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This book concentrates exclusively on the dialogic turn in the governance of science and the environment. The starting point for this book is the dialogic turn in the production and communication of knowledge in which practices claiming to be based on principles of dialogue and participation have spread across diverse social fields. As in other fields of social practice in the dialogic turn, the model of communication underpinning science and environmental governance is dialogue in which scientists and citizens engage in mutual learning on the basis of the different knowledge forms that they bring with them. The official aim is to involve citizens in processes of decision-making on scientific and environmental issues, including issues relating to the built environment such as urban planning. The attempt in this book has been made to build bridges across the fields of science and technology studies, environmental studies, and media and communication studies in order to provide theoretically informed and empiri ally rich accounts of how citizen voices are articulated, invoked, heard, marginalised or silenced in science and environment communication

The demand for sound scientific information and public participation is particularly great in urban forestry. Urban society's manifold perceptions, preferences and demands for urban forest goods and services need to be considered, indicating the necessity for socially inclusive planning processes. Successful policies can only be formulated by establishing close links with, for example, urban planning and municipal policies. Inherently, this means that close ties between research and policy are required. This article discusses the outcomes of the NeighbourWoods research and development project in which a wide range of tools for public participation were tested in six urban woodland casestudies across Europe. A distinction was made between characteristics of the specific participatory tools and those of the communication process between the facilitators (scientists) of the participation process and the end-users of information (local policy-makers). Public willingness to participate depends on factors such as existing controversy, emotions attached to the forest, and perceived dangers, e.g., in terms of threats to the status quo. Policy makers' willingness to involve themselves depends on political interests, on prior experience with public participation processes, and on their trust in the facilitators of the public participation process. Findings confirm that a set of tools comprising a step-wise process from informing the public in an attractive way, collecting information on public opinion, towards fully participatory approaches such as direct involvement in decision-making is most likely to ensure socially inclusive planning. Communication with policy-makers requires a high degree of openness, clearly explaining every phase of the process, being open about each other's expectations, in short, by developing relationships based on mutual trust.

Citizen science (CS) has shown tremendous popularity in recent years; however, there is still a lack of understanding of important aspects that determine citizens' participation and involvement in CS initiatives. Although CS initiatives could serve as a means of promoting forms of participation that contribute to the democratization of science, limited attention is still being paid to the "citizen" component of the citizen science term. For this reason, a systematic literature review (SLR), aligned with the PRISMA methodology, was applied to empirical studies on citizens' participation in environmental and nature-based CS initiatives established over the last two decades. The participatory aspect of the retrieved 119 CS initiatives was analysed on the basis of: (a) citizens' participation and (b) environmental citizenship. Our findings show that the majority of the CS initiatives were mostly limited to the local scale, and they primarily followed the contributory model, in which volunteers were mostly treated as "data collectors". Therefore, it is important to overcome barriers related to the design and implementation of CS that hinder citizens' participation and, at the same time, to strengthen democratization through a more participatory engagement of active and aware citizens, thus promoting environmental citizenship.

In Citizen Science, experts from a variety of disciplines share their experiences of creating and implementing successful citizen science projects, primarily those that use massive data sets gathered by citizen scientists to better understand the impact of environmental change. This first and foundational book for this developing field of inquiry addresses basic aspects of how to conduct citizen science projects, including goal-setting, program design, and evaluation, as well as the nuances of creating a robust digital infrastructure and recruiting a large participant base through communications and marketing. An overview of the types of research approaches and techniques demonstrates how to make use of large data sets arising from citizen science projects. A final section focuses on citizen science's impacts and its broad connections to understanding the human dimensions and educational aspects of participation. Intended as a resource for a broad audience of experts and practitioners in natural sciences, information science, and social sciences, this book can be used to better understand how to improve existing programs, develop new ones, and make better use of the data resources that have accumulated from citizen science efforts. Its focus on harnessing the impact of "crowdsourcing" for scientific and educational endeavors is applicable to a wide range of fields, especially those that touch on the importance of massive collaboration aimed at understanding and conserving what we can of the natural world

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Preface -- 1. Environmental Citizen Science: Virtues and Dilemmas -- 2. How Is Environmental Citizen Science Political? -- 3. Investigating the Impacts of Fracking -- 4. Detecting Radiation -- 5. Tracking Genetically Engineered Crops -- Conclusion. A Vision of Science by and for the People -- Appendix: Resources for Getting Involved in Citizen Science -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index

The San Juan Estuary Bay is place of many contrasts. On one hand, is one of the most valuable ecosystems within Puerto Rico's Metropolitan Area. On the other, the urbanization of nature through the Island modernization process has resulted in historic water quality problems. Recently, the SJEBP identified 12 critical areas where there are serious water contamination problems due to sewage discharges. The challenge now consists in generating the public participation and environmental policy action framework to foster its restauration on the long run. In this article we reflect upon the possibilities of community-based water quality monitoring as an approach to cultivate a political consciousness and environmental activism about water relations in the city. Through the lenses of Political Ecology, Participatory Action Research and Popular Education we reflect upon some preliminary findings about a current research effort aimed at documenting the water conflicts and generate the social mobilization needed to contribute to SJEB restauration.

The essay reviews the notion of "civic science" in global environmental governance & how it is articulated in international relations, science studies, democratic theory, & sustainability science. Civic science is used interchangeably with participatory, citizen, stakeholder, & democratic science, which are all catch words that signify various attempts to increase public participation in the production & use of scientific knowledge. Three rationales for civic science are identified: restoring public trust in science, re-orienting science toward coping with the complexity of environmental problems, & installing democratic governance of science. A central proposition is that the promotion of civic science needs to be coupled with a theoretical understanding of its institutional, normative, & epistemological challenges. The science-politics interface needs to be reframed to include the triangular interaction between scientific experts, policymakers, & citizens. 51 References. Adapted from the source document.

Mongolia is a sparsely populated Asian country covered by vast steppes, deserts, and forests. Few studies have been conducted on Online Citizen Science (OCS) activities in Mongolia. This study aims to analyze the state of OCS in Mongolia and, in a further step, to place it in an international context by comparing it with Germany and Japan, where OCS is already well established. Mongolia faces several environmental challenges, including climate change, land-use change, and intensive urbanization. OCS can help address these environmental challenges. Quantitative, qualitative, and literature-based analyses were conducted in this study. OCS has become more relevant in Mongolia since 2013, where projects have been introduced internationally rather than locally. A comparison with Germany and Japan showed that the use of web technologies and the degree of citizen participation in OCS projects are similar in these countries; however, the link to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) may differ. To better respond to citizen needs and environmental challenges, additional local projects must be developed. Mongolia has the potential to enhance environmental monitoring and the networking of various actors using web technologies in citizen science.

AbstractIn the "contributory" citizen science project INSIGNIA, beekeepers carried out non-invasive sampling of their own honey bee colonies for an environmental investigation of pesticide residues and pollen plant origin. We surveyed several traits and attitudes of 69 of the volunteering beekeepers from ten countries. We found that their motivation was similar to that found in previous studies of environmental volunteer motivation, with helping the environment and contributing to scientific knowledge being strong motivators. Our results suggest that receiving laboratory analysis results of the samples from their colonies is the most meaningful way of appreciation for beekeepers, but is not their primary reason for participation. A citizen scientist beekeeper in this study spent on average 10.4 working hours on the project during a sampling season. Our study indicates that most of our volunteers would participate in similar future investigations, or would recommend participation to other beekeepers, underlining the potential of beekeepers as citizen scientists in honey bee research.

The author examines the process of involving Russian citizens in public activity through digital communication by creating an online environment for information distribution, content sharing, and coordination of actions. The study explores the ways of engaging citizens in social and political forms of public participation in the view of increasing influence of digital communication. The study is aimed at determining the extent to which digital communication on social media influen­ces social participation and citizen engagement. The objectives of the study were to identify ways of engagement, appealing content, level of impact, users' reactions, and preferred communities.
The study method is based on networking and neo-behavioural approaches. The study employs the method of sociological online survey (N = 1,600) of social media users. The results of the study concluded that the involvement in social participation online is mostly through the consumption of information content, and less through targeted social media messages, which proved to be infrequent. Participation in social media communities for civic initiatives depends on a large extent on the focus of activities. Social media initiatives focused on solving citizen's common problems, providing assistance to people in need, and environmental issues are the most popular among citizens. Politicized communities are the least attractive, revealing the dominant attitude among Russian citizens to avoid political participation.

Environmental conflicts produced by economic development and natural resources exploitation, are discussed. Main causes of conflicts in developing countries were shown to arise from geographically external investments, inefficiency of the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), and the lack of communication between government and Non-Government Organizations (NGOs). Citizen participation can only intervene during late stages of the EIA, which is considered as one of the main shortcomings in satisfying demands of local people.

The essay reviews the notion of "civic science" in global environmental governance and how it is articulated in international relations, science studies, democratic theory and sustainability science. Civic science is used interchangeably with participatory, citizen, stakeholder and democratic science, which are all catch words that signify various attempts to increase public participation in the production and use of scientific knowledge. Three rationales for civic science are identified: restoring public trust in science, re-orienting science towards coping with the complexity of environmental problems and installing democratic governance of science. A central proposition is that the promotion of civic science needs to be coupled with a theoretical understanding of its institutional, normative and epistemological challenges. The science-politics interface needs to be reframed to include the triangular interaction between scientific experts, policy-makers and citizens.

Traversing disciplines, A History of Participation in Museums and Archives provides a framework for understanding how participatory modes in natural, cultural, and scientific heritage institutions intersect with practices in citizen science and citizen humanities.Drawing on perspectives in cultural history, science and technology studies, and media and communication theory, the book explores how museums and archives make science and cultural heritage relevant to people's everyday lives, while soliciting their assistance and participation in research and citizen projects. More specifically, the book critically examines how different forms of engagement are constructed, how concepts of democratization are framed and enacted, and how epistemic practices in science and the humanities are transformed through socio-technological infrastructures. Tracking these central themes across disciplines and research from Europe, Canada, Australia and the United States, the book simultaneously considers their relevance for museum and heritage studies. A History of Participation in Museums and Archives should be essential reading for a broad academic audience, including scholars and students in museum and heritage studies, digital humanities, and the public communication of science and technology. It should also be of great interest to museum professionals working to foster public engagement through collaboration with networks and local community groups.

Educational systems should warrant learning needs of the population they serve offering a diversity of educational agents, strategies and answers to the needs of those that seek knowledge (Caeiro et al., 2004). In Portugal the experience of teaching subjects related to Environmental Sciences via open distance learning started in 1995 at Universidade Aberta (a Public University specially dedicated to the open distance learning of graduate and undergraduate courses). This experience began with General Ecology, and in view of the interest showed by students (and in fact by a wider public) the University later offered other subjects such as Environmental Education and Water Pollution. Today we have a number of different subjects within the vast area of Environmental Sciences and are preparing an undergraduate programme in view of the recent Bolonha agreement. The University also offers post-graduate programmes that bring together the environment and the citizen participation. The aim is to heighten the interests of our students in scientific subjects related to the environment as well as providing a practical perspective of what they can do as active citizens. The programmes are supported by necessary tools that enable students to critically analyse and discuss press articles about the environment, protocols that are designed to make industries "greener" as well as government decisions.