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Demetra
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Project

DEMETRA – Democratic Governance, Environmental and Climate Challenges, and Societal Transformation: Deliberation, Inclusiveness, and Citizen Empowerment for Sustainable Food Systems

About DEMETRA

DEMETRA aims to demonstrate means to alleviate tensions between democratic governance and sustainability transitions through an analysis of new deliberative participatory processes (DPPs) in seven European countries:

  • Estonia
  • France
  • Germany
  • Italy
  • Sweden
  • Switzerland
  • United Kingdom

DEMETRA combines macro- (institutional), meso- (organizational), and micro-level (individual) explanatory factors; a crossnational comparative design; and an integrated mixed methodological approach based on multiple sources and methods. In view of the climate imperative and environmental challenges, DEMETRA seeks to provide tools for a democratic governance of the sustainability transformation.

DEMETRA analyses the micro-, meso-, and macro-level opportunities for DPPs supporting sustainability transitions, focusing on the food system as a crucial study field to identify best practices for citizens’ democratic engagement and the co-construction of sustainable societies.

Objectives and Impact

DEMETRA has the following objectives:

  • To enhance the inclusion and empowerment of citizens in democratically governed food system transition by analysing, developing, and implementing new DPPs.
  • To assess the setup, process, and outcomes of different types of DPPs in terms of their quality of deliberation, inclusiveness, and empowerment of participants.
  • To offer a detailed analysis of DPPs that bring together stakeholders to solve societal problems.
  • To show the way for a democratically governed sustainability transition capable of addressing climate change while being mindful of inequalities.
  • To show how different stakeholders can participate together in democratic and inclusive DPPs.

DEMETRA aims to create impact across society through targeted communication and dissemination strategies, project policy briefs/roundtable, a blueprint on “Deliberative Democracy and Food Systems” and the participation of alternative food organisations and social enterprises active in DPPs at the local level; scientific impact through conference and workshop participation, (open-access) publications, and an international scientific conference; and impact on citizens through an interactive learning module, online video magazines, an international film festival, and new experimental tools that involve citizens in the production of knowledge.

Research Questions

The project is constructed around four building blocks:

First building block

  • DPP setup: how are participants selected, how many and which citizens participate, which experts and governmental representatives are involved and what is their role, and what are the goals of the DPP?
  • DPP process: who speaks, who is listened to, are arguments well supported, does anyone dominate the deliberations, who influences the decisions or recommendations?
  • DPP outcome: do participants feel included and empowered, does the DPP lead to public policy-making, as well as to the implementation of sustainability transformations?

Second building block

What are the opportunities and constraints for DPPs that are both inclusive and empowering? How can DPPs foster the transformation towards sustainable and carbon neutral food systems?

Third building block

How do different types of DPPs compare in terms of quality of deliberation, reflected in the degrees of inclusiveness and empowerment realised at each stage? What are the substantive outcomes of DPPs on sustainability transformations of the food system?

Fourth building block

How can popular and effective solutions emerging from DPPs be scaled up to facilitate sustainability transformations?

Research Activities

DEMETRA undertakes the following research activities:

  • Measures citizens’ climate literacy and predispositions towards DPPs and sustainable food policies by analysing existing survey data.
  • Estimates potential policy uptake and implementation by designing a representative cross-national survey.
  • Examines involvement of civil society organisations and private enterprises in DPPs and in the development of policy options for the sustainable transition of food systems.
  • Analyses local authorities’ support of DPPs and the development of policy options by conducting interviews with elected representatives of municipal governments.
  • Studies DPPs using collaborative experimental ‘living labs’ to involve citizens in knowledge production.
  • Evaluates the different stages of the DPP concept – setup, process and outcomes – in terms of inclusiveness and empowerment.
  • Identifies how and when DPPs fit into decision-making processes by analysing policy content and adoption procedures.
  • Assesses the coherence between food policies, Farm-to-Fork Strategy (FFS) objectives and DPP solutions.

Work Packages

More about DEMETRA's Work packages

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