Periodic Reporting for period 2 - Fairville (Facing Inequalities and democratic challenges through Co-production in Cities)
Reporting period: 2024-04-01 to 2025-06-30
Fairville focuses on the formation and consolidation of collaborative frameworks and forms of inter-mediation with civil society organizations, buttressing urban and environmental democracy. Its starting point builds on confidence from on-going initiatives by residents and citizens, i.e. from a ‘bottom up’ perspective rather than defining externally what value/input should be brought. It brings together partners, most of whom have previous experience in urban and/or environmental co-production in areas marked by profound structural inequalities and democratic deficit.
The proposed topics relate to three social issues that are catalysts for inequality and democratic crisis in planning policies, namely, housing, environment and risk.
The consortium understands the articulations between multi-scalar urban inequalities, democratic quality and citizens confidence in public action. The research also documents this relationship through an examination of the terms associated with co-production. To this end, a reasoned and annotated repository of resources offer data relevant to the Fairville topics. Some of the collected interpretations are focusing on inequality within spatial dynamics, e.g. spatial segregation, as well as the multiple factors impacting on urban inequalities. In the last one year, the glossary has evolved into “words in action” section.
Bringing together researchers, community groups and a number of local authorities, the consortium is now operating eight Fairville Labs according to a principle of participatory action-research relying first on an exploration of the main issues of the affected groups. These labs are now in full motion in Brussels, Marseille (Marseille Belle de Mai and Atelier 4-5), Region Attica, London, Berlin, Giza and Dakar. These pilots of urban intervention engage co-production collectives organised in interconnected circles aiming, in particular, at producing alternative expertise including surveys, collective explorations, mapping, etc. These Fairville labs are also laboratories for ‘epistemic justice’, i.e. the cooperative production of knowledge with a horizontal focus.
The participants are also engaged in a process of co-evaluation, the main challenge being to include the protagonists, including the ones who are most removed from public decision-making and in the monitoring of the co-production.
Finally, they started to set the first steps of an international network of co-production, made of various civil-society organisations working with community groups at various scales and also international alliances for participatory democracy and/or spatial justice, including local authorities. Throughout this process, and in particular from 2024 onwards, Fairville is seeking to disseminate the scientific message in an accessible language.
The proposed topics relate to three social issues that are catalysts for inequality and democratic crisis in planning policies, namely, housing, environment and risk.
The consortium understands the articulations between multi-scalar urban inequalities, democratic quality and citizens confidence in public action. The research also documents this relationship through an examination of the terms associated with co-production. To this end, a reasoned and annotated repository of resources offer data relevant to the Fairville topics. Some of the collected interpretations are focusing on inequality within spatial dynamics, e.g. spatial segregation, as well as the multiple factors impacting on urban inequalities. In the last one year, the glossary has evolved into “words in action” section.
Bringing together researchers, community groups and a number of local authorities, the consortium is now operating eight Fairville Labs according to a principle of participatory action-research relying first on an exploration of the main issues of the affected groups. These labs are now in full motion in Brussels, Marseille (Marseille Belle de Mai and Atelier 4-5), Region Attica, London, Berlin, Giza and Dakar. These pilots of urban intervention engage co-production collectives organised in interconnected circles aiming, in particular, at producing alternative expertise including surveys, collective explorations, mapping, etc. These Fairville labs are also laboratories for ‘epistemic justice’, i.e. the cooperative production of knowledge with a horizontal focus.
The participants are also engaged in a process of co-evaluation, the main challenge being to include the protagonists, including the ones who are most removed from public decision-making and in the monitoring of the co-production.
Finally, they started to set the first steps of an international network of co-production, made of various civil-society organisations working with community groups at various scales and also international alliances for participatory democracy and/or spatial justice, including local authorities. Throughout this process, and in particular from 2024 onwards, Fairville is seeking to disseminate the scientific message in an accessible language.
•“Mapping of the impact of inequalities on political participation and democratic quality” aims to provide a tentative conceptual map about the relationship among inequalities, participation/engagement and democratic quality.
•The mutual learning process has led to the undertaking of “Words in Action”, an online document and to initiate a Counter manual of co-production for fairer cities.
• Towards a glossary: The group expanded its reflection by creating 10 entries, authored by academics and civil society members. Besides coproduction and inequalities, institutionalization and epistemic justice are key terms.
•As for the Fairville labs’ on going action-research process, a stakeholders and key actors database has been created. This simple grid has been useful to start understanding the diversity of engagements, spanning from 4 to 32 kinds of participants
•A toolbox for co-production of pilot actions outlines the Fairville labs methodology and diverse/complex pathways to work with communities and academia, often overlooked in participatory research.
•A monthly Mutual Learning Seminar, initiated in November 2023, facilitates cross-disciplinary sharing among project teams and partners
•The co-evaluation process has launched its first phase, creating a comprehensive checklist and framework for co-assessment of Fairville Labs
•Launch of Dialogues in Coproduction, a seminar series designed to foster exchange, collective inquiry and advocacy strategies amongst the Fairville Labs and a growing community of practice
•“Cartes blanches co-produced articles”, were developed in flyer and poster/pamphlet format in EN & FR, presenting the project and the Labs actions in a concise way to the general public
•Open Co-production Meetings and Workshops, also adds to the project’s highlights. Several meetings and workshops both internal and open/public, and community steering were organised.
•The mutual learning process has led to the undertaking of “Words in Action”, an online document and to initiate a Counter manual of co-production for fairer cities.
• Towards a glossary: The group expanded its reflection by creating 10 entries, authored by academics and civil society members. Besides coproduction and inequalities, institutionalization and epistemic justice are key terms.
•As for the Fairville labs’ on going action-research process, a stakeholders and key actors database has been created. This simple grid has been useful to start understanding the diversity of engagements, spanning from 4 to 32 kinds of participants
•A toolbox for co-production of pilot actions outlines the Fairville labs methodology and diverse/complex pathways to work with communities and academia, often overlooked in participatory research.
•A monthly Mutual Learning Seminar, initiated in November 2023, facilitates cross-disciplinary sharing among project teams and partners
•The co-evaluation process has launched its first phase, creating a comprehensive checklist and framework for co-assessment of Fairville Labs
•Launch of Dialogues in Coproduction, a seminar series designed to foster exchange, collective inquiry and advocacy strategies amongst the Fairville Labs and a growing community of practice
•“Cartes blanches co-produced articles”, were developed in flyer and poster/pamphlet format in EN & FR, presenting the project and the Labs actions in a concise way to the general public
•Open Co-production Meetings and Workshops, also adds to the project’s highlights. Several meetings and workshops both internal and open/public, and community steering were organised.
The current stage in the research action project is coherent particularly comparing, up-scaling, synthesizing project results, in their academic, political and social dimensions. This stage is crucial and demands a significant amount of work.
Based on the project’s empirical results, we are developing our contribution beyond the “state of the art”. The results are many-fold in the field of planning, urban policies, local government practice and impacts on the understanding of engagement.
An academic paper to the journal Society and Space titled: “Coproducing urban policies : the difficult balance between capacitating the grassroots and strategically engaging the institutions” has been submitted in July 2025
A second publication is being developed, on “why it is so difficult for (well-intentioned) officials to engage in coproduction with civil society”.
Finally, among other elements to be credited so far to the project, we noticed a growing interest from several partners that have connected locally, nationally and sometimes internationally to broader alliances in co-production: in Brussels, several large organizations are exploring the potential of co-production on environmental and housing issues ; in Dakar the lab is well connected to the Slum Dwellers International learning center for West Africa.
Based on the project’s empirical results, we are developing our contribution beyond the “state of the art”. The results are many-fold in the field of planning, urban policies, local government practice and impacts on the understanding of engagement.
An academic paper to the journal Society and Space titled: “Coproducing urban policies : the difficult balance between capacitating the grassroots and strategically engaging the institutions” has been submitted in July 2025
A second publication is being developed, on “why it is so difficult for (well-intentioned) officials to engage in coproduction with civil society”.
Finally, among other elements to be credited so far to the project, we noticed a growing interest from several partners that have connected locally, nationally and sometimes internationally to broader alliances in co-production: in Brussels, several large organizations are exploring the potential of co-production on environmental and housing issues ; in Dakar the lab is well connected to the Slum Dwellers International learning center for West Africa.