Participatory budgeting is a democratic process through which citizens make decisions about budgeting. It has received attention in public administration literature. Many scholars apply “participatory budgeting” too broadly. They conflate nominally participatory practices with those that emanated from the Global South and now expand throughout the United States. This article explores various applications of “participatory budgeting.” It also presents a heuristic framework, developed out of the work of Arnstein and Fung, which assists practitioners and researchers in identification and evaluation of participatory processes, including participatory budgeting. This framework is applied to four cases to illustrate determination of participatory budgeting practices.

This paper presents a preliminary analysis of the first participatory budgeting experiment in the United States, in Chicago's 49th Ward. There are two avenues of inquiry: First, does participatory budgeting result in different budgetary priorities than standard practices? Second, do projects meet normative social justice outcomes? It is clear that allowing citizens to determine municipal budget projects results in very different outcomes than standard procedures. Importantly, citizens in the 49th Ward consistently choose projects that the research literature classifies as low priority. The results are mixed, however, when it comes to social justice outcomes. While there is no clear pattern in which projects are located only in affluent sections of the ward, there is evidence of geographic clustering. Select areas are awarded projects like community gardens, dog parks, and playgrounds, while others are limited to street resurfacing, sidewalk repairs, bike racks, and bike lanes. Based on our findings, we offer suggestions for future programmatic changes.

One of the most enduring criticisms of John Dewey’s political thought is that it is unsuspicious of power. This essay responds to this critique by advancing the claim that power is an integral but implicit element of Dewey’s conception of human experience. Given Dewey’s indirect treatment of power, this essay has two primary tasks. First, it reconstructs and develops an explicit conception of power for Deweyan pragmatism. Second, it evaluates the extent that Dewey’s political and social philosophy is able to criticize power relations. Taken together, I aim to provide a more coherent and realistic defense of the political dimensions of Dewey’s democratic theory. This defense moves Deweyan pragmatism toward a democratic politics that neither elides conflict nor evades power.

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Researcher (R): How has doing Public Achievement (PA) changed the way you think about yourself?Casey (pseudonym for an elementary school student): I am less lonely now that I have done Public Achievement.R: Really, that's interesting, what is it in PA makes you less lonely?Casey: Well, people used to think that I am kinda weird here, and I am different. I like playing in the woods and stuff by myself and doing my own kind of stuff.R: And people think of you as less weird when you do PA?Casey: Yeah, they even give awards to kids like me in PA.R: Wow! It sounds like you are a leader in PA.Casey: Yeah, I really like doing PA.R: Let me see if I am hearing you right, before PA people thought that you were weird, and now that you have done PA, people look at you differently?Casey: Yeah.R: How do you think they look at you differently now?Casey: They look at me as a citizen.R: As a citizen, what does it mean for them to look at you as a citizen?Casey: Like I am more of an equal, they listen to what I have to say.This dialogue, filled with civic promise, is typical of the many conversations I have had with young participants in reflecting upon their experiences in Public Achievement.