Solidarity Cities: Support for Urban Volunteering
"Solidarity Cities: Support for urban volunteering" is a project promoted by the United Nations Volunteer Program (Span. UNV) with the purpose of expanding the contribution of volunteering to urban development. This project was transnational and implemented in Falmouth, Jamaica; Amran, Yemen; and Esmeraldas, Ecuador. In the case of Ecuador, the project had the joint participation of public, private and civil society organizations. These include the Esmeralda Municipality, the Faculty of Architecture, the Catholic University of Ecuador, the Ministry of National Health, the companies of Petro Ecuador, Codesa and Dicomes and the organizations of the Future to the Natura Foundation, Casa del Negro and La Nostra Famiglia, among others. In Esmeraldas, the experience of the urban volunteer project allowed for the strengthening of local capacities through cooperation and multiplying the impact of urban investments. After consulting priorities with the local Municipality and the citizenry, the initiative focused on the rehabilitation of five rural schools damaged by the effects of El Niño. Additonally, volunteers gathered for interventions on the productive development of the fishing sector and the improvement of parks and playgrounds. Among the results of the initiative is that the project has helped rehabilitate schools and parks, train teachers, community leaders, fishers, women and young people, attract international cooperation, form small businesses, and generate studies as well as an urban plan, all through the use of a methodology that brought together volunteers, strategic alliances and local government participation.
Institutional design
Formalization: is the innovation embedded in the constitution or legislation, in an administrative act, or not formalized at all?
Frequency: how often does the innovation take place: only once, sporadically, or is it permanent or regular?
Mode of Selection of Participants: is the innovation open to all participants, access is restricted to some kind of condition, or both methods apply?
Type of participants: those who participate are individual citizens, civil society organizations, private stakeholders or a combination of those?
Decisiveness: does the innovation takes binding, non-binding or no decision at all?
Co-governance: is there involvement of the government in the process or not?
- Formalization
- not backed by constitution nor legislation, nor by any governmental policy or program
- Frequency
- single
- Mode of selection of participants
- open
- Type of participants
- citizens civil society private stakeholders
- Decisiveness
- democratic innovation yields a non-binding decision
- Co-Governance
- yes
Means
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Ends
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