Intergenerational Participation: A Case Study of Actual and Perceived Levels of Participants of Joint Adult-Youth Planning Process

Author: Dawn Jourdan

Dissertation School: Florida State University

Abstract:

While city planners have not typically sought the insights of children to inform planning practice, this is beginning to change. Planning activities involving children have cropped up across the country. Such initiatives include involving school-aged children in park design, neighborhood issues, and comprehensive planning activities, among others. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has even set its sights on involving young stakeholders in certain planning processes. Specifically, HUD has begun working together with youth who reside in HOPE VI housing to discover their needs. After a national conference involving HUD officials as these young constituents, efforts have been made by HUD to create advisory commissions of the residents of HOPE VI housing programs. These commissions are made up of children and adults. Their primary function is to consider those issues arising in the community and to make recommendations to HUD about how to appropriately respond to such issues.

These joint advisory commissions are the first of their kind. They merit study because it is imperative that we learn how such participation by youth and adults affects levels of participation and empowerment. This study will attempt to describe and explain the interworkings of a single joint advisory commission by employing a longitudinal case study approach. The researcher will attempt to measure observed and perceived levels of participation engaged in by youth and adults, as well as the empowerment experienced by both groups as a result of their participation therein. The researcher intends to collect all necessary data via: participant observations, interviews, document review, and through the implementation of two scaling devices that allow participants to measure their perceived levels of participation and empowerment.

Based on this research methodology, the researcher hopes to learn how these two groups of stakeholders, youth and adults, participate in planning processes together and how they perceive their own participation, as well as the participation of others. Further, the researcher hopes to uncover the levels of empowerment experienced by these two groups from their participation in this process. These findings will fill a void in planning scholarship and have both practical and ethical implications for the use of such planning strategies in practice.

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