Participatory Budgeting As a Social Experience: A Theoritical Query For Turkey Application
Esra DoğanParticipatory budgeting has become one of the basic processes of public financial management in the world within the last quarter of the 20th century and in Turkey as of the 21st century. However, due to being at the beginning of the process, it cannot be said that the administrative, legal structure and the social structure consider the culture of direct participation to be a universal structure within the budget process. This results from the fact that, in social terms, a participatory budget has not yet acquired an experiential quality, which corresponds to Erfahrung in German. The acquisition of an experiential quality by participatory budgeting in the sense of a financial structure is a progressive process, and it is thought that the necessary administrative and legal regulations contributing to the formation and improvement of this process must be carried out as soon as possible. This study aims to investigate whether the administrative and legal context, and the implementations included in this context related to the participatory budget process in Turkey, can help the process to acquire an experiential quality, which corresponds to Erfahrung, in the social sense. Accordingly, we aim to examine the available implementations included in the legal and scientific studies related to the participatory budget process and to provide the literature with a different perspective by approaching the malfunctions in the participatory budget process within the context of social experience, which corresponds to Erfahrung.
Toplumsal Deneyim Olarak Katılımcı Bütçeleme: Türkiye Uygulamasına Yönelik Teorik Temelli Bir Sorgulama
Esra DoğanKatılımcı demokrasinin mali bağlamını oluşturan katılımcı bütçeleme, 20. yüzyılın son çeyreğinde dünyada, 21. yüzyıl itibariyle de Türkiye’de kamu mali yönetimi olgusunun temel süreçlerinden biri haline gelmiştir. Ancak sürecin yeniliği nedeniyle gerek idari ve yasal yapının gerekse toplumsal yapının, bütçe sürecine doğrudan katılım kültürünü genel geçer biri yapı olarak kabul ettiği söylenemez. Bu durum, toplumsal bağlamda katılımcı bütçenin henüz Almanca kullanımı ile Erfahrung karşılığı deneyim niteliği kazanmamasından kaynaklanmaktadır. Katılımcı bütçelemenin mali yapı bağlamında deneyim niteliğini kazanması ise tedrici bir süreç olmakla birlikte, bu sürecin oluşumuna ve gelişimine katkı sağlayacak gerekli idari ve yasal düzenlemelerin bir an önce yapılmasının gerekli olduğu düşünülmektedir. Bu çalışma kapsamında da Türkiye’deki katılımcı bütçe sürecine ilişkin idari ve yasal bağlam ile bu bağlam dahilindeki uygulamaların, sürece Erfahrung karşılığı toplumsal anlamda deneyim niteliği kazandırabilecek yapıda olup olmadığı sorgulanmaktadır. Bu doğrultuda katılımcı bütçe sürecine ilişkin hali hazırdaki yasal bağlam ve bilimsel çalışmalar dahilindeki uygulamalar incelenerek, katılımcı bütçe sürecindeki aksaklıkların Erfahrung karşılığı toplumsal deneyim bağlamında da ele alınarak literatüre farklı bir bakış açısı kazandırılması amaçlanmaktadır.
Based on the direct participation of society in the budget process, a participatory budget is the equivalent of participatory democracy in the financial field. Applying a participatory budget exposes different necessities for different countries, and these can be mentioned mainly as the suitability of the legal and financial structure and the suitability and desire of the society to be included in this structure. Moreover, the minimum conditions regarding the participatory budget are stated in the literature as follows: i) execution of negotiations for the financial/budget process (matters about scarce resources), ii) presence of cities or local administrative units which consist of those selected and are authorized for administration and resources, iii) sustainability of the process, iv) public evaluations as meetings or discussions (presence of normal citizens in classic representational democracy institutions is not stated within the scope of the participatory democracy), v) accountability for the results of the process (Dias, 2014, p. 29; Sintomer, Herzberg, & Röcke, 2008, p. 168). When these criteria are reviewed as a whole, an attempt is observed to make the budget process allow for the participation and control of the public in a holistic and sustainable way.
Technically,,a participatory budget has a financial and legal dimension and it is socially a political phenomenon encountered by the local people. In the social context, this phenomenon was first encountered in Porto Alegre, Brazil in 1989. Since then, it has turned into a phenomenal reality of local administrative units in many countries of the world, especially the countries of Latin America. In terms of applicability, this phenomenon, which is encountered in social structures with different characteristics in different countries, requires the conformity of both legal and financial processes and the social participatory mechanism of the countries to the participatory budget process (Goldfrank, 2007). The aforementioned conformity process depends on whether the administrative and political structure has an infrastructure to carry out the necessary legal and financial regulations and whether the society is conscious and willing to exhibit social participation (Wampler, 2000, p. 6). Consequently, the process related to the applicability of the participatory budget is not a condition to fulfil in the short term; on the contrary, it is a progressive process whose quality of precedent is acknowledged by both the administrative and the social structures.
When the participatory budget becomes traditional by acquiring the quality of precedent in the political and social sense, the participatory budget will have a political and social experiential quality. Thus, one could say that the transformation of the participatory budget into a political and social experience has a significant effect on its acquisition of applicability. However, the social aspect of experience, beyond the individual aspect, requires a different content behind the general acceptance. Although the relevant meaning content cannot find an exact equivalent in Turkish and English, it corresponds to Erfahrung in German. Accordingly, Erlebnis, which is a sudden, passive, fragmentary and simple experience, is distinguished from the cumulative Erfahrung that is formed of the combination of transmittable social wisdom and social acceptations (Jay, 1998, p. 48). Even though this difference is revealed by Walter Benjamin, the difference between Erfahrung and Erlebnis were approached from different perspectives by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Alexandar Kluge and Oscar Negt. In the context of this study, it will be investigated whether the administrative and financial regulations of the participatory budget process and social participation in Turkey have an experiential quality, which corresponds to Erfahrung. In this study, we aim to reveal whether or not the participatory budget has become a tradition in Turkey. We also aim to comment on its applicability level in the light of the current situation.