International Journal of Public Administration

Citizen Engagement and Dialogue Amidst Democratic Backsliding: Global Insights from Local Government Perspectives

Background and Several Topics/Questions of interest

The erosion of democratic institutions and democratic backsliding have become common problems in many parts of the world, calling academics and practitioners alike to assess how such backsliding impacts institutions of public administration, as well as whether good public administration may be capable of preserving and enhancing citizen trust in institutions, as an essential element of a functioning democracy (Andrews, Entwistle, & Guarneros-Meza, 2019; James, 2025; Dutta & Roy, 2024). Moreover, at the time of democratic backsliding, various forms of citizen engagement by public institutions operating at all levels of government are particularly crucial for fostering citizen trust in democratic institutions (Jacob, 2025).

In the past several decades, we have seen substantial growth and interest in researching the various forms of citizen engagement, as well as considerable proliferation of such forms of engagement (Bingham, Nabatchi, O'Leary, 2005; Bryson, Crosby, Bloomberg, 2014; Manoharan, Ingrams, Kang & Zhao, 2021; Nabatchi, Sancino, Sicilia, 2017). Wide-spread forms of such engagement range from providing citizens with information related to public policies and programs and organizing forums where citizens share their needs and feedback about public programs, to directly engaging citizens in the formulation or implementation of these policies and programs (i.e. co-production) (Amirkhanyan & Lambright, 2017; Nabatchi et al., 2017). Scholars have also posed questions about creating conditions for citizens’ voice in local government; not only to facilitate engagement and dialogue, but also to support good governance (Shaffer, 2019).

However, less is known about how changing conditions and evolving political regimes impact the efficacy and utilization by the governments of the various citizen engagement tools such as, for example, participatory budgeting, citizen juries, study circles, citizen panels or advisory councils (Bingham et al., 2005). Importantly, as democracies are becoming increasingly more polarized and levels of social tension in communities rise, ensuring constructive dialogue, maintaining productive engagement within the various public forums, inviting diversity of views and opinions, and the contribution of expertise with lay knowledge have all contributed to an increasingly more complex task (Motos, Font, Bherer, & Smith, 2021).

This special issue focuses on how public administration, civil society, and civic dialogue respond to global democratic erosion, populism, and institutional fragmentation across North America, Europe, Asia, and Global South.

Focusing primarily on the local government setting, as an important context where bureaucracy directly interacts with citizens and citizen groups, we invite a variety of contributions that shed light on the role of governmental institutions in facilitating citizen engagement and public trust, developing new and innovative ways of soliciting citizen input and participation, evaluating the efficacy of the various approaches and practices of citizen engagement, as well as facilitating a better understating of the various barriers to participation that local governments face in different types of pollical regimes and social environments.

We invite original contributions to the symposium on this topic. For this special issue, we seek theoretical and empirical contributions, comparative as well as single country case studies, showcasing how local governments around the world engage with their citizens in the context of institutional fragmentation and democratic backsliding. In particular, we welcome proposals that explore the following themes:

·      How does the current social and political context affect citizen engagement practices and approaches adopted by local governments? How do such governments handle political polarization and social conflict while bringing diverse actors to the discussion table?

·      How have forms of citizen engagement evolved in recent years, and have any best practices emerged? What innovations have been developed by local governments to support the effective utilization of the citizens’ input?

·      How are the local engagement forums designed to invite the diversity of political views and effectively engage broader bases of citizen constituents?

·      What roles do nonprofit actors and other types of civil society institutions play in facilitating public trust and democratic engagement at the local levels? What roles do nonprofits play in shaping civic discourse?

·      How do nonprofits and other types of civil society actors interact with local governments, perform their advocacy roles and mobilize citizens to more effectively engage with local governments?

·      What factors and strategies facilitate collaborative engagement and co-production with citizens and civic groups?