The problems of institutionality, legitimacy and credibility, and representativeness of democracy are indicators of the social complexity in the contemporary societies. They also represent the germ that can crystallize into new frameworks of political organization and action. Public bodies are forced to develop new ways of governing through innovative and collaborative forms of governance to co-create public and social value. It is in this context that democratic innovations emerge as a possibility to redefine the field of political decision-making.
In the world, there are many experiences, interpretations and applications of what it has been named as “democratic innovations”. There are similarities and differences between them, but all of them are fundamentally based on the willingness of governments to tackle the design of the public agenda and the challenges of the future that it must contain, not exclusively from the government, but in collaboration and interaction with society, fundamentally through the entire network of social actors that make it up.
Etorkizuna Eraikiz (Building the Future) Initiative, which was launched in 2016 by the Provincial Government of Gipuzkoa, represents an example of a democratic innovation deployed in a local context. Experimentation and deliberation emerge as key strategies to build together the future of the territory by institutionalising a new way of designing and implementing public policies. This democratic innovation is a central pillar in the transition towards a new institutional culture in the way of managing and administering the future of the political governance of the province of Gipuzkoa.
Thus, the initiative generates spaces for listening, deliberation and experimentation, with the aim that all this should have an expression, firstly, in the public agenda, secondly in public policies and, thirdly, in the collective capacity to respond to the future and strategic challenges of the territory.
Some preliminary results are: first, a wide participation of the society in the policy-making process in which more than 25.000 citizens and 500 companies of the territory have taken part; second, 10 strategic, 11 experimental and 75 citizens projects have been jointly implemented resulting in, if successful, public policies; and finally, the initiative has resulted in an increase in trust in both the local administration and in the programme.
This paper focuses on the analysis of Etorkizuna Eraikiz programme and describes how government and policy management need to change and adapt to the new global and local contexts. It also analyses how this program has been jointly designed by different actors/agents inside and outside the provincial government to improve and attend to society’s basic socio-economic needs fostering knowledge, reflection and experimentation. Finally, it will show how the project has helped to increase democratic legitimacy, narrow the gap between citizens and government, enlarge the problem- solving capacity, increase the support for policy and improve the quality of policy.
The papers aims at providing a valuable insight into the role that the collaborative approach plays regarding innovation in the public sector and its implications for democratic innovations.
