about persons and societies, including knowledge of the relatively uncontroversial laws and generalizations derivable from economics, psychology, political science, and biology and other natural sciences. They know then about the general tendencies of human behaviour and psychological development, about biological evolution, and about how economic markets work. As discussed in the box below, they also know about the circumstances of justice – moderate scarcity and limited altruism – as well as the desirability of the primary social goods that are needed to live a good life and to develop their moral powers. What they lack however is the specific knowledge of any particular facts about their own lives or other persons' lives, as well as other specific facts about their society and its population, level of wealth and resources, etc. Rawls think that since the parties are required to come to an agreement on objective principles that supply universal standards of justice applying across all societies, knowledge of particular facts about any

Sustainability Science and Citizens Participation:

motivated by the same *general interests*.

truly precautionary.

position concept in three respects.

**Europe** 

but for moral reasons of justice shared by its citizens.

Building a Science-Citizens-Policy Interface to Address Grand Societal Challenges in Europe 143

but on the grounds of their sense of justice. A just society should be therefore be able to endure not simply as a *modus vivendi*, by coercive enforcement of its provisions and its promoting the majority of peoples' interests - as when democracy degrades into populism –

Whenever the features and the formal constraints are satisfied, the parties in the original position are motivated only by their own rational interests in making their decisions. Their interests are defined in terms of their each acquiring an adequate share of primary social goods – rights and liberties, powers and opportunities, income and wealth, etc. – and achieving the background social conditions enabling them to effectively pursue their conception of the good. However, since under the veil of ignorance the parties do not know their particular conceptions of the good and all other particular facts about their society, they are not in a position to engage in bargaining, and this represent a radical difference from any procedure of consultation and negotiation with stakeholders whatsoever. In effect, the representatives in the original position all have the same general information and are

Finally, it is important to note that the circumstances of the original position are not suitable for any kind of decision, but mostly for situations of ignorance and uncertainty about future developments which may affect the social position and well-being of the parties (whenever certainty and exact knowledge of the consequences prevail, scientific analysis and expert judgement would be sufficient). The decision at stake in the original position is not an ordinary choice. It is rather a unique and irrevocable choice where the parties decide the basic structure of their society, or the kind of social world they should live in and the background conditions against which they will develop and pursue their aims. It is then *sui generis*, a choice of the conditions for all future choices, and taken under ignorance and uncertainty about the future state of the world where meaningful choices will have to be made. Under the highly exceptional circumstances of the original position – including the gravity of the choice, the fact that it is not renegotiable or repeatable, and the fact that it determines all one's future prospects – it is rational to choose conservatively to protect certain fundamental interests against loss or compromise. Once the rules of justice are decided they apply in perpetuity, and there is no opportunity to renegotiate or escape the situation, whatever a presently uncertain future will be. In this situation, it is entirely rational for the representatives in the original position to be unwilling to gamble with the basic liberties, opportunities and resources needed to pursue one's most cherished ends and commitments. The decisions that emerge from this procedure are fair and at the same time

**4. Mainstreaming the method to build a science-citizens-policy interface in** 

As anticipated in the previous section, citizens juries, if their members are appropriately selected, and the citizens conferences, if appropriately conducted, are the best real life approximation of the Rawls' Original Position. Indeed, the real life experience of citizens conferences - and in particular of the European citizens conferences organised in the three pilot projects RAISE, MOVE TOGETHER and AWARE – is a practice fitting to the original

person or society is morally irrelevant and potentially prejudicial of their decision. Indeed, a primary reason for a thick veil of ignorance is to enable an unbiased assessment of the justice of existing social and political institutions and of existing preferences and conceptions of the good. If the parties to Rawls' original position had knowledge of people's belief and desires, as well as knowledge of the laws, institutions and circumstances of their society, then this knowledge would influence their decisions on principles of justice. The principles agreed to would then not be sufficiently detached from the very desires, circumstances and institutions these principles are to be used to critically assess. Summing up, our capacity for a sense of justice is reflected in the operation of the veil of ignorance, as this is what makes the imaginary choices of the representatives in the original position on our behalf fair.

A third feature of the representative in the original position – partially anticipated while discussing the veil of ignorance above – is that they possess a great deal of *common sense* general knowledge about human psychology and sociology. They know, for instance, that humans remember the past, anticipate the future, and interact with things and people in the present. They know that people have diverse interests and talents. They are aware of the general types of situations in which humans can find themselves (they hold what can be called the "everyday life" or "lay street" knowledge, something different and more general than the citizens' detailed knowledge of local circumstances which is mostly valued in participatory processes at local level).

Besides the above features, there are five formal constraints required by the concept of right, and the parties in the original position must take them into account in making their decisions. These constraints are: generality, universality in application, ordering of conflicting claims, publicity, and finality. *Generality* means that, while deciding about principles of justice, these cannot include specifics facts or features, as they should be valuable across all societies. The *ordering condition* says that a conception of justice should be able to resolve conflicting claims and order their priority. The *publicity condition* says that the parties are to assume that the principles of justice they choose will be publicly known and recognised as the basis for social cooperation among the people whose relations they regulate. Publicity of principles of justice is required to respect persons as free and equal citizens, and enable them to cooperate and live together on fair terms. Related to publicity is that principles should be *universal in application*. This implies not simply that they hold for everyone in virtue of their being moral persons. It also means that everyone can understand the principle of justice and use them in deliberations. Universality in application then imposes a limit on how complex principles of justice can be – they must be understandable to common moral sense, and not so complicated that only experts can use them in deliberations. *Finality* is related to the requirement of stability of the conception of justice and the commitment of all reasonable citizens towards it. According to Rawls, an important feature of a conception of justice is that it should generate its own support. Its principles should be such that when they are embodied in the basic structure of society people tend to acquire the corresponding sense of justice and develop a desire to act in accordance with its principles. In this case a conception of justice is stable. To be stable, principles of justice should be realizable in a feasible and enduring social world. They need to be practically possible given the limitations of the human conditions. And people should knowingly want to uphold and maintain society's just institutions not just because they benefit from them,

person or society is morally irrelevant and potentially prejudicial of their decision. Indeed, a primary reason for a thick veil of ignorance is to enable an unbiased assessment of the justice of existing social and political institutions and of existing preferences and conceptions of the good. If the parties to Rawls' original position had knowledge of people's belief and desires, as well as knowledge of the laws, institutions and circumstances of their society, then this knowledge would influence their decisions on principles of justice. The principles agreed to would then not be sufficiently detached from the very desires, circumstances and institutions these principles are to be used to critically assess. Summing up, our capacity for a sense of justice is reflected in the operation of the veil of ignorance, as this is what makes the imaginary choices of the representatives in the original position on

A third feature of the representative in the original position – partially anticipated while discussing the veil of ignorance above – is that they possess a great deal of *common sense* general knowledge about human psychology and sociology. They know, for instance, that humans remember the past, anticipate the future, and interact with things and people in the present. They know that people have diverse interests and talents. They are aware of the general types of situations in which humans can find themselves (they hold what can be called the "everyday life" or "lay street" knowledge, something different and more general than the citizens' detailed knowledge of local circumstances which is mostly valued in

Besides the above features, there are five formal constraints required by the concept of right, and the parties in the original position must take them into account in making their decisions. These constraints are: generality, universality in application, ordering of conflicting claims, publicity, and finality. *Generality* means that, while deciding about principles of justice, these cannot include specifics facts or features, as they should be valuable across all societies. The *ordering condition* says that a conception of justice should be able to resolve conflicting claims and order their priority. The *publicity condition* says that the parties are to assume that the principles of justice they choose will be publicly known and recognised as the basis for social cooperation among the people whose relations they regulate. Publicity of principles of justice is required to respect persons as free and equal citizens, and enable them to cooperate and live together on fair terms. Related to publicity is that principles should be *universal in application*. This implies not simply that they hold for everyone in virtue of their being moral persons. It also means that everyone can understand the principle of justice and use them in deliberations. Universality in application then imposes a limit on how complex principles of justice can be – they must be understandable to common moral sense, and not so complicated that only experts can use them in deliberations. *Finality* is related to the requirement of stability of the conception of justice and the commitment of all reasonable citizens towards it. According to Rawls, an important feature of a conception of justice is that it should generate its own support. Its principles should be such that when they are embodied in the basic structure of society people tend to acquire the corresponding sense of justice and develop a desire to act in accordance with its principles. In this case a conception of justice is stable. To be stable, principles of justice should be realizable in a feasible and enduring social world. They need to be practically possible given the limitations of the human conditions. And people should knowingly want to uphold and maintain society's just institutions not just because they benefit from them,

our behalf fair.

participatory processes at local level).

but on the grounds of their sense of justice. A just society should be therefore be able to endure not simply as a *modus vivendi*, by coercive enforcement of its provisions and its promoting the majority of peoples' interests - as when democracy degrades into populism – but for moral reasons of justice shared by its citizens.

Whenever the features and the formal constraints are satisfied, the parties in the original position are motivated only by their own rational interests in making their decisions. Their interests are defined in terms of their each acquiring an adequate share of primary social goods – rights and liberties, powers and opportunities, income and wealth, etc. – and achieving the background social conditions enabling them to effectively pursue their conception of the good. However, since under the veil of ignorance the parties do not know their particular conceptions of the good and all other particular facts about their society, they are not in a position to engage in bargaining, and this represent a radical difference from any procedure of consultation and negotiation with stakeholders whatsoever. In effect, the representatives in the original position all have the same general information and are motivated by the same *general interests*.

Finally, it is important to note that the circumstances of the original position are not suitable for any kind of decision, but mostly for situations of ignorance and uncertainty about future developments which may affect the social position and well-being of the parties (whenever certainty and exact knowledge of the consequences prevail, scientific analysis and expert judgement would be sufficient). The decision at stake in the original position is not an ordinary choice. It is rather a unique and irrevocable choice where the parties decide the basic structure of their society, or the kind of social world they should live in and the background conditions against which they will develop and pursue their aims. It is then *sui generis*, a choice of the conditions for all future choices, and taken under ignorance and uncertainty about the future state of the world where meaningful choices will have to be made. Under the highly exceptional circumstances of the original position – including the gravity of the choice, the fact that it is not renegotiable or repeatable, and the fact that it determines all one's future prospects – it is rational to choose conservatively to protect certain fundamental interests against loss or compromise. Once the rules of justice are decided they apply in perpetuity, and there is no opportunity to renegotiate or escape the situation, whatever a presently uncertain future will be. In this situation, it is entirely rational for the representatives in the original position to be unwilling to gamble with the basic liberties, opportunities and resources needed to pursue one's most cherished ends and commitments. The decisions that emerge from this procedure are fair and at the same time truly precautionary.

#### **4. Mainstreaming the method to build a science-citizens-policy interface in Europe**

As anticipated in the previous section, citizens juries, if their members are appropriately selected, and the citizens conferences, if appropriately conducted, are the best real life approximation of the Rawls' Original Position. Indeed, the real life experience of citizens conferences - and in particular of the European citizens conferences organised in the three pilot projects RAISE, MOVE TOGETHER and AWARE – is a practice fitting to the original position concept in three respects.

Sustainability Science and Citizens Participation:

time use.

Building a Science-Citizens-Policy Interface to Address Grand Societal Challenges in Europe 145

specific needs emerging in the process, but maintains a roadmap of basic steps to be accomplished to reach the citizens conference goal. Several practical organization requirements will facilitate the process, including a suitable location, hiring a professional moderator and providing training and information as to the subject of the participation exercise in a language accessible to the citizens, arranging for lunches, dinners and coffee breaks during the meetings, and, last but not the least, ensuring the individual commitment of the citizens to participate to all the meetings – continuity is a must – by signing with them letters of commitment to which are associated reasonable fees to compensate for the citizens'

Third, the topic of concern should be relevant, general and serious enough to require a citizens conference process. In general, citizens participation is not always an appropriate instrument for obtaining input into policy. It is appropriate in those cases where the policy issue at stake is clearly delineated – for instance, in the AWARE project the issue was the deterioration of coastal water quality across Europe and policy was clearly framed in the EU Water Framework Directive – and can be expected to engage citizens' interests because it relates to their lives. In addition, to resemble to the circumstances of the original position, the citizens should be engaged on topics and situations in which there is a substantial ignorance and uncertainty about future developments which may affect their social position and well-being, and that of future generations. Sustainability topics, and in particular the management of common pool resources, are such issues. The term "common pool resources" (CPR) refers to a natural or man-made resource system - fishing grounds, groundwater basins, grazing areas, irrigation canals, bridge and road infrastructure, urban roads and spaces, mainframe computers, streams, lakes, oceans and other bodies of water, to name a few - that is sufficiently large as to make it costly to exclude potentially beneficiaries from obtaining benefits from its use. Resource systems provide "resource units" – fish, water, land for grazing, use of a road infrastructure, etc. - which are appropriated by multiple users simultaneously or sequentially, according to open access or some other socially established rule. The resource units themselves are not subject to joint use or appropriation – they are consumed individually - but the resource system is subject to joint use. In this situation the emergence of "crowding effects" and "overuse" problems is chronic, as we approach an upper threshold in the number of resource units that are simultaneously consumed in the unit of time. When the CPR is a man-made structure, such as a bridge, approaching the threshold of crossing units leads to congestion. When the CPR is a biological resource, such as a fishery or a forest, approaching the threshold may even destroy the capability of the resource itself to continue producing resource units (i.e. the ecosystem service). Decisions at stake in the management of CPR are therefore not ordinary choices. They are *sui generis* as the unique and irrevocable choice where the parties in the original position decide the basic structure of their society, insofar as an agreement is vital to ensure the durability of a common good. The highly exceptional circumstances of the original position - i.e. the gravity of the choice, the fact that it is not renegotiable or repeatable (whenever an ecosystem is destroyed, it will never return back as it was), and the fact that it determines all one's future prospects – are underlying decisions concerning the access and sustainable use of environmental and social resources as well. Moreover, as long as the users of a common pool of resources stay "unorganized", they cannot achieve a joint return as high as they could have received if they had organized in some way to undertake collective action. As a matter of facts, there is a range of empirical solutions of "self-

First, the procedure applied for the selection and recruitment of the citizens jury ensure the impartiality and representativeness of its members. The actual selection of the citizens is carried out using a specific software for random selection of the participants from a pool of candidates collected through a call for applications. The call is open on Internet to all the citizens of the area of concern – the EU Member States in case of full-fledged European conferences, or the districts of a city in case of local citizens conferences – with few requirements: 1) do not hold any specific expertise of or stake in the topic of concern to avoid any conflict of interest (so scientists, stakeholders and decision makers are excluded); 2) to be available to attend a number of events (usually three workshops and a final conference scheduled over one year time, with a commitment of about 8 days of their time); 3) to be sufficiently proficient in a common language, namely English (this applies of course only for the European conferences, not those at local level). In the applications, candidate citizens are required to describe their statistical profile – age, sex, activity (employed, unemployed, retired, student), and usually one criteria related to the topic of concern (for instance, in AWARE what use the citizens more frequently do of the coastal waters, e.g. tourism, fishing, etc.). They are required also to answer to two questions about: 1) how they see the topic of concern; 2) what motivates their participation. These questions aim to understand the moral standing of the participants, eliciting their own views and "conception of the good" in relation to the topic of concern. The random selection ensure statistical representativeness of the jury's members in relation to the population of candidates, including geographic criteria (e.g. one member of the jury for each EU Member State in the European conferences, or for each district of the city in local conferences), demographic and socio-economic distinctions, and possibly one criteria related to the specific topic of concern. An additional criteria is used during selection, ranking the answers of the citizens to the questions about their views of the topic and their motivations – with the help of a panel of independent evaluators – and allocating different probabilities of being selected for the citizens in the high, medium or low rank (the aim is not to exclude those of medium or low rank, but to gather a jury with a desired mix of the three categories). In this way, each selected member of the jury represents a different segment of the population of candidates. Of course, he or she does not represent in any statistically meaningful way the total population of the area of concern, but only that of candidates. Any bias in the composition of the latter – for instance due to different access to Internet, English skills etc. – will be reflected in the composition of the jury. To enhance the representatives of the citizens jury against the total population is important however to disseminate the citizens participation process as widely as possible, in order to gather a population of candidates (usually at least 10 times the target number of jury's members) which is sufficiently representative of the total.

Second, the procedures applied throughout the whole citizens conference process ensure equal opportunity to participate and other circumstances of the original position, namely standing behind a veil of ignorance, publicity and commitment. The members of the citizens' jury bring with themselves their common sense knowledge and moral attitudes, nothing more. They participate to the workshops and the conference as a kind of "second life" experience, far from their daily activities, cares and interests. Since the beginning of the process they are made aware of their mamdate, how the process will be ruled out, and the information they will receive from the experts on the topic of concern. The whole process will be carried out following a structured agenda – which may be flexible and adapted to

First, the procedure applied for the selection and recruitment of the citizens jury ensure the impartiality and representativeness of its members. The actual selection of the citizens is carried out using a specific software for random selection of the participants from a pool of candidates collected through a call for applications. The call is open on Internet to all the citizens of the area of concern – the EU Member States in case of full-fledged European conferences, or the districts of a city in case of local citizens conferences – with few requirements: 1) do not hold any specific expertise of or stake in the topic of concern to avoid any conflict of interest (so scientists, stakeholders and decision makers are excluded); 2) to be available to attend a number of events (usually three workshops and a final conference scheduled over one year time, with a commitment of about 8 days of their time); 3) to be sufficiently proficient in a common language, namely English (this applies of course only for the European conferences, not those at local level). In the applications, candidate citizens are required to describe their statistical profile – age, sex, activity (employed, unemployed, retired, student), and usually one criteria related to the topic of concern (for instance, in AWARE what use the citizens more frequently do of the coastal waters, e.g. tourism, fishing, etc.). They are required also to answer to two questions about: 1) how they see the topic of concern; 2) what motivates their participation. These questions aim to understand the moral standing of the participants, eliciting their own views and "conception of the good" in relation to the topic of concern. The random selection ensure statistical representativeness of the jury's members in relation to the population of candidates, including geographic criteria (e.g. one member of the jury for each EU Member State in the European conferences, or for each district of the city in local conferences), demographic and socio-economic distinctions, and possibly one criteria related to the specific topic of concern. An additional criteria is used during selection, ranking the answers of the citizens to the questions about their views of the topic and their motivations – with the help of a panel of independent evaluators – and allocating different probabilities of being selected for the citizens in the high, medium or low rank (the aim is not to exclude those of medium or low rank, but to gather a jury with a desired mix of the three categories). In this way, each selected member of the jury represents a different segment of the population of candidates. Of course, he or she does not represent in any statistically meaningful way the total population of the area of concern, but only that of candidates. Any bias in the composition of the latter – for instance due to different access to Internet, English skills etc. – will be reflected in the composition of the jury. To enhance the representatives of the citizens jury against the total population is important however to disseminate the citizens participation process as widely as possible, in order to gather a population of candidates (usually at least 10 times the target number of jury's members) which is

Second, the procedures applied throughout the whole citizens conference process ensure equal opportunity to participate and other circumstances of the original position, namely standing behind a veil of ignorance, publicity and commitment. The members of the citizens' jury bring with themselves their common sense knowledge and moral attitudes, nothing more. They participate to the workshops and the conference as a kind of "second life" experience, far from their daily activities, cares and interests. Since the beginning of the process they are made aware of their mamdate, how the process will be ruled out, and the information they will receive from the experts on the topic of concern. The whole process will be carried out following a structured agenda – which may be flexible and adapted to

sufficiently representative of the total.

specific needs emerging in the process, but maintains a roadmap of basic steps to be accomplished to reach the citizens conference goal. Several practical organization requirements will facilitate the process, including a suitable location, hiring a professional moderator and providing training and information as to the subject of the participation exercise in a language accessible to the citizens, arranging for lunches, dinners and coffee breaks during the meetings, and, last but not the least, ensuring the individual commitment of the citizens to participate to all the meetings – continuity is a must – by signing with them letters of commitment to which are associated reasonable fees to compensate for the citizens' time use.

Third, the topic of concern should be relevant, general and serious enough to require a citizens conference process. In general, citizens participation is not always an appropriate instrument for obtaining input into policy. It is appropriate in those cases where the policy issue at stake is clearly delineated – for instance, in the AWARE project the issue was the deterioration of coastal water quality across Europe and policy was clearly framed in the EU Water Framework Directive – and can be expected to engage citizens' interests because it relates to their lives. In addition, to resemble to the circumstances of the original position, the citizens should be engaged on topics and situations in which there is a substantial ignorance and uncertainty about future developments which may affect their social position and well-being, and that of future generations. Sustainability topics, and in particular the management of common pool resources, are such issues. The term "common pool resources" (CPR) refers to a natural or man-made resource system - fishing grounds, groundwater basins, grazing areas, irrigation canals, bridge and road infrastructure, urban roads and spaces, mainframe computers, streams, lakes, oceans and other bodies of water, to name a few - that is sufficiently large as to make it costly to exclude potentially beneficiaries from obtaining benefits from its use. Resource systems provide "resource units" – fish, water, land for grazing, use of a road infrastructure, etc. - which are appropriated by multiple users simultaneously or sequentially, according to open access or some other socially established rule. The resource units themselves are not subject to joint use or appropriation – they are consumed individually - but the resource system is subject to joint use. In this situation the emergence of "crowding effects" and "overuse" problems is chronic, as we approach an upper threshold in the number of resource units that are simultaneously consumed in the unit of time. When the CPR is a man-made structure, such as a bridge, approaching the threshold of crossing units leads to congestion. When the CPR is a biological resource, such as a fishery or a forest, approaching the threshold may even destroy the capability of the resource itself to continue producing resource units (i.e. the ecosystem service). Decisions at stake in the management of CPR are therefore not ordinary choices. They are *sui generis* as the unique and irrevocable choice where the parties in the original position decide the basic structure of their society, insofar as an agreement is vital to ensure the durability of a common good. The highly exceptional circumstances of the original position - i.e. the gravity of the choice, the fact that it is not renegotiable or repeatable (whenever an ecosystem is destroyed, it will never return back as it was), and the fact that it determines all one's future prospects – are underlying decisions concerning the access and sustainable use of environmental and social resources as well. Moreover, as long as the users of a common pool of resources stay "unorganized", they cannot achieve a joint return as high as they could have received if they had organized in some way to undertake collective action. As a matter of facts, there is a range of empirical solutions of "self-

Sustainability Science and Citizens Participation:

citizenship and social capital.

spontaneously interested people.

and market developments is envisioned in fig. 3.

private sector tackle societal challenges.

days.

Building a Science-Citizens-Policy Interface to Address Grand Societal Challenges in Europe 147

"European citizens" – a very significant side-effect for the building of the European

One option to scale-up the experience of citizens' workshops and conferences may be, therefore, creating with the support of the European Commission "*public spaces*" that citizens can access through calls for application to random selections open on Internet – as it was done in the AWARE citizens' recruitment process. In these public spaces small groups of people (the selected panels) are engaged in European citizens-science projects as a kind of voluntary job.3 While on the job, they stay disconnected from Internet all along the process – even cell phones are forbidden during the workshops and conference sessions – and are involved in an intense knowledge brokerage process with experts, stakeholders and policy makers. At the end of the process, the citizens' panel co-produce an assessment document ("Citizen Declarations") which can be disseminated and used again on Internet, developing WIKI-like User-Created Content applications (OECD, 2007) and triggering a continuous dynamic in the blog-sphere. This approach would equate to create as downstream result of the citizens conference process truly "collective awareness platforms" on topics of interest for scientists, citizens and the policy makers, enlarging the arena of participants to

This transition from the "old" to the "new way" of connecting scientists, citizens and policy

The figure shows the main connections. In the conventional way, EU research funding contributes to the development of Science & Technology (S&T) in Europe (broadly, total Research & Innovation funding in Europe reaches about 200 billion euro per year, and EU funding contributes with about 15 billion euro to this total4). In turn, S&T supports policy making by helping decision-makers to deliver better government decisions. S&T may also eventually improve or produce new commercial technologies, products and services sold on the market. Citizens in this traditional picture are mainly seen as "customers" of private companies or "end users" of public services; they do not have enough opportunity to **interact and contribute early in the process** and **shape** the way public government and the

The new way adds a new opportunity for the citizens, that of being randomly recruited in citizens panels – with a commitment that may be framed as a kind of "European civic service" - to make a critical review and assess the societal acceptance of the research being

These are Europe-wide challenges such as the ageing population, the effects of climate

The Europe 2020 flagship initiative "Innovation Union" (European Commission, 2010) called for focusing future EU funding programs more closely to cope with grand societal challenges, which will clearly affect future European citizens health, well-being and quality

3 Time compensation fees may be distributed to the participants, as it was done in AWARE, in order to balance for the citizens commitment that ordinarily may keep from 6 to 10 days of equivalent working

funded by the European Union, in particular to face the grand societal challenges.

change, and reduced availability of resources (energy, water, land, raw materials).

4 Sources: STC key figures report 2009/2010 and European Commission.

government" that can be found in the real world for regulating the access to a limited pool of common resources, alternative to and often more effective than both the privatization of the commons (market ruling) or their central regulation from a state authority (state ruling). These solutions engage groups of actors - e.g. citizens, fishers, farmers, etc. - who are in an interdependent situation, in organizing and governing themselves, and building "bottomup" institutions and rules of cooperation, sometime with the support of local authorities and, less frequently, fitting in a formal multi-governance framework (Ostrom, 1991). To create such self-government solutions - or revise them under new threatening circumstances such as climate change - may be the subject and mandate of citizen conference processes, which eventually may evolve towards building up constitutional conventions to establish the basic rules for governing the commons. The latter should contribute to institutionalise integrated adaptive management of common resources, including in particular rules for citizens participation and empowerment, and adequate schemes for Science-Citizens-Policy Interface.

The ultimate success of a citizen participation process is when it can be shown that the proposals advanced by citizens are translated – even if only in part – into policy. Indeed, one of the first things citizens invited to participate in consultation processes want to know is how the outputs of their discussions will be used and by whom. However, this type of follow-through is often the greatest weakness of citizen participation processes and the reason why such processes are often viewed with mistrust. It is therefore important to not only ensure that citizen deliberative panels produce outputs but also to document how these outputs are disseminated and, subsequently, used by policy-makers (Move Together, 2009).

The main avenue to achieve this would be to institutionalize the citizens conference processes at EU and local level, by embedding the citizens' jury methodology in a framework of citizens' participation rules to be adopted at the different institutional levels, in relation to sustainability topics which are relevant for citizens' assessment. For instance, at local level, there are a number of permanent participatory forums set out in the context of Local Agenda 21 processes, which are mostly open to and used by stakeholders and civil society organisations, but poorly known or used by lay citizens. These forums usually connect the local administrations with organizations from the local economy and society: they could include also – as a new stream of participation – citizens conferences convened on topics of interest, such as for example the formulation, implementation and monitoring of Sustainable Energy Action Plans in the context of the EU Covenant of Mayors (www.eumayors.eu).

Another avenue would be to mainstream the AWARE experience and approach in the context of EU funded research, with the aim to build up and maintain an effective Science-Citizens-Policy Interface in the whole European Research Area.

This claims for continuing to disseminate the AWARE approach, with the aim to achieve a "snowball effect". This could be done in the context of the European Union polity by means of a growing number of "European citizens-science projects", engaging together scientists, decision makers and permanently renovated (through random selection) panels of citizens. These European citizens-science projects will bring researchers **and** citizens from across Europe together in collaborative research experiences, that today are open only to researchers, and this can also contribute to enhance the participants' feeling of being truly

government" that can be found in the real world for regulating the access to a limited pool of common resources, alternative to and often more effective than both the privatization of the commons (market ruling) or their central regulation from a state authority (state ruling). These solutions engage groups of actors - e.g. citizens, fishers, farmers, etc. - who are in an interdependent situation, in organizing and governing themselves, and building "bottomup" institutions and rules of cooperation, sometime with the support of local authorities and, less frequently, fitting in a formal multi-governance framework (Ostrom, 1991). To create such self-government solutions - or revise them under new threatening circumstances such as climate change - may be the subject and mandate of citizen conference processes, which eventually may evolve towards building up constitutional conventions to establish the basic rules for governing the commons. The latter should contribute to institutionalise integrated adaptive management of common resources, including in particular rules for citizens participation and empowerment, and adequate schemes for Science-Citizens-Policy

The ultimate success of a citizen participation process is when it can be shown that the proposals advanced by citizens are translated – even if only in part – into policy. Indeed, one of the first things citizens invited to participate in consultation processes want to know is how the outputs of their discussions will be used and by whom. However, this type of follow-through is often the greatest weakness of citizen participation processes and the reason why such processes are often viewed with mistrust. It is therefore important to not only ensure that citizen deliberative panels produce outputs but also to document how these outputs are disseminated and, subsequently, used by policy-makers (Move Together, 2009). The main avenue to achieve this would be to institutionalize the citizens conference processes at EU and local level, by embedding the citizens' jury methodology in a framework of citizens' participation rules to be adopted at the different institutional levels, in relation to sustainability topics which are relevant for citizens' assessment. For instance, at local level, there are a number of permanent participatory forums set out in the context of Local Agenda 21 processes, which are mostly open to and used by stakeholders and civil society organisations, but poorly known or used by lay citizens. These forums usually connect the local administrations with organizations from the local economy and society: they could include also – as a new stream of participation – citizens conferences convened on topics of interest, such as for example the formulation, implementation and monitoring of Sustainable Energy Action Plans in the context of the EU Covenant of Mayors

Another avenue would be to mainstream the AWARE experience and approach in the context of EU funded research, with the aim to build up and maintain an effective Science-

This claims for continuing to disseminate the AWARE approach, with the aim to achieve a "snowball effect". This could be done in the context of the European Union polity by means of a growing number of "European citizens-science projects", engaging together scientists, decision makers and permanently renovated (through random selection) panels of citizens. These European citizens-science projects will bring researchers **and** citizens from across Europe together in collaborative research experiences, that today are open only to researchers, and this can also contribute to enhance the participants' feeling of being truly

Citizens-Policy Interface in the whole European Research Area.

Interface.

(www.eumayors.eu).

"European citizens" – a very significant side-effect for the building of the European citizenship and social capital.

One option to scale-up the experience of citizens' workshops and conferences may be, therefore, creating with the support of the European Commission "*public spaces*" that citizens can access through calls for application to random selections open on Internet – as it was done in the AWARE citizens' recruitment process. In these public spaces small groups of people (the selected panels) are engaged in European citizens-science projects as a kind of voluntary job.3 While on the job, they stay disconnected from Internet all along the process – even cell phones are forbidden during the workshops and conference sessions – and are involved in an intense knowledge brokerage process with experts, stakeholders and policy makers. At the end of the process, the citizens' panel co-produce an assessment document ("Citizen Declarations") which can be disseminated and used again on Internet, developing WIKI-like User-Created Content applications (OECD, 2007) and triggering a continuous dynamic in the blog-sphere. This approach would equate to create as downstream result of the citizens conference process truly "collective awareness platforms" on topics of interest for scientists, citizens and the policy makers, enlarging the arena of participants to spontaneously interested people.

This transition from the "old" to the "new way" of connecting scientists, citizens and policy and market developments is envisioned in fig. 3.

The figure shows the main connections. In the conventional way, EU research funding contributes to the development of Science & Technology (S&T) in Europe (broadly, total Research & Innovation funding in Europe reaches about 200 billion euro per year, and EU funding contributes with about 15 billion euro to this total4). In turn, S&T supports policy making by helping decision-makers to deliver better government decisions. S&T may also eventually improve or produce new commercial technologies, products and services sold on the market. Citizens in this traditional picture are mainly seen as "customers" of private companies or "end users" of public services; they do not have enough opportunity to **interact and contribute early in the process** and **shape** the way public government and the private sector tackle societal challenges.

The new way adds a new opportunity for the citizens, that of being randomly recruited in citizens panels – with a commitment that may be framed as a kind of "European civic service" - to make a critical review and assess the societal acceptance of the research being funded by the European Union, in particular to face the grand societal challenges.

These are Europe-wide challenges such as the ageing population, the effects of climate change, and reduced availability of resources (energy, water, land, raw materials).

The Europe 2020 flagship initiative "Innovation Union" (European Commission, 2010) called for focusing future EU funding programs more closely to cope with grand societal challenges, which will clearly affect future European citizens health, well-being and quality

<sup>3</sup> Time compensation fees may be distributed to the participants, as it was done in AWARE, in order to balance for the citizens commitment that ordinarily may keep from 6 to 10 days of equivalent working days.

<sup>4</sup> Sources: STC key figures report 2009/2010 and European Commission.

Sustainability Science and Citizens Participation:

part of the Innovation Union flagship initiative.

of great concern for the European citizens:

citizens' quality of life, is possible.

systems.

efficient use.

Building a Science-Citizens-Policy Interface to Address Grand Societal Challenges in Europe 149

and substitutes for increasingly scarce raw materials, reducing and recycling waste and ending landfill, improvements in the quality of our water supply, smart transport with less congestion, healthy or high-quality food stuffs using sustainable production methods, and technologies for fast and secure information handling and sharing, communication and interfacing. The main instruments to connect EU funded Research & Innovation, the business world and civil society are the "European Innovation Partnerships" launched as

These are going to be launched only in areas – and consist only of activities – in which government intervention is clearly justified and where combining the EU, national and regional efforts in Research & Innovation and demand-side policies will achieve the target quicker and more efficiently. Examples of partnerships being considered first address areas

 *Active and healthy ageing*: by 2020, to enable European citizens to live longer in good health by increasing the average number of healthy life years by 2, and, in achieving this target, to improve the sustainability and efficiency of our social and healthcare

 *Smart and livable cities*: by 2020 the aim is to support a number of pioneering European cities in reducing their carbon emissions by more than 20%, increasing the share of renewable energy by 20% and increasing end-use energy efficiency by 20%. The partnership aims to demonstrate that sustainable development of local economies, with a smarter use of scarce energy and natural resources while continuing to improve the

 *Water-Efficient Europe*: To promote actions that can speed-up innovation in the water sector and remove barriers to innovation, ensuring higher quality of water and a more

 *Smart mobility for Europe's citizens and business*: To equip Europe with seamless door-todoor travel and effective logistics by promoting the broad and coordinated development of Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS), and building upon available results from research and development to take them further to innovation and concrete operational deployment. Together with needed behavioral changes, this will contribute to achieve a better mobility and transport in Europe, reducing congestion, energy

 *Agriculture productivity and sustainability*: World food demand will increase massively over the next two decades. The aim of this partnership is to promote a resourceefficient, productive and low-emission agricultural sector – which works in harmony with the essential natural resources on which farming depends, such as oil and water. The European Innovation Partnerships (EIPs) are the new avenues indicated for future research to tackle societal challenges. Bringing researchers and stakeholders from across Europe together in collaborative networks is at the heart of this new approach and will continue to be vital in sustaining a European research fabric. Experience so far has shown, however, the limitations in achieving the necessary flexibility, creativity and crossdisciplinary research needed. Moreover, there is now really the need to get Europe and the European research – as least to the extent that this is going to change the citizens' life in a

consumption and greenhouse gases emissions from transport.

foreseeable future – into the minds and lives of ordinary citizens.

of life. Breakthroughs must be found, for instance, in new treatments for life-threatening diseases, new solutions to improve the lives of elder people, ways to radically cut CO2 emissions and other sources of pollution in particular in cities, alternative sources of energy

*The "old" way to connect science and society*

Fig. 4.

of life. Breakthroughs must be found, for instance, in new treatments for life-threatening diseases, new solutions to improve the lives of elder people, ways to radically cut CO2 emissions and other sources of pollution in particular in cities, alternative sources of energy

> Policy support

Market development End Users "customers"

Buying products & services

Paying taxes

*The "old" way to connect science and society*

Science & Technology

Fig. 4.

EU Research Funding

and substitutes for increasingly scarce raw materials, reducing and recycling waste and ending landfill, improvements in the quality of our water supply, smart transport with less congestion, healthy or high-quality food stuffs using sustainable production methods, and technologies for fast and secure information handling and sharing, communication and interfacing. The main instruments to connect EU funded Research & Innovation, the business world and civil society are the "European Innovation Partnerships" launched as part of the Innovation Union flagship initiative.

These are going to be launched only in areas – and consist only of activities – in which government intervention is clearly justified and where combining the EU, national and regional efforts in Research & Innovation and demand-side policies will achieve the target quicker and more efficiently. Examples of partnerships being considered first address areas of great concern for the European citizens:


The European Innovation Partnerships (EIPs) are the new avenues indicated for future research to tackle societal challenges. Bringing researchers and stakeholders from across Europe together in collaborative networks is at the heart of this new approach and will continue to be vital in sustaining a European research fabric. Experience so far has shown, however, the limitations in achieving the necessary flexibility, creativity and crossdisciplinary research needed. Moreover, there is now really the need to get Europe and the European research – as least to the extent that this is going to change the citizens' life in a foreseeable future – into the minds and lives of ordinary citizens.

Sustainability Science and Citizens Participation:

Fig. 5. European Public Sphere for Science and Society

experiments, as those mentioned above and few others.

The public sphere is not as neatly delineated in reality as it is in this scheme: currently there are not publicly funded knowledge brokerage programs – besides some sporadic pilot

The systematic and continuous funding of knowledge brokerage processes can change, however, this situation, making the public sphere concretely populated with an increasing number of opportunities (workshops, conferences, summer schools, etc.) for face-to-face

Building a Science-Citizens-Policy Interface to Address Grand Societal Challenges in Europe 151

The figure shows again the main connections between a "public sphere", where any knowledge production is in principle free (open source), and a "private sphere" where knowledge is privately owned, i.e. protected by intellectual property rights. The private sphere is the place where IPR-based technological innovation, based on the most advanced research achievements, is exploited by business actors to produce and offer to "consumers"

on the market new sustainable products and services (e.g. green technologies).

But how? One suggestion would be to fix for the next EU Common Research Framework "Horizon 2020" *a target of 10% of Research & Innovation funding* allocated for European citizens-science activities, mainly in the context of the new European Innovation Partnerships. This would mean an order of magnitude of *1,5 billion Euros* yearly (about 3 Euros per citizen) for European citizens-science activities in the new Financial Framework 2014-2020.

The European citizens science projects will include as a participation standard *transnational panels of citizens*, whose members will have to be randomly selected from at least 3 different countries of Europe, applying here the same rule holding today for forming European consortia. Citizens involved in the European science-citizens projects will have the opportunity to meet in several workshops around Europe, and work together with the experts and other citizens from other countries to the same evaluation tasks, writing down their common deliberations.

While doing this, they will have the opportunity to learn and/or exercise English as common language, and to appreciate the different national cultures, exploring commonalities and differences. This process will be open to people from all ages, social status and walks of life, helping to build an European "social capital" of new cross-country relationships and friendship networks. In addition, as the citizens will acquire in the process adequate scientific information on the sustainability topics of concern, they will have through these European projects a concrete opportunity for long-life learning and enjoying new communication skill (not only English, but also from experiencing team work), achieving a better understanding and awareness of how complex societal challenges are.

The engagement of citizens in EU funded projects should be based on a rigorous random selection of the panel members, amongst pools of candidatures submitted to open "calls for citizens" on Internet. Other supporting actions that could be funded from the EU are longlife learning and training activities aiming to enhance the citizens common language and other civic skills, for instance by means of "*European citizens' summer schools*", as well as the skills of facilitators of participatory projects. Citizens' summer schools can be organized by networks of universities and training institutes around Europe, with the support of other regional or local institutions. Applicant European citizens would be trained on EU sustainability policy frameworks and related science issues, and citizens' participation methods and tools. They will have the opportunity to share an international "classroom" environment, and learn English by working together with experts, for instance to assess the societal acceptance of science topics related to their everyday life concerns.

The final aim of the proposed 10% target of EU research funding for European citizensscience activities is to build up an "*European Public Sphere*" for publicly funded and transparent brokerage activities between scientists, citizens, stakeholders and decision makers. This public sphere should be framed around the main societal challenges, providing an institutional framework to connect public and private research, market and social innovation across Europe. The interplay of the public and private knowledge spheres of research and innovation, aiming to achieve the common goal of sustainable development, is envisioned in figure 5 below.

But how? One suggestion would be to fix for the next EU Common Research Framework "Horizon 2020" *a target of 10% of Research & Innovation funding* allocated for European citizens-science activities, mainly in the context of the new European Innovation Partnerships. This would mean an order of magnitude of *1,5 billion Euros* yearly (about 3 Euros per citizen) for European citizens-science activities in the new Financial Framework

The European citizens science projects will include as a participation standard *transnational panels of citizens*, whose members will have to be randomly selected from at least 3 different countries of Europe, applying here the same rule holding today for forming European consortia. Citizens involved in the European science-citizens projects will have the opportunity to meet in several workshops around Europe, and work together with the experts and other citizens from other countries to the same evaluation tasks, writing down

While doing this, they will have the opportunity to learn and/or exercise English as common language, and to appreciate the different national cultures, exploring commonalities and differences. This process will be open to people from all ages, social status and walks of life, helping to build an European "social capital" of new cross-country relationships and friendship networks. In addition, as the citizens will acquire in the process adequate scientific information on the sustainability topics of concern, they will have through these European projects a concrete opportunity for long-life learning and enjoying new communication skill (not only English, but also from experiencing team work), achieving a better understanding and awareness of how complex societal

The engagement of citizens in EU funded projects should be based on a rigorous random selection of the panel members, amongst pools of candidatures submitted to open "calls for citizens" on Internet. Other supporting actions that could be funded from the EU are longlife learning and training activities aiming to enhance the citizens common language and other civic skills, for instance by means of "*European citizens' summer schools*", as well as the skills of facilitators of participatory projects. Citizens' summer schools can be organized by networks of universities and training institutes around Europe, with the support of other regional or local institutions. Applicant European citizens would be trained on EU sustainability policy frameworks and related science issues, and citizens' participation methods and tools. They will have the opportunity to share an international "classroom" environment, and learn English by working together with experts, for instance to assess the

The final aim of the proposed 10% target of EU research funding for European citizensscience activities is to build up an "*European Public Sphere*" for publicly funded and transparent brokerage activities between scientists, citizens, stakeholders and decision makers. This public sphere should be framed around the main societal challenges, providing an institutional framework to connect public and private research, market and social innovation across Europe. The interplay of the public and private knowledge spheres of research and innovation, aiming to achieve the common goal of sustainable development, is

societal acceptance of science topics related to their everyday life concerns.

2014-2020.

their common deliberations.

envisioned in figure 5 below.

challenges are.

The figure shows again the main connections between a "public sphere", where any knowledge production is in principle free (open source), and a "private sphere" where knowledge is privately owned, i.e. protected by intellectual property rights. The private sphere is the place where IPR-based technological innovation, based on the most advanced research achievements, is exploited by business actors to produce and offer to "consumers" on the market new sustainable products and services (e.g. green technologies).

Fig. 5. European Public Sphere for Science and Society

The public sphere is not as neatly delineated in reality as it is in this scheme: currently there are not publicly funded knowledge brokerage programs – besides some sporadic pilot experiments, as those mentioned above and few others.

The systematic and continuous funding of knowledge brokerage processes can change, however, this situation, making the public sphere concretely populated with an increasing number of opportunities (workshops, conferences, summer schools, etc.) for face-to-face

Sustainability Science and Citizens Participation:

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meetings and free exchange of knowledge, team working and democratic deliberation about **common** sustainable development issues. This being the case, scientists, representatives of NGOs, groups of randomly selected citizens and decision makers (either civil servants and elected politicians) will have the opportunity to share their knowledge in the public sphere, being provided with the same state of the art scientific information and with equal opportunities to contribute in the dialogue. They will discuss why and how to tackle the common challenges.

In this picture, also the business stakeholders, following Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) commitments, may support and participate to the knowledge brokerage process, providing relevant information about their potential contribution to problems and solutions. The citizens panels will help to catalyze the brokerage process producing their recommendations in the form of citizens declarations. These will include commitments towards sustainable management of the issue of concern, be forwarded to the politicians and disseminated to the general public.

Finally, the process initiated in the public sphere can trigger new action plans, with initiatives taken by governments - namely new forms of *public sector innovation*, e.g. policies for the sustainable management of common pools of resources and infrastructures (in key sectors such as energy, transport, water, urban and rural development, etc.) – or directly by civil society actors, with new forms of *social innovation and entrepreneurship* providing sustainable products and services (i.e. non-profit activities on the market).

Summing up, by mainstreaming the application of the innovative method experimented in the AWARE project, the citizens in Europe may have a new opportunity: that of being randomly recruited in citizens panels. Should they choose to participate, they may build up a sort of "European civic service" and undertake, together with scientists and policymakers, a critical review of legislation, management and research being funded by the European Union to address overarching societal challenges. Active citizens – and those citizens "activated" by means of their involvement in such European citizens-science projects – may contribute in this way to a timely and adaptive governance of sustainability challenges.

### **5. References**

AWARE. (2011a). *Deliverable 3.1 – Evaluation Methodology*, EC FP7 Project, Brussels


meetings and free exchange of knowledge, team working and democratic deliberation about **common** sustainable development issues. This being the case, scientists, representatives of NGOs, groups of randomly selected citizens and decision makers (either civil servants and elected politicians) will have the opportunity to share their knowledge in the public sphere, being provided with the same state of the art scientific information and with equal opportunities to contribute in the dialogue. They will discuss why and how to tackle the

In this picture, also the business stakeholders, following Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) commitments, may support and participate to the knowledge brokerage process, providing relevant information about their potential contribution to problems and solutions. The citizens panels will help to catalyze the brokerage process producing their recommendations in the form of citizens declarations. These will include commitments towards sustainable management of the issue of concern, be forwarded to the politicians

Finally, the process initiated in the public sphere can trigger new action plans, with initiatives taken by governments - namely new forms of *public sector innovation*, e.g. policies for the sustainable management of common pools of resources and infrastructures (in key sectors such as energy, transport, water, urban and rural development, etc.) – or directly by civil society actors, with new forms of *social innovation and entrepreneurship* providing

Summing up, by mainstreaming the application of the innovative method experimented in the AWARE project, the citizens in Europe may have a new opportunity: that of being randomly recruited in citizens panels. Should they choose to participate, they may build up a sort of "European civic service" and undertake, together with scientists and policymakers, a critical review of legislation, management and research being funded by the European Union to address overarching societal challenges. Active citizens – and those citizens "activated" by means of their involvement in such European citizens-science projects – may contribute in this way to a timely and adaptive governance of

sustainable products and services (i.e. non-profit activities on the market).

AWARE. (2011a). *Deliverable 3.1 – Evaluation Methodology*, EC FP7 Project, Brussels

*research to policy in the water sector*, EC FP7 Project, Brussels

*surveys and interviews*, EC FP7 Project, Brussels

*surveys and interviews*, EC FP7 Project, Brussels

*line surveys and interviews*, EC FP7 Project, Brussels

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AWARE. (2011e). *Deliverable 2.5 – North Sea Case Study Report: results of the local events, on-line* 

AWARE. (2011f). *Deliverable 2.4 – Gulf of Riga Case Study Report: results of the local events, on-*

common challenges.

and disseminated to the general public.

sustainability challenges.

Project, Brussels

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Schmitter, P. (2000). *How to Democratize the European Union … and Why Bother?*, Lanham (MD), Rowman and Littlefield **8**

**Social Science, Equal Justice and Public**

**Through the Urban Greening Movement** 

Robert García and Seth Strongin

*The City Project* 

*USA* 

**Health Policy: Translating Research into Action** 

In Los Angeles, California, United States of America, where one lives, the color of one's skin, and how much money one has impacts one's health and quality of life. One reason for this is that people of color and low-income people disproportionately lack access to safe places and programs for physical activity, including parks, school fields and green streets. People who lack access are deprived of the benefits of green space, including improved physical and mental health, the full development of the child including improved academic performance, positive alternatives to gangs, crime drugs and violence, social cohesion, economic vitality including green local jobs, and other values

Over the past ten years, attorneys, advocates and activists in what has become known as the urban greening movement have worked to alleviate inequities in access to green space including parks, schools and pools, translating social science research, policy and law into

In southern California, Los Angeles State Historic Park, Río de Los Angeles State Park, and Baldwin Hills Park are three best practice examples where community driven organizing and legal campaigns have helped create and maintain parks in neighborhoods that are disproportionately of color and low-income and lack opportunities for physical activity. These community victories for greening, democracy and equal justice took place over the span of a decade in three neighborhoods in Los Angeles, California. Each case study demonstrates how research including public health, demographic, geographic, and economic analyses, geographic information systems (GIS) mapping and demographic analyses, social science, and history were employed to present quantitative and qualitative evidence that supported the use of civil rights and environmental laws to influence the investment of public resources to create and maintain great urban parks. Section 2-5 of this chapter present the evidence. Section 6 presents the legal analyses. Section 7 illustrates the application of the law to the evidence in the context of those parks. Section 8 presents lessons learned in translating research into action. These case studies present replicable

**1. Introduction** 

(García and Strongin, 2011).

models for other cities and regions.

systemic social change.
