Engaging Stakeholders is Essential

Engaging stakeholders underlies all phases of climate action planning. It improves the legitimacy of the plan and enables better decision making. Cities can identify key stakeholders and encourage them to take part in the process.

The chart below by the International Association for Public Participation (IAP2) shows how public participation efforts can range from informing the public to empowering stakeholders, which means actually including them in decision making. Many efforts stop at providing information, but those that move further toward empowerment usually gain greater stakeholder involvement.