Do matters of concern matter? Bringing issues back to participation

The objective of our article is twofold. First, we claim that the theoretical planning discussion dealing with public participation has forgotten one basic principle, namely that the people are taking part in the planning process because they are interested in a particular issue. There is a need for new conceptual approaches in participatory research which carry the discussion first towards the issues, then to the structures of participation. For this reason, we have combined practice-oriented policy analysis with the recent discussion of issue politics. Second, we implement the key propositions of the theoretical debate in an empirical case. The aim is to indicate how the trajectory of the issue, as well as its continuities and discontinuities, develop in diverse ways in different civic forums. We claim that this perspective provides more information for researchers, civil servants and citizens about the logic of participatory practice.