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This paper takes a new look at the importance of context - institutional and political - in effective public engagement processes. It does so through a rare comparative opportunity to examine the effectiveness of processes of public engagement in two UK waste authorities, where the same waste company was involved as both the primary contractor for the delivery of the waste management service (including new energy-from-waste facilities) and, furthermore, the same staff delivered the public engagement. Interrogating these cases affords the opportunity to place flesh on the bones of the sometimes 'abstract' skeleton of context. While engagement processes support effective local governance in an era of partnerships and deliberative democracy, the paper identifies that the methods adopted cannot be played out devoid of detailed understanding and response to local context, including the strength of partnership working between the public and private sector, the degree of political support for engagement, and the extent to which a traditional institutional paternalism still dominates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Learning that transcends participation processes is critical if public engagement is to translate into a legacy of enhanced environmental citizenship. However, a lack of empirical evidence has limited discussion to date to largely 'aspirational' claims. This paper offers the first rigorous examination of whether public participation does generate beyond-process social learning. Initially we review the literature on public participation and environmental citizenship to identify the key dimensions of social learning. We then re-visit a well-worked case study of an innovative public engagement process on the Hampshire waste strategy from the 1990s. Approximately one third of the original participants have been interviewed to identify whether and how the experience had a lasting effect on them. Key methodological difficulties are discussed, not least the analytical difficulties of attributing learning to a process that happened ten years previously. However, we argue that there is evidence that both instrumental and communicative learning have taken place, and conclude by identifying key areas that require further research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public engagement through deliberative processes is promoted in both academic and policy circles as a potential means to build public trust in risk decisions and decision-makers. Governments in particular seem to optimistically take a positive relationship between public engagement and trust almost for granted. This paper provides a new and critical analysis of this hoped-for relationship, questioning whether such a direct and positive link between engagement and trust is a false hope. The paper draws upon personal experience of deliberative processes to discuss key components of an engagement process that have the potential to impact positively on trust. Specifically, who is engaged and which interests are represented; an open and collaborative framing of the discussion, and a direct and clear relationship between engagement and the risk decision. But the paper argues that given the complexities of optimising these process elements and in the light of the known underlying dimensions of trust, expectations are misplaced and that enduring trust is unlikely to spring from engagement itself. This is not to negate the other benefits of engagement, rather it is to focus on those key elements that will need to be in place, both process and beyond, if trust is to be enhanced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of the growth in support for deliberative decision-making, this paper presents a new examination of an important and as yet largely ignored question of just how a deliberative process can capitalize on local knowledge and lead to shared (expert and public) learning and understanding. It speaks to both the academic and practitioner through a set of reflections upon the nature and demands of engagement management. Drawing upon a recent urban river restoration project in the UK, the subject of an innovative form of engagement, it identifies and examines the key management elements, i.e. the recruitment of representative interests; active facilitation; collaborative framing; optimizing interaction; and managing the unexpected. The paper concludes that both public and expert can learn if the right conditions for listening, sharing, reflecting on preferences and adapting are created and managed, and identifies the theoretical and practical implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]