The IIAS Study Group on ‘Coproduction of Public Services’ organized its 10th open meeting, a global intellectual platform for the theoretical discussion and empirical analysis of coproduction and co-creation, and their implication for the organization and management of public services.

Topics discussed addressed all aspects regarding the involvement of citizens in the creation and production of public services, in particular, the challenges of coproduction for professionals; the capacity, and willingness of citizens to engage in coproduction, the potential benefits and pitfalls of directly involving citizens in the production of public, the conditions for sustaining and scaling up co-creation and co-production initiatives and digital co-production.

The meeting was organized and supported by the Horizon projects InGOV and Interlink, projects that address co-creation in the public sector. Noella Edelmann (DUK), Trui Steen (KLU), and Charlotte van Dijk (KLU) presented the paper “Sustainability and Co-creation in Public Sector Organisations: Practices, Outcomes, and Lessons Learned” based on results from the inGOV project. In this paper they addressed how sustainability in the public sector be defined and what indicators can be used to measure it. In addition, as the co-creation of public services is seen as a dimension that contributes to sustainable public service provision, the analysis presented was based on a differentiation between the processes and outcomes of co-creation, and the risks associated with ensuring sustainable co-creation. Finally, they considered the best practices and outcomes associated with sustainable co-creation in the public sector. The work presented here significantly extends previous research output published earlier this year.[1]

The meeting is not only a wonderful opportunity to discuss the research on co-production, but also an opportunity for partners from the two Horizon projects to exchange experiences and ideas.

Thank you to the organizers of the meeting and the IIAS study group:

Trui Steen (KLU), Tina Nabatchi (Syracuse University, US), Dirk Brand (University of Stellenbosch, South Africa), Taco Brandsen, Noortje Hoevens, Marlies Honingh, Menno Hoppen and Ina Radtke (Radboud University Nijmegen, the Netherlands).

Acknowledgment: This meeting was supported by the project inGOV. The project inGOV has received funding from the H2020 Project inGOV funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under Grant Agreement 962563

[1] Edelmann, N., & Virkar, S. (2023). The Impact of Sustainability on Co-Creation of Digital Public Services. Administrative Sciences, 13(2), 43.  https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3387/13/2/43