On 4 to 8 December 2024 the first School on Participatory Democracy in Greece kickstarted in Athens, gathering close to 30 participants representing both public authorities and civil society organisations to deepen their understanding on participatory democracy tools. The School, which is a training cycle, that lasts 8-10 month, was implemented by the Council of Europe Democratic Institutions and Civil Society Division jointly with the Andreas Papandreou Foundation and the Symbiosis-Council of Europe School of Political Studies in Greece, in cooperation with the Hellenic Adult Education Association and the Symi Network.
Organising the School for Participatory Democracy, promoting new innovative forms of democracy, in the Greek capital in 2024 was double symbolic, as the city of Athens is known as the place, where the idea of democracy has been developed 2500 years ago and the year 2024 marks the 50th anniversary since the restauration of democracy in Greece.
The training cycle was designed as an interactive learning event, to deep dive in theory and practice of participatory and deliberative democracy mechanism. Participants from all over Greece were not only introduced to Council of Europe guidelines and standards on participatory policymaking, but also to very practical tools for citizens engagement designed by international experts. Interactive group exercises and roundtable discussions, covering a variety of approaches to citizen engagement, strategies for maximising inclusion, exercises for designing public consultation plans were facilitated by national and international experts with a broad and longstanding experience in the field.
Additional to the competence building, the training cycle aims to create a community of practitioners in Greece as part of an international alumni network promoting and putting in practice participatory and deliberative initiatives all over Europe.
This event was made possible thanks to the initiative of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe’s General Rapporteur on Democracy George Papandreou, and with the valuable support of the City of Athens and Mayor Haris Doukas.
