“The city of Lyon is taking a new democratic trajectory”

The mayor of Lyon receives The world in his office at City Hall, Wednesday January 5, after several days of forced rest, imposed by the Covid-19. His first eighteen months were marked by virulent attacks from his opponents, and the management of the epidemic. Grégory Doucet now wants to open a new sequence, by concretizing the emblematic projects of his mandate. Including the implementation of participatory democracy tools.

You are launching several participatory democracy schemes this year. For what reasons ?

The development of participatory democracy is an important marker of our meaningful mandate. We have created a specific budget, which did not exist before, for an amount of 50 million euros. The objective is to restore the power to act to citizens. This budget will enable them to carry out investment projects close to home, for equipment or facilities, which they will feel the need for. All suggestions will be welcome. The idea is also to go to the neighborhoods and to the populations furthest from democracy. One of the criteria for the success of these measures will be to see projects emerge in “urban policy” districts.

Some criticize these methods for going around in circles, without responding to the strategic decisions of a large city. What do you think ?

The question of efficiency is often put on the table to justify the vertical exercise of power. It is the design of the chef who decides quickly and everything. I do not evade the responsibility of the mayor in decisive choices. I assume it, like when it was necessary to quickly set up a vaccination center in Gerland. But participatory democracy is not at all a waste of time. On long-term issues, the more the decision will be collective, the more it will be solid, anchored in reality, sustainable. When I consider the redevelopment of the right bank of the Rhône, after seventy years of urban planning devoted to cars, we can suffer from a few months of consultation, right?

Opponents accuse you of bypassing representative democracy by circumventing the role of elected officials. Do you hear it?

These criticisms often come from the conservative leanings of the political staff. Representative democracy has been reduced too much to agreed modalities: a ballot in the ballot box at intervals. This is no longer enough. There are other ways of making democracy. The more we multiply the perspectives, the more we enrich democracy.

We need to constantly cultivate our belonging to a collective. I strengthen representative democracy by strengthening neighborhood councils, by creating the children’s borough council or by establishing the conference of borough mayors and giving them real means. It’s a change, no one can deny it. And I am launching other democratic methods, by initiating several participation tools such as the participatory budget, the barometer of well-being. The city of Lyon is taking a new democratic trajectory.

Does this change the place of the chosen one?

The professionalization of the political world has established the capture of power by a political elite, which is more concerned with its re-election than with the search for the general interest. The political world, busy making media stunts, has isolated itself in a bubble. Representative democracy alone has alienated the citizen from his ability to act. Today, the solution passes through various forms of democratic expressions, I am convinced of it. The local elected representative represents the citizen in certain decision-making bodies, but he also gives back the power entrusted to him.

The citizens’ convention on the climate, launched by the President of the Republic, has generated many disappointments. Doesn’t the consultation of citizens risk being a decoy?

The failure of the device is linked to the Jupiterian exercise of power, that’s all. The President of the Republic did not keep the commitment he had announced, he changed the rules along the way. It’s a defiance machine. The quality of the work of the 150 citizens drawn by lot demonstrated the full relevance of collective work, independent of spheres of influence, with simple and very engaging proposals. To succeed in participatory democracy, clear principles are needed, based on the humility of the elected representative and the accountability of his action. And you have to keep them, otherwise it’s a show.