The impact of participatory budgeting on basic services: municipal practices and evidence from the field

Abstract

In 2013, over 1,700 local governments in more than 40 countries were practising participatory budgeting (PB), which entails citizens meeting to agree on priorities for part of the local government budget for their neighbourhood or the city as a whole, and helping to oversee project implementation. This paper reviews PB in 20 cities in different continents, ranging from small urban centres to Chengdu, China, with over 17 million inhabitants, and examines 20,000 recently funded projects worth over US$ 2 billion. It finds that PB has contributed significantly to improving basic service provision and management, with projects that are usually cheaper and better maintained because of community control and oversight. While in most cases PB improves governance and the delivery of services, it does not often fundamentally change existing power relations between local governments and citizens. The paper also discusses challenges and solutions for PB’s effectiveness and scaling up.