Inclusive co-production of public services with transgender groups

• In Event: Coproduction and Innovation in Social Work

Abstract

Traditional approaches to strengthening the democratic ethos of public services, and citizens’ trust in them have mainly focused on deliberative participation forums. Yet, such approaches have generally done little to reduce the long-term patterns of exclusion and inequality experienced by marginalised and stigmatised groups such as trans and gender diverse groups, undermining their trust and willingness to become involved in democratic governance. In this research, we will explore the potential of a participatory governance approach - user and community co-production of public services and outcomes - which has recently become highly topical worldwide. Co-production is a more intensive form of engagement than public deliberation. It includes citizen action, not just citizen voice, promotes an asset-based perspective, and enables people with lived experience to make a contribution to improve the public services they access (or wish to access) and wider processes of democratic governance.
This paper presents the first results from a case study in Brazil to identify barriers to equitable public services and explore innovative co-production approaches. It compares the differing perceptions of staff working in public services and those of transgender groups in relation to their lived experience of health and wellbeing public services and the outcomes they experience. It brings a contribution to the emerging literature on how co-production with marginalised people can strengthen their involvement in democratic governance, while also shedding light on how nonprofit organisations can facilitate this co-production to remedy the power imbalances and conflicts between marginalised or stigmatised groups and the public service organisations with which they interact.

References

Brandsen, T. (2021), Vulnerable Citizens: Will Co-Production Make a Difference?, in: The Palgrave Handbook of Public Service Co-Production and Outcomes, ed. By Loeffler, E. and Bovaird, T.). Palgrave: Cham, 527-539.
Coproduction Collective (2021), Excluded: the trans community in research and healthcare, https://www.coproductioncollective.co.uk/news/excluded-the-trans-community-in-research-and-healthcare.
Corrigan M, Quinn B, Moore A, O'Donnell S. (2022), Co-producing transgender awareness training for healthcare students and professionals. Nurs Manag (Harrow). 9 Aug 2022. doi: 10.7748/nm.2022.e2050. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 35942586.
Loeffler, E. and Bovaird, T. (2021), The Palgrave Handbook of Co-Production of Public Services and Outcomes, Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-53705-0.
Lino, A. F., Loeffler, E., Mendonça, P. E., and Aquino A. C. B. (2023). Peer co-production fostering ‘symbolic representation’ of vulnerable groups. Conference Paper, IRSPM Conference Budapest.

Authors

• Patricia Maria E. Mendonça, Universidade de São Paulo

• Andre Lino, University of Essex

• Elke Loeffler, The Open University Business School