Citizens' councils (Bürgerräte), adopted rules for having a say, facilitation and clarification when things get tight. For municipalities, public administration and civil society. Processes in which those affected are asked before the decision has been taken. My role is fixed in writing before I am in the room for the first time. Who pays is something I say myself.
Planned. The municipality is developing something - a village centre, a mission statement, cooperation with the neighbouring municipalities - and wants people on board from the start. Not because a conflict is pressing, but because a development is meant to hold once it has been decided. That is the easier path, and it is the reason for half of my formats.
Come to a head. A project is on the table: mooted, wanted or already close to being decided. A rezoning, a building project, a route, a plant, a merger. The process runs as it has to, the deadlines are kept, legally everything is in order - and still the people who will live with it find out from the newspaper. Then they organise. Anyone who informs people only once there is nothing left to decide reaps resistance where contributions would have been possible.
That is the visible side. The quieter one is shown by the Österreichischer Demokratie Monitor 2025: 89 per cent regard democracy as the best form of government, but only 35 per cent think the political system works well. That is not a statement about your municipality; the figure applies to the system as a whole. It does say something about the expectation people bring into a hall - that everything has been decided anyway. No argument refutes that expectation, only a process in which it turns out to be wrong.
In the municipalities, pressure is added. Budgets are getting tighter, tasks are shared with neighbouring municipalities, and in parts of the Lower Austrian Gemeindeentwicklungsförderung (municipal development funding) participation processes are expressly required. In many places participation is therefore on the list anyway. The open question is not whether, but whether it can change anything. If it cannot, it does more harm than good.
Source: Österreichischer Demokratie Monitor 2025 (FORESIGHT, 2,005 respondents, October and November 2025).
Anyone who works with a public can have three roles. They must not be mixed. Which one I hold is fixed in writing before the first appointment takes place, and I name it at the start of every event. Within a process it does not change.
Provider of expert input
Talk, workshop, assessment of a situation. Without a mandate in the matter and without a role in the process itself. The only role that is also possible when several sides are sitting in the room.
Adviser to one side
I work for one side and in its interest: for the municipality, for the project side, for a citizens' initiative, for a body representing those affected. Then I am not all-partial (allparteilich), and that is stated in every document.
All-partial designer of the process
I design and lead the process, a citizens' council for instance, or a dialogue in a situation that has come to a head. Then I advise no side on the substance, not even the side that pays me. All-partial does not mean neutral: neutral would be to feel responsible for nobody. All-partial means doing the same for every side.
Ordered along the question of where a municipality currently stands. Almost always it begins with a single facilitation or with the Situation Clarification.
A single appointment
Public assembly, closed working session or information evening. Half day or full day, also at short notice
An assembly, a closed working session or an information evening, led by someone who is not part of the municipality. The running order and the rules are agreed beforehand, speaking time is allocated, every question is taken up and either answered or expressly left open. With a preparatory conversation and a written summary that can be published. The smallest way in: one appointment, no commitment to a process.
Entry point
90 minutes, for Gemeinderat, committee, public office or association
Ninety minutes for the Gemeinderat, a committee, a public office, a public assembly or an association. What happens when a decision reaches a public, and what a citizens' council can do and what it cannot.
one day on site, with a written assessment of the situation. The usual way in
One day on site with the mayor, the Amtsleitung (head of the municipal office) or the head of the relevant public office, and two or three further people. With preparation and a written assessment of the situation: whether a process is worth doing, in what form and in what role. The usual way in.
Processes
around three months, in three modules that can each be ended on their own
Three modules, each to be commissioned on its own and ended on its own: first the design of the process, second the running of it, third evaluation and handover. After each module the municipality decides anew. Around three months; for processes with a draw, three to five. All party groups (Fraktionen) hear the same thing at the same time. For your assessment under procurement law I always state both in the offer: the value of the single module and the estimated total value of all three - the split serves your option to get out, not the circumvention of a threshold value.
twelve to sixteen people drawn by lot, one and a half days, public answer from the municipality
Twelve to sixteen citizens drawn by lot deliberate for one and a half days on a question the Gemeinderat has not yet decided. After that a public Bürgercafé (open citizens' café), a written response from the municipality to every recommendation, and a Resonanzgruppe (resonance group) that follows the implementation. A citizens' council is not a vote and not an opinion survey: a random selection is given time, material and counter-argument, and puts forward reasoned recommendations. It does not replace the decision of the Gemeinderat.
This is the Vorarlberg citizens' council format, anchored there in the provincial constitution since 2013. Why one and a half days and not the four that the OECD recommends as the standard case: the format is built for an open, narrowly framed question and does not end with the recommendation but with the Bürgercafé, the response and the Resonanzgruppe. Where it is about variants, costs and conflicting expert opinions, I advise a longer format with several appointments - even though it costs more. The municipality carries out the draw; it remains responsible under data protection law, and I receive no register data. Material costs come on top.
Rules and craft
when the municipality involves people - adopted by the Gemeinderat
The municipality sets down when it involves people, who can propose a process and how it answers contributions. Drawn up by politics, administration and citizens drawn by lot, put out publicly for feedback, adopted by the Gemeinderat.
closed working session for Gemeinderat and administration, practised on a real project
For the Gemeinderat and the administration, also as a closed working session with all party groups. Determining the scope to shape the outcome, clarifying roles, organising feedback, practised on a real project. At the end there is one page of participation commitments for the next project.
When things get tight - and afterwards
when the lines are drawn. Also at short notice
First separate preliminary conversations with all sides and the assessment of whether a dialogue is possible and in what role - including when that assessment is no. After that, facilitated sessions; the minutes go to everyone at the same time. Not mediation in the legal sense: the suspension of limitation periods under the Zivilrechts-Mediations-Gesetz (the Austrian Civil Law Mediation Act) is tied to registered mediators. What you get is an orderly process, confidentiality by written agreement, and training in mediation and conflict clarification that I work out of.
what a completed process actually achieved
What a completed process achieved: what was promised, what happened, what became of the contributions. With conversations on all sides and a report that can be published. Processes, rules and commitments I have had a hand in, I do not assess as an independent body.
Material costs such as room, catering and invitations are borne directly by the client.
The full description of services with all fees is available as a document to pass on. A short mail to mw@mwcc.eu is enough; it comes the same or the next working day, without a follow-up question and without becoming a contact.
No side is excluded as a client. What is excluded is something else. What is written here also stands verbatim in the offer and applies from the moment I am commissioned - so you can hold me to it.
For a citizens' council the municipality is the client, and the participants drawn by lot are not a party - which is why they need a different kind of protection. The text of their recommendations belongs to them: it is passed on without editing, without cuts and without comment. If a contested matter with several sides lies behind the question, the five rules apply in addition.
Feel free to distrust me. These five points can be checked by anyone who does not trust a process.
What is open and what is decided is there in writing before the first appointment. So is the level: informing, consulting or co-designing - the three levels of the Standards. The decision is then taken in the Gemeinderat; nobody can take that off its hands. If a vote is to be binding, the way there is a Volksbefragung (municipal referendum) under the Gemeindeordnung (the provincial municipal code).
Mine included, and with it the question of who pays.
Contributions are grouped, but no concern disappears in the grouping: for each one, the feedback report states what became of it and why. It is the municipality that has to deliver this, not I - which is why I make it a condition. Without that commitment I do not take on the process. In my experience, whether a process is regarded as fair in hindsight hangs on this document.
A process whose result is settled in advance is not one, and then nobody should call it that either.
Who was invited, how the selection was made and who was missing is stated in the report. For draws, the basis of the draw and the stratification criteria; for open formats, the attempt to reach those who do not come of their own accord as well.
I work along the Standards der Öffentlichkeitsbeteiligung (the Austrian standards for public participation), which the Ministerrat (Council of Ministers) adopted on 2 July 2008 and recommended to the federal administration for application. Municipalities are not bound by them - which is why here it is a commitment on my part. The accompanying practice guide names four preconditions. I check them in writing before every process: political backing, actual affectedness or interest, real scope to shape the outcome, and sufficient resources in time, money and people.
For citizens' councils, the eleven OECD principles for deliberative processes (2020) apply in addition. Four of them shape every process: selection by lot with stratification; active inclusion including an allowance for expenses; leadership by a team that is not subordinate to the client; and a commitment, published before the process begins, to respond publicly to every recommendation. I name a fifth because it speaks against my format: the OECD recommends at least four full days in person, unless a shorter frame can be justified. How I justify it is set out under the Citizens' council format.
Three routes, and with all three the role stays the same. This question belongs in the first phone call.
That one side pays does not damage the all-partial role, as long as that side does not appoint me on its own. That is exactly what the joint selection, the disclosure and the veto are there for. What the role does not survive is concealment.
I checked these details, when this section was written, against the guidelines of the Land Niederösterreich (Province of Lower Austria) in force at the time. Funding conditions change; the information given by the funding body remains the binding one. The same applies to other provinces and bodies.
Thirty years in change projects in large organisations, several of them in public sector bodies, among them an administration that works for all party groups of a legislative body at the same time. In an industrial company I led large groups and dialogue rounds through a change programme; in a municipal service provider I developed a mission statement with large groups. Around thirteen years in leadership and management, and with it the view of those who have to answer for a decision in the end - although that cannot be equated with holding a political mandate.
Systemic-complementary long-form training in organisational consulting with Beratergruppe Neuwaldegg and with Königswieser & Network, Master of Science (MSc) in Coaching, training in mediation and conflict clarification. Co-author or central contributor in four specialist books, among them a contribution on the interplay of subject and process knowledge.
I live in the Bezirk Korneuburg (the district of Korneuburg, Lower Austria) and am personally affected there by a planned project. I have also appeared publicly in this matter; it is documented and can be found without difficulty. I say this of my own accord in every initial conversation and will name the matter at any time on request. On this page I do not name it, because the people involved there should not be part of my advertising.
Firm limits follow from this. In the Bezirk Korneuburg I take on neither the explaining role nor a mandate as adviser to one side in this field of work; that applies to my own municipality as well. What is possible there is solely the all-partial role, and that only if all the key sides select me jointly and each single one of them can reject me without giving a reason. For companies involved in that project I do not work, nor for their group companies and those acting on their behalf, regardless of place and subject.
For projects of the same kind elsewhere, I take on the all-partial role only if I have disclosed my own affectedness beforehand in writing, to all key sides and before being commissioned. The project side I do not advise on projects of the same kind.
These limits end with the last legally final act in this matter. If I change them, it happens through a dated amendment at this point; the previous version remains available.
My own affectedness is a private matter. It is not a reference project, appears in no list of services, and is nowhere a qualification.
What this means for your municipality: outside the Bezirk Korneuburg, nothing. If the question is raised in the Gemeinderat, the answer is put in one sentence: the consultant is affected privately, in another place and in another matter, has disclosed that before being commissioned, and holds no mandate there. I keep these sentences ready on a sheet that you can put into the meeting papers.
A process without scope to shape the outcome is one I turn down. If the decision is settled and all that is left is to produce agreement, I say so and do not accept the mandate, in any of the three roles. Partly settled is the normal case here and no reason to decline: then it is spelled out in advance what is settled and what is open, and participation covers the open part - honestly labelled.
If the Situation Clarification comes to the result that nothing is open, you learn that, and only you. The assessment of the situation goes to the client; I do not publish it, do not pass it on, and do not communicate a refusal to the outside.
Who could be influenced and how - on that nobody gets anything from me, for any side. Within the same project I do not change role, not even after a lapse of time.
Legal questions belong with a lawyer, with the Amtssachverständiger (the official expert appointed by the authority) or with the supervisory authority. From project applicants (Projektwerber) I do not solicit commissions in this field of work, and contacts arising from private engagement are never a route to a commission for me.
What I learn in preliminary and one-to-one conversations stays there. Only what has been agreed beforehand as publishable is published: minutes, process documentation, reports. Statements attributable to individuals I do not pass on, not even to the client.
In half an hour we will both know whether a process is worth doing here, and in what role. The conversation is free of charge and confidential: no recording, no file, no message to anyone else in your municipality, no later mention as a reference. So you can ask without it becoming a fact.
If a phone call is too early: write me two or three sentences about the situation. You get back a written assessment and the services document with the fees, both to pass on to the Amtsleitung, a committee or a party group. After that you hear nothing further from me unless you get in touch.
If I cannot contribute anything to your situation, or the role cannot be kept clean, I say so and name where you are better placed. Get in touch while there is still something to decide.
Telephone +43 664 210 29 81 · mw@mwcc.eu