5. Recreatieschap Voorne-Putten-Rozenburg
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Re-creation and participation A research towards participation issues of recreatieschap Voorne-Putten- Rozenburg in the area of Brielse Meer Fleur van der Zandt, September 2012 Master Thesis Human Geography, Specialization Urban and Cultural Geography Re-creation and participation A research towards participation issues of recreatieschap Voorne-Putten- Rozenburg in the area of Brielse Meer Nijmegen School of Management Master thesis Human Geography Author: Fleur H. W. van der Zandt Student number: S4081277 Email: [email protected] Supervisors Radboud University: H. van der Stoep & H. Ernste Supervisors Bureau Buiten: A. Van Mispelaar & J. Laro September, 2012 Summary Background In the Netherlands for already several years a transition is going in the division of responsibility between the government, the market and citizens. Nowadays this movement is speeding up because of the financial crisis. Lack of financial resources forces governments to give more room to initiatives from the private sector. For recreational areas in the Netherlands, this new hands-off mentality of the government led to problems. Less state money is available for development and maintenance of the areas. An area which has to deal with decay because of these issues is Brielse Meer. No money is available for improvements in the area and solutions are expected to be found in enhanced participation with entrepreneurs and citizens. The problem is however that the recreatieschap of Brielse Meer does not know what possibilities there are for participation and how to support this. Further decrease of possibilities for recreation might lead to negative health consequences, degradation of natural landscapes and economic losses in the leisure industry in the area. Finding a solution for Brielse Meer is therefore necessary. Because the issue is quite new for the recreational sector, in literature not many has been written with respect to participation in the recreational sector in the Netherlands. This research offers a small contribution to the scientific debate about participation (in recreational areas) and may encourage others scientists to further study this phenomenon. Goal In the end, the main goal of this research is to contribute to knowledge about participation in a concrete context to assist recreatieschap Voorne-Putten-Rozenburg in their strategy to enhance participation in Brielse Meer by examining what citizens and entrepreneurs would like to- or can do- with respect to public participation. Method Because Brielse Meer is a large recreational area including many different actors and a complex organization structure, a quantitative single case study is conducted. The presence of the many involved actors made is possible to more intensively explore the differences between their intentions to participate. The complexity of the location makes it however not possible to generalize the results of this study for other areas. A survey, based on the Theory of Planned Behaviour (Ajzen, 1991), has been conducted to approach as many as possible persons involved in the area. People have been approached face-to-face and via email to fill out the online survey. Additionally, interviews have been held to obtain additional information when necessary. Respondents have been divided into three groups of actors, namely entrepreneurs, visitors and members of associations. Their results have been analyzed by means of a regression analysis. Results Brielse Meer is owned by the Recreatieschap Voorne-Putten-Rozenburg, which is managed by deputees of six municipalites and the province. They together are the decisive power behind six recreational areas around Rotterdam.The maintenance and other daily activities of the recreatieschap are however executed by the Groenservice Zuid-Holland, which is an executive organization of the Province Zuid-Holland. At the moment, the recreatieschap would like to improve the quality of their recreational areas, but does not give priority to the area of Brielse Meer. The only way in which the decay in the area can be countered is by increasing participation in the area. However, no concrete strategies or plans have been set up to encourage this. At the moment, the organization randomly tries to increase communication with partners in the area and extra efforts have been done to inform people about the budget cuts and to give them a voice in the process. Structural partnerships are not yet formed, but the organization is making progress. From the sight of citizens and entrepreneurs, it can be said that involvement in the area is already present. Action groups are fighting against the budget cuts and people are regularly taking own initiatives to improve the quality of the area. At the moment it seems like visitors are the least active in participation activities, while entrepreneurs participate more often. Resulting from the survey can be said that there are possibilities to increase the level of participation in the area. People are especially willing to give their opinion, to advice the management, to pay for facilities and especially members of association seem to be willing to volunteer. From the regression analysis can be concluded that intentions to participate in general significantly increase when for example family members, friends or members of their association are also willing to participate. Besides, intentions seem to increase when participation offers people fun, satisfaction or new experiences, which is especially the case among members of associations. This indicates that the social aspects of participation are important contributors and it is recommended to organize participation in groups of already socially connected people. Moreover, participation can be increased by taking away barriers by showing participation does not have to cost too many time or money. Also raising awareness about the issue and literally asking people to participate is likely to increase peoples intentions to participate. Another point which is probably helpful to be overcome is that fact that many people do not know the organization of GZH or the recreatieschap well, or do not know the difference between the two organizations. Moreover, among the people who do know the organization(s) trust seems to be low. People complain about the felt distance between them and the organizations, and about the slow decision making processes. They blame the complex organization structure to cause difficulties in cooperation. Both organizations are therefore recommended to more timely respond to initiatives to recover trust and to make the most of participation. Another problem with respect to participation does not lie in the fact that citizens and entrepreneurs do not feel involved, but instead is caused by the fact that they are often not willing to take responsibility for the area. The area for decades has been managed by the government and people do not see why they should take responsibility themselves. This lack of responsibility is besides likely to be caused by peoples dissatisfaction and by unfulfilled promises of the government in the past. This responsibility problem asks for a paradigm shift and is likely to be a hard challenge for the GZH and the recreatieschap. Content LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES ...................................................................................................................... VIII 1. INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Background ................................................................................................................................................ 1 1.1.1 From government to governance ............................................................................................................. 1 1.1.2 Influence on environmental policies ......................................................................................................... 2 1.1.3 The issues of Recreatieschap Voorne-Putten-Rozenburg related to the trends and developments .......... 3 1.2 Research objective ..................................................................................................................................... 4 1.3 Societal relevance ...................................................................................................................................... 4 1.4 Scientific relevance ..................................................................................................................................... 5 1.5 Relevance for the internship organization ................................................................................................. 6 1.6 Research model .......................................................................................................................................... 6 1.7 Research questions .................................................................................................................................... 6 2. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK .................................................................................................................... 8 2.1 Introduction................................................................................................................................................ 8 2.2 The definition of participation .................................................................................................................... 8 2.3 Different types and forms of participation