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What is a Democratic City?
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A Democratic city connects democracy to everyday life, and embraces four principles: four basic principles - Dialogue, Participatory, Social Activism and Mutual Responsibilities between the individual and the community.
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What is a Happy City?
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A happy city is one that knows how to provide us with a wide variety of connections with friends, acquaintances, colleagues and strangers. “At the end of the day, what make us happy are other people,” Charles Montgomery, author of the book “Happy City,” 2013.*
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The Happy Cities Index examined resident satisfaction, which stems from spacious planning, green spaces, public gardens and parks close to the residential areas, proximity to work, investment of the local authority in cleanliness, travel between cities and commuting. Planning of the urban space has an impact on the residents’ perception of happiness.
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A happy city will cause its residents to feel happier in terms of their sense of safety, health, affiliation to the city and their experience related to active social connections.**
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A happy city is a city that promotes a sense of community among its residents and enables them to become socially involved in the city in which they live. Thus, a sense of community and social involvement contribute to the residents’ sense of happiness (Charles Montgomery, “Happy Montgomery” – 2013).
How does the Democratic Institute connect Democracy to everyday life and promote a sense of community and social involvement?
The Democratic Institute’s leading values are social responsibility and reciprocal responsibility between individuals and communities. These values are expressed in the manner in which the organization operates within and outside of the organization. The organization is participatory, and its management is democratic. For example, the process of selecting executive directors, including the selection of the executive directors entering their positions in 2022, Sigal Wasser and Lior Tal Sadeh, is conducted in a democratic process, by a representative committee called the Executive Directors Committee. The committee is comprised of management representatives, representatives of the administrative committee and representatives of the employees, selected by the employees themselves. In this way, the executive directors are not appointed rather have received a mandate from the organization’s employees.
At the Democratic Institute, we offer organizations to implement participatory processes in the workplace. Studies have shown that the employees’ sense of connection to their place of work and a sense of belonging and tenure in the workplace become stronger when the employees are partners in the decision making process, are offered an opportunity to be active, to take part in reciprocal relationships in the organization and to be a part of a shared dialogue.
Management based on freedom and trust contributes to creating a community in the workplace. Inclusive leadership enables the organization to transition from supervision to trust. The manager must inspire, enable and create a vessel for creativity – this is the path of the community.
How does the Democratic Institute promote the social involvement of senior residents in the authority?
The overcrowding of the residential areas, a variety of housing types, the transportation and the land uses impact the existence of social movements. Spontaneous human movement increases the chance of fostering activism. This indicated in the research study: Walk and Be Moved: How Walking Builds Social Movements, 2003) conducted by Brian Knudsen and Terry Clark from the University of Chicago.*** Indeed, many protest movements in the course of history grew in large city centers around the world.
At the Democratic Institute, we promote social involvement of people ages 60+ in communities in their place of residence. This activity gives them a sense of meaning and influence in the community framework in which they live with their peers. Many of them are interested in directing their efforts, talents and experiments toward new activity – social involvement that offers them the possibility of promoting initiatives that are important to them; while at the same time, they will give back to the community and town in which they live tenfold.
When they retire, many seniors choose to move from the suburbs to the city centers, which offer them small apartments that suit their needs, crowded and shady streets that make culture, commerce and health and welfare services accessible to them. This move can enable them not only to receive what the city has to offer, but also helps them develop on a personal level and to create social initiatives that will promote the local authority to which they have moved.
The overcrowding of the residential areas, a variety of housing types, the transportation and the land uses impact the existence of social movements. Spontaneous human movement increases the chance of fostering activism. This indicated in the research study: Walk and Be Moved: How Walking Builds Social Movements, 2003) conducted by Brian Knudsen and Terry Clark from the University of Chicago.*** Indeed, many protest movements in the course of history grew in large city centers around the world.
At the Democratic Institute, we promote social involvement of people ages 60+ in communities in their place of residence. This activity gives them a sense of meaning and influence in the community framework in which they live with their peers. Many of them are interested in directing their efforts, talents and experiments toward new activity – social involvement that offers them the possibility of promoting initiatives that are important to them; while at the same time, they will give back to the community and town in which they live tenfold.
When they retire, many seniors choose to move from the suburbs to the city centers, which offer them small apartments that suit their needs, crowded and shady streets that make culture, commerce and health and welfare services accessible to them. This move can enable them not only to receive what the city has to offer, but also helps them develop on a personal level and to create social initiatives that will promote the local authority to which they have moved.
