Participación ciudadana en los planes de desarrollo y ordenamiento territorial de la ciudad de Ibarra en Ecuador

Abstract

ABSTRACT

For large democracies, the direct participation of citizens in governance, mainly local, poses a great challenge due to the implementation of mechanisms such as “citizen councils”, “consultative councils”, “participatory budgets” among others, so that citizens can be an integral part of the government system, sharing with them the responsibilities of drawing up local action plans. Although it is true that in Ecuador participatory representativeness is guaranteed, establishing norms that promote citizen participation in public affairs, there are still certain gaps that prevent an adequate development of citizen intervention in several local governments, as is the case of the GAD of the canton Ibarra. For this reason and with the purpose of knowing the context in which the participatory processes unfolds in the Ibarra’s GAD, the need to apply qualitative information gathering techniques such as the interview was established, which was directed to seven officials who collaborate with the citizen participation processes at the territorial development level; and quantitative, such as the survey directed to twenty-four representatives of the five urban and seven rural parishes of the canton Ibarra. The results of these interviews and surveys showed that citizen engagement still has many limitations related to the lack of communication, low training, and the lack of permanent presentation of the results of the work tables to the citizens. Likewise, there are other barriers that arise from the limited budget, the lack of political decision and the analysis and evaluation of results, which, based on indicators, can promote more efficient mechanisms of citizen participation; These mechanisms should be based on the ability to act, deliberate and participate permanently with plenary meetings, citizen education and training for GAD officials, building alliances with citizens and trust, as well as controlling and evaluating citizen participation processes for more efficient decision-making at the local management level.