Bringing Citizens to the Table: The Impact of Participation Costs on Budget Participation

Abstract

There have been few attempts to systematically understand participation costs faced by citizens in participatory budgeting. This article explores how local government efforts to reduce participation costs affect citizens’ levels of participation. Two types of costs in budget participation are identified: compliance and learning costs. Employing panel data from citizens’ budget proposal submissions in Seoul, South Korea, the results demonstrate that budget education programs for reducing learning costs significantly increase the number of proposals. This implies that high participation costs can hinder citizen engagement in budgeting, and that local actions to lower these costs can encourage more citizens to engage.

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