Citizen participation to face the climate challenge

The Community of Practical Learning on Action for Climate Empowerment (ACE) has held its third session dedicated to public participation and the role of  civil society in promoting strategies and actions for climate empowerment.  

This is a EUROCLIMA+ programme initiative that is being developed by FIIAPP in partnership with OREALC/UNESCO Santiago. The session focused on methods, strategies, and tools to encourage and sustain public participation.   

The first meeting tackled the question of how public participation can be encouraged by public administrations. The aim was to promote their involvement and to bring the public on board as relevant stakeholders in the changes to public policies, highlighting their knowledge and practices. In this regard, work was done within the framework of the Escazú agreement, access to information, public participation and access to justice in environmental matters. Consideration was also given to how the rallying of the has a key role to play in reaching new consensuses that will make it possible to accelerate climate action. The role of civil society in generating responses, articulating networks, creating knowledge and innovative practices to attract the attention of public administrations and have them reflected in climate policies was analysed in the second part.   

The session hinged on two central themes: participatory processes in the development of national strategies on climate change in Spain and climate assemblies as methodological tools for promoting climate empowerment in Europe.   

Moreover, it is expected that EUROCLIMA+, a programme financed by the European Union, is to start its transnational knowledge sharing sessions with Chile, Costa Rica and Peru within the framework of the Community of Practical Learning on Action for Climate Empowerment (ACE).  This initiative aims to facilitate dialogue among peers to deepen learning and good practices on ACE in the region. It is a methodological tool to facilitate closer, more personalised and task-oriented collaboration in the search for recommendations and key elements in public policies on ACE, and its potential to mitigate and adapt climate change in the region.