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Participatory Budgeting (PB), an institutional innovation to promote democratic change, is a form of collaborative governance in which citizens are involved in decision-making processes about how to spend part or all of available government funds. Like the broader concept of democracy, for PB to be effective, there needs to be an ongoing participatory process that involves the building of civic capacity and infrastructure. This paper focuses on a particular attribute of civic efficacy, that of deliberative public engagement, defined as collaborative problem solving through informed, inclusive, egalitarian processes with the outcomes influencing policy, decisions and/or collaborative action. It is argued that to be a deep democratic reform, PB needs to be more intentionally deliberative than usually practiced, within an environment that nurtures civic collaboration and empowerment. In the current situation of disaffected, often angry and/or cynical citizenry, without resorting to revolution, overcoming the pervasive sense of impotence to effect real change is not easy. It requires ongoing effort to create the civic capacity, policies and the institutions that will enable everyday people to work together with decision-makers to achieve collaborative public wisdom, decisions and action. For PB to avoid being merely a superficial band-aid to the perceived malaise of our democratic systems, we contend that the culture in which it is situated needs to be nurtured and stewarded to be more collaborative, considered and egalitarian. The deliberative democracy process instituted over a number of years in Greater Geraldton, Western Australia, shows how some of the preconditions for an effective participatory budgeting initiative could be achieved. The lessons learned are widely applicable to other western democracies, and potentially, other forms of governance.

Participatory Budgeting (PB), an institutional innovation to promote democratic change, is a form of collaborative governance in which citizens are involved in decision-making processes about how to spend part or all of available government funds. Like the broader concept of democracy, for PB to be effective, there needs to be an ongoing participatory process that involves the building of civic capacity and infrastructure. This paper focuses on a particular attribute of civic efficacy, that of deliberative public engagement, defined as collaborative problem solving through informed, inclusive, egalitarian processes with the outcomes influencing policy, decisions and/or collaborative action. It is argued that to be a deep democratic reform, PB needs to be more intentionally deliberative than usually practiced, within an environment that nurtures civic collaboration and empowerment. In the current situation of disaffected, often angry and/or cynical citizenry, without resorting to revolution, overcoming the pervasive sense of impotence to effect real change is not easy. It requires ongoing effort to create the civic capacity, policies and the institutions that will enable everyday people to work together with decision-makers to achieve collaborative public wisdom, decisions and action. For PB to avoid being merely a superficial band-aid to the perceived malaise of our democratic systems, we contend that the culture in which it is situated needs to be nurtured and stewarded to be more collaborative, considered and egalitarian. The deliberative democracy process instituted over a number of years in Greater Geraldton, Western Australia, shows how some of the preconditions for an effective participatory budgeting initiative could be achieved. The lessons learned are widely applicable to other western democracies, and potentially, other forms of governance.

The definition and disposition of mentally ill persons involved in the criminal justice system has been a long standing problem in most western cultures. Most allied debates, however, have been theoretical and philosophical rather than pragmatic. The following paper examines data from the Western Australian courts, prison and mental health systems to determine the nature and extent of the problem, together with the current dispositions of mentally ill offenders. In so doing, fundamental problems in the system are highlighted and possible alternatives suggested.

Public participation in governance is regarded as a key element in enhancing urban sustainability. While there is a wealth of participation efforts in Indian cities, there are inadequate processes for regular, inclusive, egalitarian, informed and well-structured democratic participation that provide a real say to citizens in public decision-making. 'Deliberative democracy' has emerged as one way to improve effective public participation in decision-making, though it is mostly prevalent in developed countries. An action research initiative was implemented over several years in Pune, India. It used mixed methods to introduce and assess the applicability to the Indian urban context of high-quality public deliberations. This article presents a case study of a deliberative democracy initiative, framing the transformative public involvement needed to address sustainability problems. It also shows how the integration of the mixed methods approach in the action research to design and facilitate deliberative participation processes, helped to broaden and deepen understanding, and enhanced the transformative capacity of the research design.

This article expands the evidence about integrative thinking by analyzing two case studies that applied the collaborative decision-making method of deliberative democracy which encourages representative, deliberative and influential public participation. The four-year case studies took place in Western Australia, (1) in the capital city Perth and surrounds, and (2) in the city-region of Greater Geraldton. Both aimed at resolving complex and wicked urban sustainability challenges as they arose. The analysis suggests that a new way of thinking, namely integrative thinking, emerged during the deliberations to produce operative outcomes for decision-makers. Building on theory and research demonstrating that deliberative designs lead to improved reasoning about complex issues, the two case studies show that through discourse based on deliberative norms, participants developed different mindsets, remaining open-minded, intuitive and representative of ordinary people's basic common sense. This spontaneous appearance of integrative thinking enabled sound decision-making about complex and wicked sustainability-related urban issues. In both case studies, the participants exhibited all characteristics of integrative thinking to produce outcomes for decision-makers: salience—grasping the problems' multiple aspects; causality—identifying multiple sources of impacts; sequencing—keeping the whole in view while focusing on specific aspects; and resolution—discovering novel ways that avoided bad choice trade-offs.

Since online deliberation has not delivered on the expectations of more considered, democratic participation, the authors propose less focus on technological 'fixes' and more on re-conceptualizing its primary purpose to gathering resonance in an authentic public square. The ideas that emerge can then be deliberated in representative face-to-face public deliberations, with the coherent voice that results contributing to more inclusive, legitimate, and implementable democratic decision-making.

In this special issue of the Journal of Public Deliberation, multiple faces of Participatory Budgeting programs are revealed. The articles demonstrate that there is no standardized set of "best practices" that governments are adopting, but there are a broader set of principles that are adapted by local governments to meet local circumstances. Adopt and adapt appears to be the logic behind many PB programs.

Since online deliberation has not delivered on the expectations of more considered, democratic participation, the authors propose less focus on technological 'fixes' and more on re-conceptualizing its primary purpose to gathering resonance in an authentic public square. The ideas that emerge can then be deliberated in representative face-to-face public deliberations, with the coherent voice that results contributing to more inclusive, legitimate, and implementable democratic decision-making.

In this special issue of the Journal of Public Deliberation, multiple faces of Participatory Budgeting programs are revealed. The articles demonstrate that there is no standardized set of "best practices" that governments are adopting, but there are a broader set of principles that are adapted by local governments to meet local circumstances. Adopt and adapt appears to be the logic behind many PB programs.