Activating citizens to participate in collective co-production of public services

User and community co-production of public services has been seen as important topic since the late 1970s, both in private and public sectors.  In recent years it has been recognised that the outcomes of public agencies are actually the result of the efforts of multiple stakeholders – but particularly on the contributions of service users and the communities in which they live. Moreover, interest in the potential of co-production has grown because of the major fiscal pressures facing governments since the financial crisis of 2008. However, much of the interest in co-production has been conceptual or through illustrative case studies – there has been little quantitative empirical research on citizen co-production behaviours. The research reported here involved a large-sample survey in five European countries which sought to fill this gap. This article examines in depth one especially significant finding from this research – the major gulf between current levels of collective co-production and individual co-production. It reports the characteristics of these large differences, explores why they might have arisen and considers the social policy implications, if government were to seek greater collective co-production, given its potential benefits. 

Cite as: Bovaird, Tony; van Ryzin, Gregg; Loeffler, Elke and Parrado, Salvador (2015), “Activating citizens to participate in collective co-production of public services”, Journal of Social Policy: Vol 44 (1): 1–23, https://doi.org/10.1017/S0047279414000567.