ABSTRACT
Administrative participatory projects can and must be examined from the perspective of political participation and democratic citizenship. Promotion of democracy and active citizenship are mentioned in the Europe for Citizens and Culture programmes and many of the projects funded by them. It is necessary to examine how the goals are interpreted in the projects funded by these programmes: how citizenship—a cornerstone of democracy—and participation—a dimension of citizenship through which citizens' activity contributes to democracy—are discussed in the projects and how they are, in turn, connected to democracy. The chapter analyses variety of meanings given to participation in the projects demonstrating how contested the concept of participation is which reflects the complexity of citizenship. It explores what kind of activity participation is and what kind of actors the participants are in the project texts. The chapter summarises implications these conceptualisations of participation have for citizenship and democracy.
