ABSTRACT
In this chapter, we look at specific and practical ways that public agencies committed to the New Public Service can work positively with citizens (broadly defined) and with nongovernmental organizations to achieve a higher level of citizen engagement. The process of citizen engagement has been defined as the “ability and incentive for ordinary people to come together, deliberate, and take action on problems or issues that they themselves have defined as important” (Gibson 2006, 2). Governments at all levels have moved from the federally mandated citizen participation requirements of the 1960s and 1970s to embrace a variety of citizen engagement approaches and goals in multiple policy arenas. In fact, we have now reached a point in contemporary practice that has been termed “the age of citizen engagement.” As a result, “citizen engagement is no longer hypothetical: it is very real, and public administrators are central to its evolution” (Roberts 2008, 4).
