Abstract:
The ‘heat transition’ is the transition of heating houses by the combustion of natural gas to more sustainable alternatives. This transition is directly linked to people’s living environment and requires citizen participation. Furthermore, it is largely carried out at a local level and many municipalities have started with pilot projects. This is also the case in The Hague, that gives its own active interpretation to the transition. This research contains a case study analysis into citizen participation and collaborative governance within the heat transition, by looking at three neighborhoods in The Hague: Ypenburg, the Vruchtenbuurt and the Vogelwijk. These neighborhoods all have citizens’ initiatives that are working together with the municipality and other partners on finding collective solutions for sustainable heat. By using scientific literature, a conceptual framework was made that assumes that the form of citizen participation influences the governmental system context, which in combination with the technical system context affects and is affected by the collaborative governance regime (CGR). It also analyses to what extent citizens participate, how citizens collaborate with other partners within the heat transition and which factors make this collaborative governance (un)successful.
