What does the Institut für Partizipatives Gestalten do?

»Our current problems can no longer be solved using the very methods that caused them in the first place.« This is the guiding principle of the Institut für Partizipatives Gestalten (IPG). This is why IPG’s method and process designers and architects work to find the most innovative approaches and ideas in participation-based planning and problem-solving. They then refine the ideas and add them to the range of services they offer.

Why are we awarding a grant to the Institut für Partizipatives Gestalten?

We believe it is high time that the participatory design and creative processes that have long since been used in areas like town planning and landscape architecture, sustainability projects, the development of schools and education and organisation-building should now be tried out on larger scale projects.  Working with IPG we want to design a piece of collaborative democracy for the EU.

What have we achieved together?

There is a wide gulf between the reality of how the EU actually does trade negotiations and the ideal version, which would be a process that is transparent, democratic and participatory. Via the »Co-Creating Trade Policy« project we have explored how, in future, a process of devising solutions through cooperation could be developed and implemented. Through this project we were advocating good and innovative agreements which, above all, have the support of the majority.