This papers is not only interested in disadvantaged people in poor communities whom we see on television and in pictures and who are often the target of many participatory approaches. When the word "people" is mentioned here, it means all of us, you and me, a business man in his office in Japan, a young girl jogging on the sea shore in USA, a young boy on his camel in the Arabian desert, a mother taking her children to school in Mexico, a farmer plowing his land in Europe, a peasant in a remote village in Africa, etc We are all entitled to participating in the world around us especially in matters that most affect us and our daily lives, in our environment. "We can only understand our world as a whole if we are part of it. As soon as we attempt to stand outside, we divide and separate. Making whole necessarily implies participation." (Fowles, RA.) .
However, much of the new media, most obviously television, encourages humans to sit back and watch the world go by as passive viewers and consumers only. Decisions are being made, processes are completed, disasters are happening, and yet most people watch it fleeting as if it is another world where all this is happening. Unfortunately, a consumer mindset does not remain limited to television, but in many cases extends to other activities and domains in our culture such as the environmental sector. People follow climate change, water scarcity, deforestation, biodiversity loss, and all other major current environmental concerns and yet although they may be anxious about these issues, they do not have the access to ways of change nor the knowledge of how to do so. Change was needed and it still is.
What major changes occurred in the participatory approach and more specifically in the public participation in environmental decision-making (EDM) over the past twenty years? What are the impacts of this change in the environmental sector? What are the limitations of this evolution and what is still missing? Is investing in new methodologies enough or change is required elsewhere probably in people's minds?.
