Terezie Lokšová: The journey of one(?) innovation - participatory design in the Czech local governance

Involving the citizens in various local projects (the re/design of public spaces, housing estates, the reappropriation of buildings, etc.) seems to be an already well-established approach to improve both the local relationships and the project itself in the Czech context. The participatory approaches mostly travelled internationally and uni-directionally, predominantly from the US and Scandinavia. Their implementations, based initially on international contacts, involved various translations and practical adaptations; the landscape of practice also sometimes remains open-ended and ever-changing, just as the contexts themselves.

However, the academic reflections of the public participation in Central and Eastern Europe so far seem to be caught in the mainstream discourses of ‘catching up with the West’ (Eyal et al. 2001) while also depicting the post-transition era and local contexts as uniform and stable. Through the semi-structured interviews with the ‘pioneers’ of public involvement working in the Czech contexts since the late 90s and analysis of various documents produced within the processes, I seek to develop a more nuanced understanding of the local participatory arrangements.

By exploring the views and accounts of practical experiences with spreading and implementing the public involvement by the participatory experts, the context-specific paths and assemblages of participatory design come into view, showing the heterogeneity of imported practices, their adaptations, and in/stability of participatory assemblages in time. Work in progress will be presented.

The website of the conference is here.