An innovative participatory policymaking approach using Open Studios: the creation of “Ecosystems of Care”

Abstract

This paper explores an innovative policymaking tool known as “Open Studios”. This is a participatory, multi-disciplinary two-day workshop which allows open discussion, interaction, and solution development between end users, researchers, and experts in a field. Taking into consideration issues on accessibility, equity, and scarcity of green spaces in urban centres, we developed and applied a new model of community building which is bottom-up, locally managed, and adaptable to the needs of its users: the “Ecosystems of Care”. We present the main features of this new way of organizing and structuring green urban areas, as well as our observations from two pilot projects which were created to understand the feasibility and applicability of this idea. We conclude by reflecting on our lessons learned from these applied experiments, the potential of Ecosystems of Care for improving the wellbeing of the population and look at issues related to their replicability and long-term sustainability.

Science highlights

• • Open Studios are an innovative policymaking tool focused on co-creation and the interaction between experts, end-users, and researchers on a common issue.

• • Through an Open Studio we developed the idea of Ecosystems of care, focused on creating more inclusive green spaces that are managed by the community and quick to implement in a variety of different settings.

• • We present evidence to show that Ecosystems of care have the potential to tackle inequalities in access to green spaces, ultimately improving the wellbeing of people who live in cities.

Policy and practice recommendations

• • Ecosystems of care are effective social innovations that are fast to organize, bottom-up, and centered around a holistic definition of inclusiveness that considers social and structural barriers.

• • These initiatives are based on a democratic space development, focused on the programmability of a space that involves all potential users.

• • To be effective, a stakeholder mapping is necessary to understand the various users and communities cohabiting in this space.

• • Sustainability of these initiatives is favored by the support of local government and authorities; however, it is important that their management and organization remains within the hands of local organizers.

Background

RESISTIRÉ (RESpondIng to outbreakS through co-creaTIve inclusive equality stRatEgies) was a Horizon 2020 research and innovation project interested in investigating inequalities exacerbated by the COVID-19 public health emergency and aimed at developing solutions centered around equity. Movement restrictions and non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) introduced during the COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the key role which access to green spaces had on the wellbeing of people, as well as the socioeconomic inequalities in accessing them. Through a scoping review and stakeholder consultations, RESISTIRÉ decided to focus one of its policy proposals on the development of new ways of using public green spaces. This paper aims to present the conceptualization and delivery of the “Ecosystems of Care” pilot project, which was the result of an innovative participatory approach of policymaking called Open Studio (OS) that took place on the 12th and 13th of October 2021.

Methods

OS are two-days, thematic, policymaking workshops that invite people with different backgrounds (artists, community leaders, architects, and public servants) as well as people directly affected by the issued discussed, to come up with innovative solutions to potentially apply to their own, local setting. Ultimately, they aim to develop ideas and interventions with a concrete vision of their possible future impact, following the core value of fulfilling the vision of all stakeholders involved in the resolution of a problem (López Belloso et al. 2024; Street 1997).

OS were the central policymaking tool used by RESISTRÉ, with topics first drafted by the team based on consultation with experts and stakeholders, as well as quick literature reviews on themes that seemed to be of central importance to the wellbeing of communities during the COVID-19 pandemic. Green areas and the inequalities related to their access and use consistently appeared as important topics in the literature, both in general and in the context of the wellbeing of individuals during the pandemic (Hugo Poelman 2016; Kardan et al. 2015; Milner et al. 2021; Poortinga et al. 2021), moving the team to dedicate an OS and policy proposal of the project to this topic.

Three central questions were then drafted by RESISTIRÉ as necessary outcomes of the “Solutions for Inclusive Access to Green Commons” OS:

• 1. how to create new green spaces and reform grey areas to solve the problem of unequal availability in cities;

• 2. how can existing green areas be reshaped to be accessible to all;

• 3. how can these areas become safe, free and inclusive spaces for all diverse individuals within a community.

The workshops are designed to make people from different perspectives and fields work together on a common solution, enabling a conversation between very different experts without having to fall back onto the necessity of speaking a common technical language (Robertson and Simonsen 2012). Invited participants to the “Solutions for Inclusive Access to Green Commons” OS included: artists, architects, community organizers, public servants, members serving on common housing associations, environmental scientists, botanists, as well as real estate developers from different parts of Europe. This was done to ensure that the policy solutions discussed were inclusive of a wide range of perspectives.

Policy discussions in OS are centered around better stories and personas, two tools created ad hoc for each workshop. The first are positive narratives and promising practices of how communities or governments have come together to solve a problem, or have found resilience during times of hardship (Georgis 2014). These narratives are created through a prior research phase conducted by the RESISTIRÉ team in preparation of each workshop. These tools are necessary to help frame the development of solutions from a positive perspective and inspire the participants. Personas are instead descriptions of hypothetical individuals who might be affected by the policies discussed during the OS. These fictional characters, inspired by interviews with real people (carried out by the RESISTIÉ team) who reported some kind of hardship or form of discrimination. They are a tool to help empathize with the wide range of possible situations which a targeted policy needs to take into consideration (López Belloso et al. 2024). Personas are created using a variety of different types of users, to make policy solutions as inclusive and sensitive to the needs of all potential people. This also helps to ground the conversation around concrete situations and structuring the development of a policy blueprint which is centered around users (Fig 1).

Fig. 1

Example of better stories and personas used during the Open Studios

In practice, these exercises are carried out as small group open discussions and develop in the following steps:

• 1. Each group was assigned three better stories and was asked to highlight which elements they found innovative in the solution and what were their shortcomings. A list of caveats and strengths was drawn up and enumerated for each group.

• 2. Next, personas were introduced as potential users of any urban green area. Participants were asked to empathize with these users and comment on possible solutions to resolve their specific conflicts and problems presented. These solutions can include both physical changes to the environment, as well as initiatives which could help create a more welcoming space. Core concepts and ideas from these descriptions were then distilled and enumerated.

• 3. A list of common characteristics, problems and solutions that were described by each group was created. This list constituted the foundations upon which each group would then develop their policy proposals. This is where the OS methodology is at its most innovative: the brainstorming process which brings together people from very different professional backgrounds gives light to policy ideas which consider all aspects central to possible solutions.

• 4. After a deliberation period for each group, every idea was presented and the selection of the pilot project was based on a group vote from all participants, organizers of the OS included.

Policy solutions created by the OS are required to follow the principles of design justice (Costanza-Chock 2020; López Belloso et al. 2024), putting under the limelight the voice of those directly impacted by a policy and prioritizing the effect that the policy will have on its community.

Results

Ecosystems of care: a pilot project by RESISTIRÉ

The group who participated in the “Solutions for Inclusive Access to Green Commons” OS drafted four core principles to make green areas more inclusive in their utilization and development:

• 1. Decisions based on a bottom-up participatory approach, centered around users.

• 2. Focused on the problem of gentrification around green areas, mindful of mitigating this process.

• 3. Creating a space which is psychologically and physically safe for all users.

• 4. And finally, programmable, defined by the OS as the ability of a space to host and organize activities which users can contribute to.

Based on these principles, the development of green spaces as “ecosystems of care” emerged. These represent a way of designing and organizing communities within public green spaces considering the direct participation and inputs of local users, who are usually left out of decision-making process for the spaces which they utilize.

A call for interest open to any organization or individual in Europe was published online, offering funds for kick-starting an initiative that would need to include in its proposal concrete ways of addressing the above-mentioned principals to access the funds. The call was published on the RESISTIRÉ website and promoted through professional networks of the participants. It offered full funding for a period of up to 6 months. Two sites for pilot projects were selected. One project, based in Barcelona, Spain, was developed by a local grassroots organization (aquí) and focused to bring together different, isolated communities of a same place (Parc de l’Espanya Industrial) by organizing events and offering a space to discuss ideas on their shared public space. The other project was based in Graz, Austria, and managed by two local community organizations (respectively, Transition Graz and Illusions), which were interested in requalifying a green space through a participatory, democratic process with the residents of the Triester Neighborhood in the city. (López Belloso et al. 2024).

Discussion

Ecosystems of care and their potential for improving wellbeing

Ecosystems of care propose the creation of a “programmable” green space, which means:

• 1. galvanize users to interact with each other and promote their involvement in the decision-making processes of a public space;

• 2. promote the creation of new green areas where there aren’t any by bringing together communities around a solution;

• 3. create an opportunity for interaction, respectful confrontation, and discussion between users, residents, and policymakers;

• 4. act as a protector of the right of everyone to access these public domains;

• 5. reduce inequalities in access and use of green areas by involving and hearing from all users or communities;

Ecosystems of care are grounded in social, rather than technical or environmental innovation, making them malleable to the community, relatively cost-free, and easy to implement at any level. They represent an effective tool for making green spaces more inclusive of all users by encouraging them to be actively involved in decision-making processes used by them. While they cannot provide a solution to the structural inequalities found in urban green areas, they can tackle the unequal utilization and development of them, which often fail to take into consideration the diverse communities which coexist in a space, and underestimate the importance of green areas for the wellbeing of all users.

Conclusions

Replicability

A year after the beginning of the two pilots, the organizers, and a team from RESISTIRÉ joined together again for a roundtable discussion to understand the future of these projects and what features of each could help the replicability of these elsewhere. The lessons we learned form this meeting are summarized in Fig. 2, which represents the methodological framework for the application of ecosystems of care.

Fig. 2

Methodological framework of an ecosystem of care

The creation of this project in two very different contexts, and with substantially different objectives, gives good hope to believe that ecosystems of care can easily adapt to a variety of environments.

Strengths of Open Studios as tools for policymaking

Open Studios are an innovative policymaking tool combining a variety of participation and design techniques which makes them a strong method of confronting problems and developing solutions. They offer the opportunity to openly discuss complex, intersectional issues which affect people’s everyday lives, giving them the opportunity to participate in the formulation of concrete solutions. The format allows for a confrontation between bureaucratic realities, end users’ needs, structural problems, and real-life applications. Additionally, the workshop tools used in OS are effective in framing problems and solutions around a common narrative, making policy proposals centered around users and real-life situations, as well as easier to implement and propose to local realities.

Limitations

We encountered some limitations in this policymaking mechanism. Firstly, there is no method to assure a representative participation to these events, and OS are likely to attract a share of stakeholders that is better off and not necessarily representative of the most marginalized. While we have tried to codify a set of good practices which could help in shaping and creating these projects elsewhere, we cannot account for the myriad of complex social, bureaucratic, and structural issues that a community might run into: the local context remains the strongest determinant of success of these projects.