Understanding Public Awareness/Communications/Public Participation: 
Theory Underlying the Netherlands Approach

What can we learn from experience to guide in the application of Article 6? This summary draws on the work of Van Woerkoem, C., Hesselink, F., Gomis, A., Goldstein, W  (“Evolving role of communications as a policy tool”). The approach has been applied by the Netherlands Ministry of the Environment and served as a case study at the COP 6 side event. The Ministry provided the secretariat with a copy of its course-book , “Government Communication and Public Information”

At the core of “public awareness programmes” is the function of  planning communications. Steps in the communications planning process have been well documented academically by Communication/Journalism departments within colleges and universities as well as by associations of “communicators”. The World Wide Web provides additional resource to improve capacity in this function .

Increasingly however research suggests that when communications planning is integrated with other policy instruments, as opposed to carried out as a separate activity, it can help not only to increase awareness but also to affect behaviour and the ownership and acceptance of policy.

The notion of  communication as an instrument of government policy is evolving. It can be used in three ways: as a product of government; government as a product of communication; and government as communication .

Communication as a product of government is a part of the policy mix which when used together with other instruments such as regulations or taxes will influence knowledge, attitudes and attempt to influence behaviour. Government as a product of communication uses communication to improve policy processes in order to create a more effective policy by interaction with stakeholders most affected. Government as communications is when government fulfils its function in collaboration with other actors whereby the use of communications is directed generally more to social problem solving as opposed to using it directly to a fixed policy product

Perceiving communication as a policy tool implies that it is positioned in a policy mix according to the barriers to change unwanted practise or to encourage certain behaviours or the adoption of new attitudes/actions. That means putting in place structures or creating conditions to encourage change such as, for example, providing infrastructure for recycling schemes or tax incentives for insulating homes. The point is that using communications in a supportive role can stimulate public awareness about the existence and content of other instruments, enhance the acceptability or relevance of these instruments and improve the efficiency of their implementation.

Another consideration that affects the role to be played by communications as a policy tool is the government’s stage in the policy process. These stages are:

identifying the issue

forming the policy

implementing the policy

managing/controlling

At the stage of forming the policy, communication activities might raise public awareness of the problem and include consultations with stakeholder groups. At this point the target groups are opinion leaders, decision-makers and the general public.

At the stage of implementing policy, the goal is to communicate information about how to proceed. That is to communicate the substance of policy and the accompanying measures, aimed at specific target groups.

Finally, at the management and control stage, communication is provided as a service to sustain newly adopted attitudes and behaviour. The aim is to provide information about the policy or its modification, that is being pursued as well as to feedback reactions to that policy.

When communications is viewed as a policy tool, a number of lessons should be kept in mind.

If communication is not considered throughout the policy process and is brought in after the plan is developed, then the communication will be forced to follow a DAD model (Decide, Announce and Defence). Thus, it may not create the desired acceptance given the policy was not the result of discussion about the issues that the concerned public thinks are important.

 

Communication specialists are not only responsible for the effectiveness of communication as a sole instrument but must also understand the outcomes of non-communicative instruments. For this reason the skills of a communication specialist should be used from the beginning and not be invited only at the end to communicate what has been decided. An example to illustrate this point: A law or a financial instrument is a message. The law/financial instrument becomes part of the policy mix adopted. The selection of instruments depends on many factors, among them rational choice, political considerations, cultural factors, custom and experience. If many lawyers are involved in solving a problem the solution will likely be a law; if an economist is involved it may be a financial instrument that results. However, if a sufficient level of acceptability is not reached, instruments including laws or financial instruments will be ineffective.

 

Communication can only partly contribute to the level of acceptability if it is applied from the time the policy is approved of and implementation is at hand. Acceptability does not take place in the short term, it is something that needs to be started earlier as part of the policy making process. If acceptability is the goal, then policy becomes a product of communication. Encouraging acceptability calls for an approach whereby communication is used by government specialist to explore social processes aimed at defining and solving problems.

Understanding Public Participation

This brings our discussion to review what then is public participation? Public participation can be viewed as a process by which the public, decision-makers, affected/stakeholder groups share their knowledge, experience and opinions in order to develop decisions, plans and policies. It is not marketing an idea through public relations, nor informing a community of a project well underway or simply a means for groups to grandstand their position. It is a two-way communications process by which citizens/stakeholder groups get involved in order to deal with conditions that affect them and in order to make a difference (City of Ottawa, “The City and Citizens: Public Participation”, 1991).

The conditions within which it could occur effectively might include:

a) That the information delivered by government is easily understood;

b) The policy process must be organised so as to be interactive occurring on a continuous basis and not just at a fixed moment (keeping in mind that the goal is to create a sufficient level of understanding and commitment);

c) The social learning process must occur between groups in society so that groups that do not hold the same views on the issue can be brought together to become aware of different interests involved and together they can look for new solutions for the benefit of the collectivity.

A Stakeholder Approach

Ultimately, a stakeholder approach results when public participation is among the tools used to develop and support programs and activities (PAAs). As government strengthens its skills at facilitation/mediation it moves towards becoming a public network manager. Applying such an approach requires the communication specialist to bring people in, to discuss how to adapt policy to different interests and how to inform people of existing ideas. Thus, the communication specialist increasingly becomes integrated in the work of  policy making by regularly meeting with specialists, lawyers, technicians, financial experts and sector representatives/stakeholders and ultimately each player takes responsibility for the end result. That is, the players in the process take responsibility for communicating within their constituency. Acceptance of the policy is then acceptance based not strictly on outcome but on participation in the process.  This model opens up for the government strategic partnerships upon which it may build to develop and implement PAAs and to expand the range of resources (human and financial) that can be made available to realise their collective goals.