ABSTRACT

Residents of marginalised neighbourhoods have long been governed as a vulnerable group in need of help. Increasingly, however, they are expected to be active citizens and (co-)creators in improving their neighbourhood. While much is written about the shift towards more participatory governance, less is known about how this shift manifests in the work practice of urban professionals, particularly in marginalised neighbourhoods and in terms of citizen (dis)empowerment. This paper explores how urban professionals give shape to citizen participation in a marginalised Dutch neighbourhood. I found that they navigated between narratives of ‘vulnerability’ and ‘active citizenship’ and employed ‘selective empowerment’: a differentiated approach in which they ascribed a significant supportive role to themselves and facilitated participation within a normative framework. The research offers a more nuanced image of ‘empowerment’ than previous studies suggest, demonstrating that a discursive shift in governance approach is not automatically synchronised with urban professionals’ work practice.

摘要

边缘化社区的居民长期以来一直被视为需要帮助的弱势群体。然而，人们越来越期望他们成为改善社区的积极公民和（共同）创造者。尽管关于向更多参与性治理转变的文章很多，但人们对这种转变如何体现在城市专业人员的工作实践中却知之甚少，特别是在边缘化社区和公民（剥夺）赋权方面。本文探讨了城市专业人士如何塑造荷兰边缘化社区的公民参与。我发现他们在“脆弱性”和“积极公民身份”的叙述之间徘徊，并采用了“选择性赋权”：他们采取差异化的方法，赋予自己重要的支持作用，并促进规范框架内的参与。该研究提供了比之前的研究更细致的“赋权”形象，表明治理方法的话语转变不会自动与城市专业人员的工作实践同步。