Active citizens

Another central finding in the interviews with the neighbourhood association activists who participated in the Citizen Channel project was that they represented the ideal of active citizenship, often present in the development of new forms of participation (e.g. Barnes et al. 2007, van de Wijdeven &

Hendriks 2009, Eriksson & Vogt 2013, Skelcher et al. 2013). The idea of active citizenship has also been seen in the earlier literature as the main characteristic of projects and the project society in general (Boltanski &

Chiapello 1999, Sulkunen 2006). The activists from neighbourhood associations who took part in the Citizen Channel project were already active in their neighbourhoods and the broader society before the project, many of them over several decades. They were important actors in their neighbourhoods and had assumed an advocacy role towards policy-makers on various local issues such as the organisation of public transport or the improvement of traffic safety. They had also created broad networks among local actors and had relations with municipal officials and the institutions of the municipal administration. There was a constant interaction between their role as active citizens and the current issues in their neighbourhoods that they were promoting or trying to solve.

Then this neighbourhood association activity, (…) it actually started about twenty years ago when my older son got hit by a car at a pedestrian crossing. And then I started to think whether residents could affect the safety of their local environment and I collected names from the neighbouring housing companies so that there would be a raised pedestrian crossing. And it started from there.

Project participant, neighbourhood association activist

In a way, I have already been doing the same work [as in Citizen Channel] here in our area, of course not so much across the [municipal]

border, except that (…) we have for instance been able to keep this bus line [crossing the municipal border]. (…) In that way Citizen Channel was for me a familiar thing, I just went there like “ok, it’s a good thing that it goes a bit across the border”.

Project participant, neighbourhood association activist

Besides the neighbourhood associations, the interviewees were also often active elsewhere, such as in municipal politics, political parties and in the elected area councils that existed at the time of the interviews both in Espoo and Vantaa. Even though several of the neighbourhood association activists (either interviewed directly or referred to in the interviews) were involved in party politics, they were primarily interested in the local area and concrete issues. For instance, one of the interviewees said that they were involved in party politics primarily as a resident activist who could in that way participate in municipal committees and have broader connections to the wider city.

However, not all of those interviewed held party memberships.

I have always been interested in what is built on the neighbouring plot or whether local services work, this is the thing. When I lived in Espoo I had a small son and I couldn’t get him to day care so I put together a petition. (…) I had a cause which was real for me. So I have fought for these things all my life, or made a noise about them, let’s say. And then, of course, I have a political background, because otherwise you don’t get on these committees and then you have a reference group. (…) I don’t [care] much about politics, but it’s like the framework.

Project participant, neighbourhood association activist

The neighbourhood association activists who were interviewed for this study shared some elements in common with the two activist archetypes that have developed in the context of governance presented in the studies of Bang and Sørensen (1999, 2001, see also Chapter 2.3). As was noted in Chapter 2.3,

“Everyday Makers” are active lay people who are characterised by slogans such as “do it yourself”, “do it where you are”, “do it concretely instead of ideologically” or “do it with the system if need be” (for the complete list, see Bang and Sørensen 2001, 156). According to Bang and Sørensen, even though these people, to a greater or lesser extent, vote and keep themselves informed about “high politics”, their political identity is primarily based on their action and networks at the local level. However, in this study, the neighbourhood association activists interviewed had a more profound engagement with their local activism than the “ad hoc or part time” attitude of Everyday Makers, and this extended to their party membership. As such, the neighbourhood association activists also encompassed elements of the “Expert Activists”

(Bang and Sørensen 2001) who are more deeply involved in governance networks and have a more strategic approach to them than the Everyday Makers.

As was noted in Chapter 2.3, in their study on Dutch neighbourhoods, Ted van de Wijdeven and Frank Hendriks (2009) have further developed the model of Everyday Makers and Expert Activists into the ideal types of

“neighbourhood experts” (who are structurally involved and follow the institutional logic), “case experts” (who are involved on an ad hoc basis but also follow the institutional logic), “everyday fixers” (who are structurally involved but follow the situational logic) and finally, “project conductors” (who are involved on an ad hoc basis and follow the situational logic). The Citizen Channel participants clearly exhibited aspects of the structural involvement and institutional logic of the “neighbourhood experts”. However, their emphasis on current and constantly changing local issues was also shared with the ideal type of “everyday fixers” who wanted to “get things done in a concrete way” (van de Wijdeven & Hendriks 2009, 130).

It must nevertheless be noted that even if these neighbourhood association activists were involved in a project like Citizen Channel, they had a much longer and more established background in their neighbourhood (and often, in political institutions), which made them different from the ad hoc types of

“case experts” and “project conductors”. As will be discussed in Chapter 6.1, this long-term commitment of these neighbourhood association activists made them different from the younger generation, which uses a more ad hoc form of action. In the case of neighbourhood development in Helsinki, this has even meant the parallel existence of established neighbourhood associations, which often have problems recruiting younger members, and loose Facebook groups and other networks referred by Tulikukka (2012, 86) as “town village movements”, which are active around events and local development.

In Finnish research, these most active resident activists have sometimes been called “super types” (Staffans 2002) or “power actors” (Staffans 2004).

According to the analysis by Staffans (2004), these people have become professional “advocates of everyday life” who have solid expertise on local issues and are embedded in local networks. The participants in the Citizen Channel project mentioned in the interviews several local issues where they had been or were at that time advocates. The networks of the neighbourhood association activists interviewed consisted of relationships with activists from other neighbourhood associations, with municipal officials, with the established participatory structures in their areas such as local committees and often, with political parties and municipal boards.

For the citizens participating in the Citizen Channel project, the main benefit from the project was not the idea that they were “activated” or

“empowered”, as they were already active in their neighbourhoods and in the broader society (see also van de Wijdeven & Hendriks 2009). As such, Citizen Channel differed from the empowerment projects typical of social urban policy, where the aim is to activate disadvantaged groups, often in worse-off neighbourhoods (Kuokkanen 2005, Smith et al. 2007, Eliasoph 2011; see also Chapter 2.5). Such projects have been implemented in Finnish suburbs, especially as a part of the EU’s urban policy (Bäcklund & Schulman 2003,

Kuokkanen forthcoming a). However, as Helka is the umbrella association for neighbourhood associations, its members are effectively those of the neighbourhood associations who are active in their own districts. According to the interviews, Helka as an organisation had not been directly trying to activate passive groups, although it did collaborate with the city of Helsinki, which was working with underrepresented groups.

Traditionally, our members are these active people who are already activated by themselves. We haven’t done much to try to activate completely passive groups – that’s more an issue for social services.

But we have lots of connections and contacts with them, and the social services office in Helsinki works to support local groups.

Project administration, NGO or other association

The analysis of the interviews with the citizens participating in Citizen Channel presents a picture of the active resident interested in local issues. However, because of the double strategy of the Citizen Channel project to concentrate both on the development of a model of resident participation and on actual issues in the pilot areas, the impact of the residents participating on the model or toolbox remained relatively modest (this thematic will be analysed further in Chapter 7.2). In the next subchapter, the overall picture of the Urban Programme and the Citizen Channel project and the interpretations of the various actor groups involved in them will be considered more in detail.

5.4 SUMMING UP: VARIOUS INTERESTS, VAGUE