How Citizen Partnerships co-produce projects with Yamato City in Japan

Learning points

An academic evaluation of the Citizen Partnership from 2003-2006 recommended that the Citizen Partnership should set up a ‘scrutiny committee’ to ensure that the decision-making process leading to the funding of citizen proposals would be fair and would treat all proposals equally. Furthermore, the evaluation demonstrated that the community groups needed more support in their work – for example, in project management and in marketing their activities to a wider public.

Overall, the Citizen Partnership has provided a valuable governance approach to give both citizens and city government the opportunity to co-produce projects and harness each other’s expertise and skills to improve the quality of social care and wellbeing in Yamato City.