Not everyone wants a seat at the table: A national segmentation of participatory needs in the Dutch energy transition

Abstract

Public participation important for the social acceptance of energy policies. However, there is a lack of knowledge about how different segments of the population want to participate in energy policies. Through a national survey we investigate how different segments of the Dutch population want to participate in local and national energy transition decision-making. We identify that citizens make decision in terms of their expected gains of participating and how much time they want to invest in participation. Some citizens only want to invest a little amount of time and as a consequence these citizens will only participate in processes with a low time investment. Second, we observe a climate concern paradox where individuals concerned about climate change often refrain from participating in formal processes due to distrust in government and perceived tokenism, preferring activism instead. Our results highlight the need for an attentive democracy where policymakers are better informed about public desires before initiating participatory processes. We introduce a novel, citizen-centric method for segmenting the population according to their participatory needs in energy transition decision-making. This approach surpasses existing typologies by aligning engagement processes more accurately with local needs, mitigating participation fatigue, and enhancing the effectiveness of participatory efforts.