J. E. Perlman. Citizen participation in city planning and development. Technical Report July, The Mega-Cities Project, 2000.

The key idea of the paper is that no plan for renewment of the city can be meaningful without a direct involvement of citizenry. Perlman describe a “pro-active” and a “re-active” citizenry, describing the former as people engaged in decisions that affect their lives and communities. Perlman (ibidem) shares a lesson she has learned from her experience around the world, which is in accord to what we are describing here:

No community or city can fulfil its full potential in the long run without a vibrant, independent civil society and their active involvement of its citizenry (and these are complementary but not synonymous).