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increasingly expressing the party’s standpoint rather than their own. Third, a minority does not always get what it deserves due to dominant majorities. People sometimes speak of ‘legitimacy erosion’, which is explained as a gradual, but fundamental deterioration of the legitimacy of the performance of public administration. Legitimacy refers to the competence of the public administration or representatives to govern.16 Recent research has been conducted to map out the perceived legitimacy of acts associated with the Dutch Ministry of Justice.17 In studying these, the researchers considered it important to first assess issues related to the perceived legitimacy of formal institutions, legal officials, and rules and regulations. In addition, three dimensions of legitimacy were established, which subsequently define legitimacy as: (1) trust; (2) satisfaction; and (3) acceptance.18 According to the study, empirical data does not suggest large-scale erosion but legitimacy is practically affected. Legitimacy of performance is not self-evident, but more often disputed. It should be noted, however, that a relatively small amount of empirical data is available, especially in the social science literature. Finally, the research showed that familiarity among the citizens with certain parts of the judicial authorities is relatively high, while familiarity with other parts is particularly low. It can be expected that participation leads to more trust, more satisfaction, and more acceptance on the part of the citizens. As a result, the legitimacy of the public administration performance increases. People generally agree that it is sensible to bring the exercise of power as close as possible to the citizens. One way of achieving this involves decentralization in either functional or territorial terms. Territorially decentralized authorities are municipalities and provinces, whilst the functionally decentralized authorities are the public bodies for employment and business. We also see that governing committees have been established within municipalities and provinces with a specific task. Advantages of functional decentralization include the significant influence of stakeholders, increased expertise, and increased participation. However, territorial decentralization also offers substantial advantages as the distance between government and citizens is significantly smaller. Furthermore, public representatives can also be called to account relatively easily and in a direct manner. In short, participation— particularly at local and regional level19—enables a greater influence for citizens and increases the willingness to cooperate.
3. Specification of the Concept The focus here is on four forms of participation: (1) popular initiative; (2) citizens’ panel; (3) referendum; and (4) community-level participation. It is essential to clearly describe these four forms and the three policymaking phases: (1) the policy agenda development phase; (2) the policy development phase: and (3) the decision-making phase.
(a) Participation: term, motives, distinctions, and forms Participation has already been defined as active involvement of a group of individuals in a collective process. Within the context of public administration, it refers to the involvement of citizens in the actual or intended actions of administrative authorities
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17 Addink and others 2000, 87–8. Weyers and Hertogh 2007. 19 Tyler and Huo 2002. Addink 2009.
