Description

The Citizens' Assembly stems directly from the proposals made by Parisians during the consensus conference launched by the City of Paris in 2019, echoing the "grand débat national" (great national debate).

While several initiatives already allow citizens to give their opinions (participatory budget, advisory councils, citizen panels and conferences, etc.), the ambition of the Citizens' Assembly is unprecedented. It provides its members with new tools to learn, discover and decipher municipal issues, better understand how the City of Paris and public services work, breathe new life into ideas and influence public decision-making.

The Citizens' Assembly is a permanent deliberative democratic body whose members are renewed every 12 to 18 months. 100 Parisians aged 16 and over are mobilized by a weighted drawing of lots, in order to ensure certain representation criteria: gender parity, diversity of age groups, diversity of social classes (by level of diploma), geographical diversity of the territory (representation of the districts).

The Assembly's objective: To take part directly in the making of public decisions.

How:

• By conducting a citizen watch
• By targeting priority subjects
• By deciphering, analyzing, questioning and evaluating them
• By issuing proposals

With which tools: 

• By working in working groups on 3 major themes: Social - Education, Environment, Public Space 
• By taking the pulse of Paris in the media (press review, decrypting...)
• By working with other Parisian participative bodies
• With the help of training sessions
• By questioning the departments and elected officials of the City, by hearing them, by asking a current question in the Paris Council or by activating a citizen evaluation mission
• By activating and piloting a citizen jury on a specific issue 

To achieve what:

• Submit a vow to the Paris Council.
• Submit the adoption of a citizen's deliberation to the Paris Council.
• Directly co-construct a public policy, an action plan, put on the agenda a priority subject for the citizens.

Its mandate ended in March 2023. The work was thus carried out in two phases:

Phase 1: Discovery and learning (November 2021 - June 2022)

• Three thematic workshops are formed: social - education; environment; public space.
• Priority areas of work were determined by the members.
• Hearings and site visits are organised.

Additional training sessions were provided for volunteer members (public speaking, understanding of current events).

At the end of phase 1, each thematic workshop submitted a mid-term "Summary Notebook" to the executive, presenting the status of their work and their questions ("Social Education" summary notebook; "Environment" summary notebook; "Code de la rue" summary notebook). 

In the light of these summary notebooks, the Parisian executive proposed to each workshop a working mandate for the second phase of the work. These three working mandates were unanimously adopted by the members of the Citizens' Assembly during the plenary session in June 2022.

Find the minutes of the June 2022 plenary session and the working mandates (in french).

Phase 2: Deepening and recommendations (September 2022 - March 2023). The three thematic workshops worked on the following mandates:

• To make recommendations for updating the Paris Reading Plan agreement.
• To make proposals to simplify the process for residents in the context of aid for the energy renovation of housing.
• To provide input for roadmap no. 1 of the "Code de la rue": draw up recommendations on the conflicts of use on which priority action should be taken.

After four months of work, hearings and visits, they were able to submit their recommendations to the Parisian executive during the plenary session in December.

Read the minutes of the December 2022 plenary session (in french)

Working meetings involving the members of the workshops, the City's departments and representatives of the elected representatives led to the drafting of three citizens' wishes in January 2023, which were voted unanimously by the workshop participants. Three wishes were presented at the Paris Council meeting in March: the Paris Reading Plan, the energy renovation of Parisian housing and the "Code de la rue".

More information:

Nomination file in French (PDF)

Clip: https://twitter.com/Paris/status/1646853929819357184?s=20

 Some news: 

• The Alternative (2022) Paris's standing Citizens Assembly has real teeth, shaping policy and laws - and is part of a quiet revolution
• Fair Vote Canada (2022) The Paris Citizens' Assembly: where citizens write the law
• NOEMA (2022) A Movement That's Quietly Reshaping Democracy For The Better

Reports (in French):

• https://cdn.paris.fr/paris/2023/02/13/ac-carnet-de-synthese-atelier-social-education-NheJ.pdf 
• https://cdn.paris.fr/paris/2023/02/13/ac-carnet-de-synthese-atelier-environnement-o0ge.pdf 
• https://cdn.paris.fr/paris/2023/02/13/ac-carnet-de-synthese-atelier-espace-public-8dOi.pdf 
• https://cdn.paris.fr/paris/2023/02/13/assembleecitoyenne-cr-pleniere-25juin22-ag9p.pdf 
• https://cdn.paris.fr/paris/2023/02/13/assembleecitoyenne-cr-pleniere-10dec22-hwBt.pdf