Where Residents, Politics, and Government Meet

Philadelphia’s Experiments with Civic Engagement

By: Chayenne Polimédio, Elena Souris, Hollie Russon-Gilman

This article is an excerpt from our recent paper, Where Residents, Politics, and Government Meet: Philadelphia’s Experiments with Civic Engagement. To read the full paper, click here.

Americans by large margins say that government does not work for them. Studies show that the views of average people are not well represented and people don’t believe they are heard by those in power. This crisis of representation often leads to a crisis in participation. Solutions to the low levels of engagement and lack of faith in democracy, its institutions, and its representatives tend to lack sustainability and scalability. Proposed solutions often favor technocratic expertise over experience. Apps and new data sets become the way to just fix problems in the short term; metrics and measurable wins take precedence over collaborative policymaking and genuine constituent empowerment that would lead to sustainable improvements in the quality of life for all.

Fresh thinking about civic engagement does not have to be complex. The best approaches go back to the basics, ask the right questions, and focus on the people. Well-designed partnerships among the public, private, and nonprofit sectors, along with philanthropic and public investment in physical spaces, informed by the lessons of human-centered design can help tackle the crisis of representation and participation facing many American communities.

In Philadelphia, the fifth-largest city in the United States and one long strained by racial and class tensions, new thinking about civic engagement, trust, and participation has taken the form of a massive investment of philanthropic and public resources into the city’s neglected public spaces and civic infrastructure, including recreation centers and libraries. Can these investments, if designed to draw in residents and engage them in local decisions, help rebuild the bonds of community and democratic trust? This is a question relevant to cities and towns all across the country. Philadelphia’s experience may provide some answers.

Governments, along with the philanthropic, private, and nonprofit sectors, have begun to support such work. Foundations are increasingly aware that while the growth of urban economies has generated great wealth, it has also widened inequality. Funders are responding by supporting policies and models of engagement that seek to ensure that residents are able to benefit more equitably from economic development.1 In addition, the private sector has begun to think about distressed cities and localities as opportunities for development. And government officials have welcomed the capital and the expertise that oftentimes understaffed and cash-strapped agencies lack.

In Philadelphia, democratic need, funder support, fresh thinking, and municipal and resident commitment to change come together. At the invitation of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, we explored two of its investments. The nonprofit Fairmount Park Conservancy is leading a civic engagement effort in advance of Rebuild, an initiative led by Mayor Jim Kenney that will invest hundreds of millions of dollars to improve neighborhood parks, libraries, and recreation centers. The second one is the PHL Participatory Design Lab, a 2017 “Knight Cities Challenge” winner, which uses behavioral economics and human-centered service design to improve public services provided by the Office of Homelessness Services and Department of Revenue.

Our goal was to develop some insight into what kinds of interventions are likely to have the most impact in promoting sustainable civic engagement and more inclusive, equitable, and responsive public policy. First, we looked at the link between investments in physical infrastructure and civic engagement. Second, we studied inclusive design practices that aimed to take users’ experiences into account when designing policy and government communications. We tested assumptions in these two models of individual engagement, and we looked at how these models can apply in other cities.

Our research took us to one of the first disc golf courses in the world, to city hall, and to neighborhoods across Philadelphia.

Our investigative framework tested several assumptions:

• That investments in physical capital can yield higher levels of social, human, and economic capital.
• That community and group involvement lead to residents who are more engaged in their neighborhoods and local governments
• That individuals want to engage in governance and to take part in community-oriented activities.
• That individuals will get involved if the costs and barriers to engagement are lowered.
• That barriers to engagement can be lowered with the creation of better tools and processes.
• That civic technology is a tool for positive change and an asset to civil society organizations and other forms of social entrepreneurship.

This paper is a combination of desk research, dozens of in-depth semi-structured interviews, and multiple site visits and follow-ups. Through a snowball sampling approach, where we started with an initial group and expanded it in a systematic way while learning about community networks, we were able to identify key actors and institutional players, as well as engage with community members.

Much of the work that we examine in this paper — from applying user-centered research to improve government services to investing in renovations in physical spaces in order to develop social capital — reflect twenty-first century realities and challenges that must be grappled with by those in charge of policymaking, those who advocate for such interventions, and the people for whom policies are crafted.

We found that addressing low levels of civic engagement often means recognizing citizens as advocates for their neighborhoods, and that hearing the public’s expertise requires investing in civic structures, listening to new voices, and taking chances on new ideas. By combining experience with technical knowledge and building with citizens rather than for them, solutions that focus on social capital investments go beyond the voting booth and carry potential for sustainability and scalability.

Based on our research examining civic engagement in Philadelphia, as well as our broader assessment of the literature and the civic engagement landscape, we have compiled findings and recommendations geared to a wide group of stakeholders. This includes public officials, civil society, community members, philanthropy, the private sector, and academia. These high-level findings and recommendations help contextualize our experience on the ground in Philadelphia within the broader civic innovation ecosystem. The recommendations section of the report goes into deeper detail.

Findings

• There is no “one-size-fits-all” model for civic engagement. Different models will work better and be more inclusive depending on who participates, how they engage, and what types of opportunities are available, as we saw with Philadelphia’s range of programming.
• Process and implementation can slow down progress. City officials and policy makers can easily miscalculate how long it will take to pass a bill like the soda tax, or get funding for a program like Rebuild. These delays may discourage under-resourced residents from participating, while well-resourced residents familiar with the political process can wait it out.
• Civic organizations, such as the Philadelphia nonprofit Fairmount Park Conservancy, can complement municipal government and help offset its limitations.
• Though technology and digital tools provide more civic engagement opportunities, technology alone does not effectively eliminate barriers to entry or help attract more diverse viewpoints. When integrated as part of a policy process , as with the Design Lab, technology has a lot of power.
• Ideal resident input systems communicate to users what happened as a result of their contributions. Positive feedback loops help residents experience success either individually on a campaign or as a sense of shared effort with others, which can help build their sense of agency. One example may be the volunteer groups in Philadelphia: advisory councils at recreation centers and the friends groups at parks.
• Local governments and engagement structures should encourage proactive and positive engagement, rather than incentivizing residents to merely participate in response to a problem. For example, the Philadelphia Parks Alliance does grassroots-style outreach around rec centers’ neighborhoods to match renovations with the communities’ specific needs.
• Improving civic engagement must include reforms that make democracy more equitable. While programs such as Rebuild, the Design Lab, and volunteer groups have an impact, it’s important to think about what other structural factors may impact traditional democratic processes.

Long-Term Recommendations

• As the soda tax case teaches, it’s helpful if funders can adopt an if-then model to plan for unforeseen events, delayed political timelines, or limited funding streams to keep projects and grantees moving.
• Plan for “sailboats, not trains” by thinking about civic engagement funding as a long-term, adaptive investment without rigid planning or short horizons. Such a framework would help projects adapt to obstacles like the Rebuild project has faced.
• Design sustainable funding streams by encouraging public spending and public/private partnerships where philanthropic money acts as a “down payment” on expected public investment. To do so, funders can support increased municipal capacity by backing fellowships or helping departments find innovative, yet self-sustaining, funding sources.
• As powerful as programs like Rebuild can be, the political arena also deserves attention. Promote structural reform and discussions about the role of money in politics, voting reforms (like ranked choice voting), and the resources that government needs in order to do its job.

Medium- to Short-Term Recommendations

• Build a civic layer to create a spectrum of engagement for individuals that meets them where they are in the evolution of their “civic life,” providing different levels of engagement and accessible opportunities. As Philadelphia departments and nonprofits implement different outreach methods, other organizations can experiment with tactics ranging from block-walking outreach to roles that work directly with the City.
• Invest in training for government employees and civil society leaders, similar to city volunteer trainings, as well as more diverse employment outreach.
• Avoid one-off, occasional engagement by developing an ongoing and iterative system for residents through outreach, input, and participation. Philadelphia friends groups and resident advisory councils are an instructive model.
• Bring engagement into the 21st century by taking advantage of modern technology and asking whether these tools are engaging all residents. For example, volunteer groups talked about both the benefits and limitations of social media.

Our study of civic engagement efforts in Philadelphia was funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. The views expressed in this report are those of its authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.