Assemblée Citoyenne Charleroi – Quand la ville se construit avec ses habitants : enjeux et leviers pour un centre attractif
(2025) Assemblée Citoyenne Carolo — Location: Charleroi, Belgique (14.December.2025)
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- (en) This paper reflects on the drivers of city-centre attractiveness through the experience of the Charleroi Citizens’ Assembly. Building on the concerns expressed by participants—particularly regarding safety, cleanliness, vitality, and the welcoming character of the city centre—it seeks to connect citizens’ expectations with the concrete policy instruments available to local authorities to achieve sustainable urban transformation. The analysis relies on a key conceptual framework in public policy studies: the triangle of actors, which distinguishes between political and administrative actors, policy target groups, and final beneficiaries, while also accounting for impacts on third parties, whether winners or losers. The paper demonstrates how citizen participation can strengthen the functioning of this triangle through three main contributions: providing fine-grained knowledge of everyday urban practices, enhancing the democratic legitimacy of public decisions, and improving coordination between policymakers, public administrations, and users. On this basis, the paper offers a structured overview of ten categories of public policies that can be mobilised to enhance city-centre attractiveness, ranging from improvements to public space and active mobility to support for local commerce, culture, housing, integrated governance, place branding, the nighttime economy, and data-driven policymaking. In conclusion, the paper argues that urban attractiveness never results from isolated interventions, but from a coherent set of interdependent actions, and that citizens’ assemblies constitute a key device for informing public choices, anticipating policy effects, and strengthening the democratic quality of local governance.
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Moyson, S. (2025). Assemblée Citoyenne Charleroi – Quand la ville se construit avec ses habitants : enjeux et leviers pour un centre attractif. Assemblée Citoyenne Carolo, Charleroi, Belgique.