Content uploaded by Karla Sessin-Dilascio
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Karla Sessin-Dilascio on Jun 02, 2022
Content may be subject to copyright.
Revista de
Administração
Contemporânea
Journal of Contemporary Administration e-ISSN: 1982-7849
1
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
RESUMO
Objetivo: este artigo tecnológico apresenta uma técnica empregada na
análise de atas de conselhos deliberativos e de suas variáveis para apoiar
a reexão sobre o design institucional de conselhos voltados à governança
participativa empoderada. Método: utilizou-se a análise descritiva para
apresentar o processo heurístico de criação da técnica de pesquisa e de
operacionalização de variáveis selecionadas a partir do estudo de caso
mencionado, identicando aspectos da análise documental, da análise
de conteúdo categorial das atas e da tradução quali-quantitativa das
variáveis identicadas. Resultados: a técnica de decomposição binária se
mostrou útil na identicação de variáveis operacionais a partir da análise
das atas de reuniões de conselhos deliberativos que podem auxiliar na
produção de diagnóstico conciso sobre aspectos do design institucional
de conselhos e da participação deliberativa de comunidades tradicionais.
Conclusão: o artigo contribui para a ampliação da dimensão analítica
das atas de conselhos deliberativos, inclusive no âmbito de comunidades
tradicionais, e pode servir como instrumento relevante para uso de
pesquisadores na mensuração da participação, do empoderamento e da
deliberação, de acordo com o design institucional do conselho, bem como
na compreensão das implicações quanto aos modos de participação de
comunidades tradicionais na tomada de decisão.
Palavras-chave: conselhos gestores; técnica analítica; comunidades
tradicionais.
ABSTRACT
Objective: this technological article presents a research technique used in the
analysis of deliberative decision-making processes reports and their related
variables to provide insights for institutional design analysis for an empowered
participatory governance. Method: a descriptive analysis was used to articulate
a viable heuristic of creation of a research technique for the operationalization
of selected variables from a previously concluded case study, identifying aspects
of document analysis, coding content analysis, and qualitative-quantitative
translation strategies. Results: an adapted binary decomposition technique
proved to be useful in the identication of operational variables from the
analysis of the decision-making processes reports that can contribute to
the production of concise diagnosis on relevant aspects of the institutional
design of community councils and its role for the participation of traditional
communities in their decisions. Conclusion: this article contributes to the
expansion of the analytical dimension of deliberative community councils
reports, including those related to traditional communities decision-making
processes, and can serve as a relevant instrument for researchers for measuring
institutional mechanisms of participation, empowerment, and democratic
deliberation. e institutional design of community councils can be therefore
improved by an increased understanding of the modes of participation of
traditional communities in decision-making processes within such deliberative
democratic spaces.
Keywords: community councils of conservation units; analytical
techniques; traditional communities.
Técnica de Análise da Participação Social em Conselhos:
Operacionalizando Conceitos
Technique for the Analysis of Social Participation
in Councils: Operationalizing Concepts
1. Universidade de São Paulo, Instituto de Energia e Ambiente, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Ciência
Ambiental, São Paulo, SP, Brazil.
2. Universidade Federal do Acre, Cruzeiro do Sul, AC, Brazil.
3. Universidade de São Paulo, Escola de Artes, Ciências e Humanidades, São Paulo, SP, Brazil.
JEL Code: Q280, R520, R580.
Editor-in-chief: Marcelo de Souza Bispo (Universidade Federal da Paraíba, PPGA, Brazil)
Associate Editor: Gustavo da Silva Motta (Universidade Federal Fluminense, PPGA, Brazil)
Reviewers: Virgílio Cézar da Silva e Oliveira (Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora, FACC, Brazil)
Magnus Luiz Emmendoerfer (Universidade Federal de Viçosa, Brazil)
Peer Review Report: The Peer Review Report will be available once the article is assigned to an issue.
Received: November 09, 2021
Last version received: April 21, 2022
Accepted: April 25, 2022
# of invited reviewers until the decision:
Karla Sessin Dilascio*1
Charles Borges Rossi2
Paulo Antônio de Almeida Sinisgalli3
123456789
1st round
2nd round
Cite as: Sessin-Dilascio, K., Rossi, C. B., & Sinisgalli, P. A. A.
(2022). Technique for the analysis of social participation
in councils: Operationalizing concepts. Revista de Administração Contemporânea. Advance online publication.
https://doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en
*Corresponding Author.
Published as Early Access: May 18, 2022.
Technological Article
Note: This text is translated from the original Portuguese version, which can be accessed
here
.
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
2
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
INTRODUCTIONINTRODUCTION
Questions about why people participate in collective
decision-making processes in a public setting and about
how to stimulate greater social participation are of great
interest to researchers and public administrators dedicated
to valorizing democratic spaces and civic responsibility.
However, in many contexts the polysemous character of
social participation makes it dicult to operationalize and
evaluate the concept. According to Lavalle and Vera (2011):
“participation is, at the same time, a category native
to the political practice of social actors, a theoretical
category of democratic theory with varying weights
according to theoretical perspectives and the authors,
and an institutionalized procedure with functions
bound by laws and regulations” (Lavalle & Vera,
2011, p. 101).
e rst theoretical discussions on social
participation, within the scope of contemporary political
science theory, were dedicated to understanding the
motivations linked to the participation of individuals in
collective spaces, the problem of apathy, and inequality
in participation (Kerstenetzky, 2003; Schlozman, Verba,
& Brady, 2012). e theories of socioeconomic status
(SES) and civic voluntarism (CV) are among the central
reections in this discussion. ey arise from studies on the
covariation between social stratication and participation,
concluding that the wealthier social strata (e.g., higher
income, education, and occupation) have a greater degree of
participation and that political inequalities are derived from
social inequalities (Verba, Schlozman, & Brady, 1995).
Understanding the role of individual choice in these
processes has been the object of Olson’s work (Olson, 2015)
focusing on the collective result of individual choices,
extending to the evaluation of the cost of the opportunity
of participation. In his work, individuals weigh the costs
and benets of social participation, encompassing direct
and indirect gains, scarce resources such as time, money,
skills, and self-condence, in addition to their respective
interest in the process (Rosenstone & Hansen, 1993).
Of these decision-making processes, social ‘recruitment’
done through the exchange of information and informal
reections (e.g., among friends and family members)
(Rosenstone & Hansen, 1993; Verba et al., 1995), added
to the cognitive dimension of power and to the vices of
localism, sectarianism, and a growing diversity of issues,
can favor ‘uncivil’ behavior. is makes it dicult to
form a link between associativism and the principles of
democratic equity, universality, transparency, and equality
(Kerstenetzky, 2003; Schlozman et al., 2012).
While participation generates high costs for the
individual and spreads out the agendas and the problems of
scale for state entities, associativism (‘associative democracy’),
understood as organized political interests, gained strength
among theoreticians of Tocquevillian pluralism as a way of
reducing the inequalities of social life. ey identify that
the coupling of individuals and institutionalities could
reduce the individual costs of participation and, at the same
time, produce organized common interests with a greater
possibility of generating responses from state entities
(Kerstenetzky, 2003). Barber (2003) presents this argument
to build the concept he names ‘thick democracy,’ alluding
to the possibility of expanding participatory democratic
institutions (i.e., associations) beyond the state, generating
a critical layer that would act in the construction of a strong
democracy (Barber, 2003).
In the context of globalization, the expansion of
communication through social networks, and the advance
of liberalizing agendas, the question of participation turns
toward civil society (Abers & Bülow, 2011; Alonso, 2009).
ere is a decoupling of the concepts of representative
government and political representation, and a constitutive
and operational reinterpretation of participation (Lavalle,
2011). In this new scenario, there is the institutional
pluralization of democracy and the pluralization of
representation, which implies changes in the locus,
functions, and actors of representation.
e rise and multiplication of these representative
spaces authorized by the state (i.e., councils)1 opened the
way for complexifying the notion of social participation
and its ability ‘to produce specic democratic goods’
(Vello, 2018), reaching principles such as legitimacy,
justice, authorization, and the genuine sharing of power
(Prado, Araujo, Chamy, Dias, & Seixas, 2020). is also
required diversication of levels of decentralization (Patsias,
Latendresse, & Bherer, 2013), extension of deliberative
processes (Gaspardo, 2018), and changes in the decision-
making capacity of social actors (Schröter, Sessin-Dilascio,
Jericó-Daminello, & Sattler, 2018). e focus turns to
understanding the extent to which these democratic
spaces allow the inuence of citizens on public policies of
government at its various levels (Fung & Wright, 2003).
e literature on empowered participatory
governance (EPG) collaborates in this direction, stating
that the lack of capacity of liberal democracies to solve
problems in response to popular demands is connected to
problems of institutional design. EPG seeks to understand
and analyze which institutional designs are able to deepen
the way in which ordinary people can eectively participate
in and inuence public policies that directly aect their
lives (Fung & Wright, 2003). According to the authors:
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
2 3
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
“we call this reform family Empowered Participatory
Governance (EPG). ey are participatory because
they rely upon the commitment and capacities of
ordinary people to make sensible decisions through
reasoned deliberation and empowered because they
attempt to tie action to discussion” (Fung & Wright,
2003, p. 5).
EPG focuses on actions related to solving practical
problems of public interest that are supported by
deliberative processes that involve ordinary citizens and
government agents. EPG studies are supported by empirical
analysis of institutional designs that facilitate decision-
making and greater implementation power in local action
units that, although not autonomous, combine multilevel
institutions to nd resources, solve problems, and spread
innovation and learning. e institutional design of EPG
practices “transforms state institutions and restructures the
administrative bureaucracy of the state toward deliberation
groups authorized by state agents” (Fung & Wright, 2003,
p. 5).
According to Patsias, Latendresse and Bherer (2013),
Fung and Wright's (2003) EPG is supported by three
principles and three institutional design properties. e
principles are: (a) practical orientation, (b) bottom-up
participation, and (c) deliberative solution generation. e
properties are: (a) the devolution of decision-making power
to local and intersectoral action units; (b) the coordination
and accountability of these local units to a superordinate
body; and (c) the restructuring of local government
according to the imperatives created by new participatory
arrangements.
Understanding and identifying these practical-
operational mechanisms, incorporated in institutional
design (Fung & Wright, 2003), and which lead to
democratic innovations (Avritzer, 2012), can be very useful
for researchers, managers, and technicians who want to
implement new tools to improve collective decision-making
processes.
How can we improve the analysis of council
meeting minutes for the betterment of the institutional
design of these spaces in order to enhance the processes of
deliberation, participation, and empowerment of traditional
communities? is is the purpose at which this technological
article is aimed.
e analysis technique for council meeting minutes
joins other analytical tools for document research (Garcia,
Rodrigues, Emmendoerfer, Gava, & Silveira, 2016; Silva,
Emmendoerfer, & Cunha, 2020) and content analysis
(Bardin, 2011), presenting operative variables that
come from concrete cases to help professionals identify
institutional design problems that inuence the quality
of social participation in councils from the perspective of
empowered participatory governance (EPG) literature. e
presentation of the technique aims to stimulate an attitude
of ‘critical vigilance’ through the use of the technique as a
rupture of the ‘intuitive’ knowledge about ‘social signicance’
and, at the same time, to avoid the use of the technique for
the sake of technique, without commitment to the concrete
reason for why the tool is necessary (Bardin, 2011).
e article presents the technique created for the
analysis of 14 years (1998-2012) of meeting minutes from the
Cardoso Island State Park (Parque Estadual Ilha do Cardoso
— PEIC) Management Council, recognized nationally
and internationally for its capacity for inclusion and the
empowerment of the area’s traditional Caiçara communities
in park management decision-making, generating positive
results in the areas of social and ecosystem security in the
territory (Sessin-Dilascio, 2014).
e main objective of this work is to bring proposals
of techniques for analyzing council meeting minutes in order
to operationalize concepts of participation, empowerment,
and deliberation. In the analysis of participation, the
article proposes the analysis of the minutes’ metadata (e.g.,
date, frequency, and type of meeting, among others). As
for empowerment, there are suggestions for qualitative-
quantitative analysis (e.g., diversity of agenda topics and
inclusion of new agendas in the meeting, among others) while
the same happens for the operationalization of deliberation
(e.g., number of deliberations in each meeting and number
of agreements and norms dened at the meeting, among
others). e intention is to support the reection and practice
of professionals interested in improving participatory
council spaces in terms of deliberative process improvement,
traditional community empowerment, increase in diversity
of the participating social actors, conict resolution, and
process organization, among other relevant aspects of
their operations. e article starts with a brief background
presentation on PEIC management and goes through the
description and selection of variables for the EPG analysis
and its quantitative-qualitative operationalization modes
before presenting its conclusions.
A brief background on the management
of the Cardoso Island State Park (Parque
Estadual Ilha do Cardoso — PEIC) and the
role played by traditional communities
e creation of PEIC in 1962, just like many other
protected areas of the time, armed the paradigm of the
separation of nature and humanity, embraced by the
preservationist concept of protecting pristine and untouched
nature from all human interference (Sessin-Dilascio, Prager,
Irvine, & Sinisgalli, 2015). Although relevant at the time,
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
4
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
this model of environmental protection caused several
anomalies, such as the expulsion of traditional peoples and
communities2, whose social and cultural reproduction was
intrinsically linked to these territories; it disregarded the
role of these communities in forest maintenance (Diegues,
1996; Diegues & Nogara, 1994; Santilli, 2005; Schröter et
al., 2014). Such a top-down decision-making modality for
environmental preservation disregarded the possibility of the
traditional communities’ acting in favor of environmental
preservation, joining forces with the state to guarantee the
preservation of the environment and of their ways of life
(Pereira & Diegues, 2010).
e establishment of the democratic regime in the
1980s, associated with the strengthening of discussions on
social participation and representation in society, was reected
in the analyses focused on the actions of the state and non-
governmental entities in areas of environmental preservation.
In organized civil society and social movements, struggles,
such as those between the rubber tappers and indigenous
peoples during the standos in Acre, with the respective
formation of the Forest Peoples Alliance (Weiss, 2019), and
those of the indigenous peoples in the Constituent Assembly
and in the United Nations Conference on Environment
and Development (Earth Summit), marked the rise of the
concept of socio-environmentalism in Brazil (Santilli, 2005;
Sessin-Dilascio, 2014). is change has been accompanied
by discussions on the rights of indigenous peoples and
traditional communities to their territory and to spaces
for democratic participation, sliding into the questioning,
theoretically, of the preservationist paradigm. In practice,
it supported the expulsion of traditional communities
from their territories, which were turned into protected
preservation areas — a practice that the state adopted over
the years in relation to the communities of Vale do Ribeira
(Diegues, 1996; Diegues & Nogara, 1994).
ese discussions led to the enactment of Law
No. 9985/2000, which instituted the National System
of Conservation Units (NSCU), institutionalizing these
conicts in the Brazilian legal system. Subsequently
regulated by Federal Decree No. 4340/2002, this law
founded the creation of Sustainable Use Conservation Units
(SUCU), which guarantee the right of use and occupation
of the territory by traditional communities in models
such as extractive reserves and sustainable development
reserves, reinforcing the socio-environmental paradigm in
this institutionality, and the Full Protection Conservation
Units (FPCU), such as parks, natural reserves, and others
intended for the preservation of nature, according to the
preservationist paradigm. e SUCUs would have their
deliberative councils active in the management of the
protected area, allowing collective decision-making about
management to be done during council meetings, while the
FPCUs opened advisory bodies, but not for deliberation
about management; the nal decision on the direction of
their management was left to the state (Sessin-Dilascio,
2014).
is step was important because it incorporated
aspects of representative democracy in the decision-
making for the management of Brazilian conservation
areas, especially enabling and, many times, demanding
the participation of social groups historically excluded
from these decision-making processes, not to mention the
wider range of social exclusion in which they often nd
themselves. In the case of protected areas, cases of expulsion
and persecution of communities that traditionally occupied
and eectively protected these territories are common,
disregarding the primordial role of these traditional
communities in maintaining their environmental integrity
(Diegues & Nogara, 1994; Neves, 2006; Pereira & Diegues,
2010; Shepard et al., 2020).
From an institutional point of view, PEIC remained
subject to preservationist concepts, which, after the approval
of the NSCU, allowed for the removal of local populations
that occupied the park’s territory, as well as the establishment
of an advisory council formed by actors relevant to park
management. However, over time, changes that originated
within the international context, made possible by foreign
nancers in the implementation of park projects, inuenced
the character of the decision-making processes linked to
management, inspection, and monitoring (Schröter et al.,
2018).
More specically, with the demand from the
administrators for the elaboration of a park management
plan3 to be built in a participative way with the traditional
communities living in its territory, based on the conditions
imposed by the German bank, which supported the Atlantic
Forest Preservation Project (AFPP) within the scope of the
State Secretariat for the Environment (SSE), the way was
opened for a signicant qualitative change in community
participation in the decision-making processes linked to
its conception and execution. e Administrative Support
Committee was created in the same way, becoming, after
the approval of the NSCU, its advisory council (DMC).4
From these steps and over the next ten years (1998-
2008), the PEIC management process, with the support
of international funding and the institutional opening of
the Forestry Foundation to carry out bottom-up decisions,
made it possible to consolidate an adaptive co-management
structure in the park (Campolim, Parada, & Yamaoka, 2008;
Sattler et al., 2015; Schröter et al., 2018; Sessin-Dilascio et
al., 2015).
e process involved the collective discussion of
agreements on the use and occupation of the PEIC in
a system of itinerant DMC meetings, divided among
the six communities that inhabited the area at that time:
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
4 5
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
Itacuruçá, Camburiu, Marujá, Enseada da Baleia/Vila
Rápido, Foles, and Pontal do Leste. is resulted in the
elaboration and execution of rules and agreements derived
from the management plan, the DMC discussions, and
the work of the Marujá Residents Association (Amomar)
(Campolim et al., 2008; Sessin-Dilascio et al., 2015).
PIntertwined processes and norms from distinct spheres of
power gradually shaped PEIC’s own mode of adaptive co-
management of natural resources, operated by innovative
institutional designs at the micro level that, with the due
support of interested inuential groups, began to determine
the action of state agencies in a deliberative manner.5 In this
way, the democratic participation operated in the PEIC
DMC began to reect the characteristics of the concept of
empowered participatory governance, described by Fung
(2006; 2009).
METHODMETHOD
Much of the work of public administration researchers
consists of identifying, organizing, and coding documents
for the analysis of their content, according to their objectives
and hypotheses of interest (Bardin, 2011; Garcia et al.,
2016; Silva et al., 2020). Identifying and delimiting the set
of documents to be analyzed, guaranteeing the procedural
conditions for their access, can be a challenging activity for
the researcher.
In the research experiment on which this work is
based, the documents analyzed were identied in the rst
eld experience, in the municipality of Cananéia, in the year
2011. However, access to the PEIC DMC meeting minutes
was only granted one year later as a result of a long analysis
process by the São Paulo Forestry Institute, the government
institution responsible for managing São Paulo’s state parks.
e minutes were on paper, placed in a le, along with
several other documents, photos, and decrees. Access to
the documents was only permitted in the physical presence
of the researcher at the PEIC headquarters, and scanning,
photocopying, or any other means of reproduction were
not allowed. is required long periods in the eld, made
possible only by the international funding for the research.
e document analysis (Garcia et al., 2016; Silva
et al., 2020) was an essential step toward classication
indexing. e analysis of the PEIC decision-making process
started with the eld collection of 14 years of DMC meeting
minutes, totaling a number of 163 records (n = 163) from
the period between 1998 and 2012. e documental
organization was consolidated in an electronic spreadsheet
with the objective of facilitating access to the content of the
documents, presenting a condensed representation of the
information to be later systematized. e limitation on the
use of the minutes required that all the content of interest
to the research contained in the minutes be transcribed
following the document analysis indexing, to allow the
content analysis to be carried out later, away from the eld
environment.
e content of the minutes was then entered into
NVivo software for qualitative analysis following the
categorical content analysis (Bardin, 2011). Initially, all the
content was reread, as an ‘exploratory procedure’ (Bardin,
2011), in order to determine which variables could be
explored from the minutes. Relevant passages were coded
ad hoc, and the contents of the codes were reread and
reorganized several times, against the backdrop of EPG
literature. is taxonomic analysis of the content resulted
in quantitative and qualitative indicators of the thematic
groups presented in Table 1.
It was from the categorical analysis of the content
that it became evident which metadata would be interesting
for the composition of the qualitative-quantitative analysis,
focused on the identication of EPG operational variables,
and, especially, for the analysis of the institutional design of
social participation spaces such as councils. e metadata of
interest were then systematized in an electronic spreadsheet
consolidated from the document analysis. In this article,
we dene metadata as those that were not organized into
the structure of the minutes as the central message of the
meeting reports, such as frequency of meetings, rotation
in communities, and number of special meetings (see
Table 1), but which are essential for understanding the
institutional design of social participation spaces. e binary
decomposition technique was applied to translate qualitative
metadata (for example, the frequency of the meetings, the
rotation in the communities, and the number of special
meetings) into quantitative variables. In the analysis, we
decided to omit the real names of the subjects representing
the council to avoid any embarrassment or local political
disputes.
e ow of tables was organized for the sake of
composing a logical narrative for the article; however, in
the analysis it does not follow the same timeline as the one
presented. e creation of the tables followed a circular ow
of reading and reection, which deepened with each time
around. e exploration of the data that started with the
document analysis and the ad hoc analysis of code creation
in NVivo made clear the complexity of the path to be
followed. e exploratory analysis allowed the identication
of metadata and the creation of the rst table (Table 2),
which stimulated a deeper analysis based on qualitative
data that could be quickly mobilized and translated into
quantitative data. After several attempts and failures to nd
consistent variables that could be quantitatively translated
to create quantiable numerical data (Table 3), we arrived at
Table 4. Note that this table was created after several reading
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
6
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
and trial-and-error cycles of the analysis. In Table 5, greater
sophistication is noted in the aggregation of information
derived from the NVivo qualitative data analysis program,
which was possible after several revisions of the codes
created in the software, the identication and exclusion of
the operationalization of some qualitative data (Table 3),
and the nearly exhaustive analysis of the minutes. Finally,
all variables were aggregated with their respective concepts,
generating Table 1. Figure 1 illustrates the ow of creation
for the tables presented in this article.
In the following sections, a descriptive analysis of
the binary decomposition technique used to translate
qualitative data into quantitative will be presented (Leite
Filho, 2008) as well as the variables dened to operationalize
key concepts of EPG (i.e., participation, empowerment, and
deliberation), identifying important structures that made up
the institutional design of the PEIC DMC, created to ensure
social participation of the traditional Caiçara communities
that inhabited the area of the park.
THE ANALYSIS TECHNIQUE FOR EMPOWERED THE ANALYSIS TECHNIQUE FOR EMPOWERED
PARTICIPATIVE GOVERNANCE IN THE PEIC PARTICIPATIVE GOVERNANCE IN THE PEIC
MANAGEMENT COUNCILMANAGEMENT COUNCIL
e analysis of the institutional design of the
PEIC DMC prioritized the identication of data and
its translation into operational variables dedicated to
understanding the institutional structure that provided for
greater social participation of traditional communities in
park management, anticipating moments of deliberation
that had practical eects on the management. We chose to
emphasize the operationalization of the analysis technique
within the concepts of: (a) participation, (b) empowerment,
and (c) deliberation.
Some questions were considered to assist in the
evaluation process of the institutional design operated
to expand EPG in the DMC meetings: (a) what are the
patterns of social participation, (b) how are the meetings
organized (participation), (c) which norms (formal and
informal) and processes were created that facilitated the
inclusion of Caiçara communities in deliberative processes
(empowerment), (d) how does the dialogue between the
government representatives and the councilors take place,
and (e) how are the discussions connected with public
actions (deliberation)? Metadata and qualitative data were
Figure 1. Flow of analysis and creation of the tables presented in the article.
Source: Elaborated by the authors.
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
6 7
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
extracted from these minutes. e operationalization of
EPG concepts (i.e., participation, empowerment, and
deliberation) for the case study on PEIC’s adaptive co-
management was elaborated in two stages: (a) all the data
extracted from the DMC minutes were organized among the
concepts, supported in the literature and in the denitions
presented in the Introduction, and (b) the variables created
from the data and according to EPG concepts were listed.
Table 1 presents the list of data (metadata,
quantitative data, and qualitative data) that were extracted
from the minutes and the variables created. e extracted
metadata that quantitatively operationalized the concept of
participation were: (a) date of the meetings, (b) frequency
of the meetings, (c) type of meeting (regular or special), (d)
location of the meetings, (e) number of people present, (f)
number of council representatives present at the meeting, (g)
number of institutes represented, (h) diversity of institutes
represented, (i) number of people from the communities, (j)
number of community representatives from the DMC, and
(k) presence of families from Marujá at the meeting6. e
qualitative data identied to quantitatively operationalize
the concept of empowerment were: (a) diversity of subjects
on the agenda, (b) inclusion of new agendas in the meeting
by representatives not from PEIC management, (c) number
of issues raised by social actors, (d) diversity of issues raised
by community members, (e) moments in which Caiçara
communities were mentioned, (f) moments in which the
Caiçara communities gave their opinions, (g) diversity of
issues raised by each community, (h) diversity of issues raised
by community families, (i) formation of commissions in the
DMC, and (j) diversity of issues raised by social actors. e
qualitative data identied to quantitatively operationalize
the data on deliberation were: (a) number of deliberations
at each meeting, (b) number of agreements and norms
(formal and informal) dened at the meeting, (c) presence
of the PEIC director at the meetings, and (d) deliberation
by community.
It is important to emphasize that the identication of
the data to be used in the technique of binary decomposition
and the identication of the variables, as well as their
grouping, did not appear previously in the analysis as a
‘closed procedure’ but as ‘exploration procedures,’ which
occurred over the course of repetitive readings of the
minutes, the coding process in NVivo, and the recoding,
concatenated with the readings and notes of the EPG
literature. is was a circular process of reading, analyzing,
and reecting, in which the understanding of the concepts
and variables was deepened with each turn. In the following
sections, the technique used to organize these data in an
electronic spreadsheet and the data processing technique of
binary renement by aggregation will be presented, as well
as the result that can be derived from these data processing
techniques to help managers and researchers in the analysis
of EPG, based on council meeting minutes.
It is important to emphasize that in the analysis of
the minutes, it became clear that there was a multiplicity of
social actors responsible for writing them over the 14 years (n
= 163); the diversity of formats and structure in the writing
reected this. Some minutes were extremely detailed while
others paid attention only to the resolutions, leaving out any
description of arguments or disagreements during the time
of the meeting, so many relevant data may have been lost.
When reading these minutes, it was possible to infer the
dierence in the details of the subjects, description of the
actors who participated and put subjects on the agenda, as
well as in the description of the facts. e lack of denition
of a format or methodology for composing the minutes and
for discussing how they should be drafted may have reduced
the possibilities and scope of the document analysis of the
DMC social participation process.
Organization and analysis technique for the
DMC minutes’ metadata
From the readings, organization, classication,
analysis, and reection on the content of the DMC minutes
(n = 163), the metadata that could be used were identied,
according to the concepts of interest to EPG, also considering
the context in which the council was inserted. In the case
of PEIC, the frequency of meetings, the rotation in the
communities, and the number of special meetings emerged
as relevant metadata to be considered in the analysis. is
is judged by the territorial extension of the park, by the
number and diversity of traditional communities that live
in the area and are part of the DMC, and by the complexity
and urgency of the issues and conicts discussed. ese
contextual elements obligated the institutional design to
consider arrangements that facilitated the participation of
these communities and the prioritization of subjects that are
urgent to them.
In the document analysis organized in an electronic
spreadsheet, codes for the minutes were dened and the raw
data were standardized, with the codes and information of
the minutes distributed in its rows (codes of the minutes
and dates of the minutes) and the metadata arising from the
analysis of the NVivo codes in its columns. After inserting
the metadata of interest in these columns, corresponding to
each row of minutes, the data processing was started using
the binary decomposition technique. e composition of
the data in variables and their approximation regarding the
characterization of the concepts were carried out later. It is
noted that the metadata in question were the basis for the
operationalization of the concept of ‘participation’ (Table 1).
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
8
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
Table 1. Data extracted from the analysis of DMC meeting minutes.
Concepts Type of data Analyzed data Created variables
Participation Metadata
1) Date of the meetings
Frequency of the regular meetings per year 2) Frequency of the meetings
3) Type of meeting (regular or special)
4) Location of the meetings Meeting rotation
5) Number of people present
Diversity of social actors
6) Number of council representatives present at the meeting
7) Number of institutes represented
8) Diversity of institutes represented
9) Number of people from the communities Presence of the communities at the meetings
10) Number of community representatives from the DMC
11) Presence of families from Marujá at the meeting Representation of Marujá social participation
Empowerment Quali-
quantitative
1) Diversity of subjects on the agenda
Empowerment of the social actors who make up
the DMC
2) Inclusion of new agendas in the meeting by representatives not
from PEIC management
3) Number of issues raised by social actors
4) Diversity of issues raised by community members
5) Moments in which the Caiçara communities were mentioned
6) Moments in which the Caiçara communities gave their
opinions
Empowerment of the communities
7) Diversity of issues raised by each community
8) Diversity of issues raised by community families
9) Formation of commissions in the DMC Empowered governance
10) Diversity of issues raised by social actors
Deliberations Quali-
quantitative
1) Number of deliberations at each meeting
Norms and agreements made during the
meeting
2) Number of agreements and norms (formal and informal)
dened at the meeting
3) Presence of the PEIC director at the meetings
4) Deliberation by community Deliberations on construction and renovations
for the Marujá community
Note. Source: Elaborated by the authors, based on the minutes of the PEIC council meetings between 1998 and 2012.
e variables created from the metadata of the
minutes were: (a) frequency of regular meetings per year
(based on the data for: 1. date of the meetings, 2. frequency
of the meetings, and 3. type of meeting — regular or
special), (b) rotation of meetings (based on: 4. location
of the meetings), (c) diversity of social actors (based on
the data for: 5. number of people present, 6. number of
council representatives present at the meeting, 7. number
of institutions represented, and 8. diversity of institutions
represented), (d) community presence at meetings (based on
the data for: 9. number of people from the communities,
10. number of community representatives from the DMC),
and (e) representation of social participation from Marujá
(based on: 11. presence of Marujá families at the meeting).
e minutes received codes according to date distribution,
with minutes 1 in row 1, and so on. e minutes were
divided by year. Table 2 presents examples of how the data
were organized, indicating just a few sample minutes for the
practical purpose of illustration. e names of the people
mentioned are ctitious.
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
8 9
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
Table 2. Example of DMC meeting metadata processing.
a) Frequency of regular meetings
Code Year Type of meeting Regular Special
1 1998 R 1 0
2 1998 R 1 0
b) Rotation of meetings
Code/
minutes Year Location PEIC Marujá Enseada Itacuruçá Camburiu Foles Pontal
12 1999 Park 1 0 0 0 0 0
13 1999 Itacuruçá 0 0 0 1 0 0
c) Diversity of social actors
Code Year DMC Representative Non-DMC present Association Local
go v.
Environmental
body Church NGO Indigenous Others
12 1999
SOS, Fisheries
Institute, Gaia, City
Hall
Nupaub/USP,
Unesp Rio Claro
intern
0 1 0 0 3 0 0
13 1999
SOS, Fisheries
Institute, Gaia, City
Hall
Caio, Milton and
city council member 0 1 0 0 3 0 0
d) Community presence at meetings
Code Year DMC Representative Non-DMC present PEIC Enseada Iacuruçá Camburiu Foles Pontal Marujá
12 1999
SOS, Fisheries
Institute, Gaia, City
Hall
Nupaub/USP,
Unesp Rio Claro
intern
1 0 (1) 0 0 0 (1)
13 199
SOS, Fisheries
Institute, GAIA,
City Hall
Caio, Milton, and
city council member 0 0 (1) 0 0 (1) (2)
e) Representation of social participation from Marujá
Code/
minutes Year DMC Representative Resident Family 1 F2 F3 F4 F5 F6 F7
7 1998 Oliveira (1) Iza (3), Celestino
(6) 1 0 1 0 0 1 0
10 1998 Oliveira (1) Celestino (6) 1 0 0 0 0 1 0
Note. Source: Elaborated by the authors, based on the minutes of the PEIC council meetings between 1998 and 2012.
It is interesting to note that many of the metadata
collected were not recognized as variables due to some factors:
(a) the number of occurrences was very low (for example, it was
rare that the representatives of communities other than Marujá
had their arguments considered in the minutes, as was the
inclusion of new agendas in the meeting by representatives other
than PEIC management), (b) the occurrence was common,
so it was not necessary to generate a variable (for example,
the constant presence of a state government representative in
council meetings), (c) the data became irrelevant for the analysis
(for example, the time at which the meetings took place in that
context made no dierence to the community members, or the
institution responsible for writing the minutes varied little),
and (d) the data was very spaced out (as in, for example, the
formation of committees).
e non-variation of some metadata served as an
indication of practices that took place outside of the DMC
meeting environment and that were incorporated into semi-
structured questionnaires applied to the park director, to the
representatives of the institutions, and to the communities. As
an example of this, the time of the meetings was previously
agreed upon with the representatives of the council, information
that was claried after the analysis of the minutes. e number
of people present at the council also varied little since the writer
of the minutes prioritized inserting the names of the ocial
representatives of the council as a quorum, especially when
these meetings took place in the communities, and the number
of people listening was too high to t into the minutes.
Organization technique, analysis, and
translation of qualitative data into quantitative,
based on the DMC meeting minutes
e identication of qualitative data and those that
could be transformed into quantitative data required several
cycles of systematic reading of all the meeting minutes during
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
10
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
the study period (i.e., 14 years, n = 163). e rst reading
from the angle of content analysis of the minutes began with
the database derived from the document analysis inserted in
NVivo. Several readings were carried out, with the ad hoc
creation of descriptive categories, which were revised and
improved at each reading. In this process, we sought to identify
which qualitative data best operationalized the concepts of the
EPG literature and which variables could be derived from these
data with the creation of codes in NVivo. is step allowed
the organization of the tables that would be used as a basis for
the binary decomposition technique, based on the structure of
document analysis. e columns presented the qualitative data
that would compose the denition of each variable, with the
code for the year of the minutes being the metainformation
replicated in each analysis.
e qualitative data listed were aggregated into variables
(Table 1) that operationalized the concept of empowerment as
follows: (a) empowerment of the social actors who make up the
DMC (from the data of: diversity of subjects on the agenda,
inclusion of new agendas in the meeting by representatives not
from PEIC management, number of issues raised by social
actors, diversity of issues raised by community members, and
moments in which Caiçara communities were mentioned),
(b) empowerment of the communities (based on data from:
moments when Caiçara communities expressed their opinions,
diversity of issues raised by each community, and diversity
of issues raised by community families), and (c) empowered
governance (based on data from: formation of commissions in
the DMC and diversity of issues raised by social actors). e
concept of deliberation comprised: (a) norms and agreements
created during the meeting (from the data for: number of
deliberations at each meeting, number of agreements and
norms — formal and informal — dened at the meeting,
and presence of the PEIC director at the meetings), and (b)
deliberations on constructions and renovations for the Marujá
community (based on the deliberation data per community).
Even though Table 1 presents the qualitative data related
to each variable of each concept, it is important to emphasize
that some of the data found were not apt for operationalization,
especially due to awed structuring of the minutes that favored
the inclusion of relevant and systematic information related
to practical issues of interest to the management. In addition
to this element, other characteristics of the datum made its
collection and analysis impossible (Table 3).
Table 3. Qualitative data identied but not operationalized.
Concept Variable Data not analyzed Observation
Empowerment
Social actors
who make up
the DMC
1) Diversity of subjects on the agenda
ere was a limitation on the number of subjects inserted by the
PEIC director on the agenda, considering the cost of time and human
resources for each subject. Because of this, the quantity of initial
subjects did not vary much and was not considered an important
datum.
2) Inclusion of new agendas in the
meeting by representatives not from PEIC
management
Missing aggregate information on the name and/or the institution
responsible for the new agenda.
4) Diversity of issues raised by community
members
e composition of the minutes did not favor the identication of all
the social actors present at the meetings, only those who were elected
council representatives. In addition, o-topic interventions were not
systematized.
Communities
7) Diversity of issues raised by each
community Larger number of issues raised by representatives from Marujá.
8) Diversity of issues raised by community
families
Larger number of issues raised by representatives from Marujá, with
higher frequency of one single family’s participation.
EG
9) Formation of commissions in the DMC
From the minutes, only lists of the commissions formed were
possible, but there was no systematic process of organizing the
minutes for these commissions, nor was it clear in the DMC minutes
which were the deliberations that emerged from these commissions.
Consequently, this data were not included in the analysis.
10) Diversity of issues raised by social actors
e qualitative analysis of the agendas of each minute made it
possible to extract a new variable from the metadata of the diversity
of subjects brought to the discussion by dierent social actors.
Deliberations
Norms and
agreements
created during
the meeting
1) Number of deliberations at each meeting
A low number, compared to the number of meetings, but not
unimportant. e deliberations were the result of intense discussions
and arguments that often lasted for a considerable number of
meetings, especially those that touched on interests that were
precious to the local communities and elites. Some took more than
seven years to end.
3) Presence of the PEIC director at meetings Obligatory and constant, therefore not relevant as a variable.
Note. Source: Elaborated by the authors, based on the minutes of the PEIC council meetings between 1998 and 2012.
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
10 11
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
After the qualitative data not to be operationalized
was dened (Table 3), the qualitative information from the
minutes was coded. e minutes’ main concepts, or rather
the agendas that were discussed at each meeting, were then
identied. e agendas incorporate both the topics previously
designated for the meeting and those that emerged during the
discussion process, which had not been previously selected
by the park’s management council. A code was established
for each agenda designated for each code of the minutes and
the respective date. It was noted that the rst meetings were
populated with an immense range of demands to be discussed
at the meeting and that, many times, these were not met due
to lack of time. e institutional learning process has reduced
the number of agendas per meeting over time, making room
for deeper discussion on the chosen theme. Table 4 presents
examples of the coding of meeting agendas, and minutes 1, 3,
and 6 (n = 163) were chosen as illustrative examples.
Table 4. Illustrative table of the coding of meeting agendas in their respective variables.
Concept Empowerment of social actors who make up the DMC
Variable Code Agenda
Empowerment
a. Diversity of discussed
subjects 1
1. Importance of PEIC resident communities in the Management Plan, 2. Function
and action of the Management Committee on PEIC norms, 3. Discussion of the
composition of the Management Committee (institutions, members, and alternates).
b. Number of issues raised
by social actors 3
Association of each social actor to the agenda code for each meeting minutes, such as:
Church (5, 6, 3, 15, 16), Communities (3), F. Inst. (3), DPRN (3, 10, 15, 16), Gaia
(7), Marujá (7, 12, 10), Ocimar (7, 14, 16), Itacuruçá (14).
c. Number of times that each
community is mentioned in
the meetings
3
1. Organization of the minutes, 2. PED, 3. Sust. Fisheries, 4. Water supply for the
communities, 5. Issue of hunting with dogs, 6. Marujá community campground,
7. Water supply for Marujá, 8. Amomar, 9. Waste collection, 10. Confection of
sh traps, 11. Authorization for planting, 12. Wood for canoes, 13. EcoWatt, 14.
Renovations and constructions (there was no special meeting), 15. Deliberations of
renovations and constructions.
d. Moments when Caiçara
communities expressed their
opinions
61. Organization of the minutes, 2. PED, 3. Sust. Fisheries, 4. Water supply for the
communities, 5. Issue of hunting with dogs, 6. Marujá community campground.
Deliberations e. Marujá community 6 1. Seasonal rentals in Marujá, 2. Resident registry, 3. Pró-Lagamar Project, 4.
Indigenous issues, 5. Water in Camburiu, 6. Sale of houses in Marujá.
Note. Source: Elaborated by the authors, based on the minutes of the PEIC council meetings between 1998 and 2012.
Table 5 presents examples of how the analysis of
qualitative variables translated into quantitative variables by
the binary decomposition technique operated. Note that
the same structure of document analysis was used; however,
there was greater sophistication regarding the aggregation of
information derived from the NVivo qualitative data analysis
program.
e concept ‘empowerment of the actors who make up
the DMC’ was associated with the variables: (a) diversity of
subjects discussed and (b) number of times each community
is mentioned in the meetings. e concept of ‘empowerment
of the communities’ covered: (c) moments when Caiçara
communities expressed their opinions and (d) deliberations.
e variables were composed of micro-variables derived
from the organization of data from all the meeting minutes,
following the model proposed in Table 4.
e variable of diversity of subjects discussed (a)
was operationalized from the composition of the micro-
variables: communities (basic, houses, and traditional),
administration (organization, plans, physical infrastructure,
and partnerships), environment (organization, exotic species,
and use of natural resources), indigenous people, and
tourism (such as support capacity, organization, and summer
operation) (Table 5a). e variable referring to the mention of
each community in the meetings (b) was operationalized by
identifying the mention of the name of the community and/
or the names of its residents in the meeting minutes. ese
mentions were organized and decomposed by the technique
of binary decomposition by aggregation (Table 5b).
e number of issues raised by social actors was a
derivation of the variable ‘participation/diversity of issues
discussed’ (Table 5c). Since the agendas had been numerically
organized for the previous analysis, the numbers of each
agenda of the day were associated with the social actors
who mentioned them at each meeting. An analysis code
was created to correlate each associated social actor with the
code/number of the agenda that the actor mentioned on the
day of the meeting: church (5, 6, 3, 15, 16), communities
(3), institute (3), DPRN (3, 10, 15, 16), Gaia (7), Marujá
(7, 12, 10), Ocimar (7, 14, 16), and Itacuruçá (14).
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
12
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
Each of these actors was divided into their categories:
associations, local government, environmental police,
church, NGO, communities other than Marujá, Marujá,
and indigenous people. e step followed the same logic as
the previous step — technique of binary decomposition by
aggregation (Table 5b).
When the Caiçara communities expressed their
opinion, the same code/number of the agenda that the
community actor mentioned on the day of the meeting was
used. e next step respected the same logic as Table 5b
(Table 5c). is analysis contributed to the discussions on
representation in social participation, very present in recent
literature on the subject.
In constructions and renovations, for the Marujá
community, all the moments were listed in which Marujá
community representatives made approval requests to the
DMC for constructions and renovations in the community
in each meeting, as well as the number of requests fullled.
is step followed the same logic as the previous step — the
technique of binary decomposition by aggregation (Table 5d).
Table 5. Example of the operationalization of the binary decomposition technique of qualitative data.
Concept
Variables
a. Diversity of subjects discussed
Empowerment of the actors who make up the DMC
Code
1. Communities 2. Administration 3. Environment 4. In-
dige-
nous
people
5. Tourism
Basic Houses Traditio-
nal Org. Infra. Par t-
nership Org. Exotic
species NR
Capa-
cita-
tion
Org.
Sum-
mer
opera-
tion
1 0 0 1 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
b. Number of times that each community is mentioned in the meetings
Code Communities Marujá Itacuruçá Enseada Pontal Camburiu Foles
3
Marujá (2), Ita-
curuçá (0), Ensea-
da (0), Pontal (0),
Camburiu (0),
Foles (0)
2 0 1 0 0 0
c. Number of issues raised by social actors
Code Actors No. agen-
das
Associa-
tions Local government Environmental
police
Chur-
ch NGO Communities
— Marujá
Ma-
rujá
Indi-
genous
people
Church (5, 6, 3,
15, 16), Commu-
nities (3), F. Inst.
(3), DPRN (3,
10, 15, 16), Gaia
(7), Marujá (7,
12, 10), Ocimar
(7, 14, 16), Ita-
curuçá (14)
16 1 4 0 5 1 1 3 0
Empowerment of the communities
c. Moments in which the Caiçara communities gave their opinions
Code Communities Marujá Itacuruçá Ensea-
da Pontal Cam-
buriu Foles
6
Marujá (4, 6),
Itacuruçá (5), En-
seada (0), Pontal
(0), Camburiu
(0), Foles (0)
2 1 0 0 0 0
d. Deliberations
Code Deliberations
related to Marujá Fullled Not
fullled
6 1, 5, 6 1 0
Note. Source: Elaborated by the authors, based on the PEIC council meeting minutes (names are ctitious).
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
12 13
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
ON THE BINARY DECOMPOSITION ON THE BINARY DECOMPOSITION
TECHNIQUETECHNIQUE
In Brazil, institutionalized spaces for social
participation such as councils produce information in their
bureaucratic ow — the minutes of their meetings —, which
are rarely used for institutional reection or improvement
of internal decision-making processes. As presented in
the Introduction, many of the problems related to low
or ineective social participation in decision-making are
related to the institutional design (Fung & Wright, 2003) of
these democratic spaces. Tools to identify problems related
to the institutional design of councils and to identify these
practical-operational mechanisms that can be incorporated
to improve social participation are still not widespread.
Councils should be spaces for collective discussion,
reection, and, even more so, decision-making, where
possible solutions can be created for the practical problems
related to citizens’ needs, in terms of the implementation,
review, or creation of public policies. According to EPG
literature, the institutional design of the councils should be
guided by orientation for practice, bottom-up participation,
and the creation of possible solutions through deliberation.
e technique of analyzing council meeting minutes
presented in this article is a useful tool for identifying the
aws and the potentiality of institutional design within the
scope of EPG guidelines. Figure 2 presents the meeting
minutes template that was commonly used by PEIC and
whose format prevails in many preparations of minutes. It is
noted the location of the data transformed into variables for
the analysis of the GPE of the PEIC management, described
in Table 1.
Figure 2. Minutes template sample indicated for the use of the binary decomposition
technique.
Source: Elaborated by the authors.
e rst step in facilitating the analysis of the minutes
is a document analysis by creating an indexed database in
which information from the underlying analysis can be
entered. As mentioned, the broader format for creation of
the council minutes is aimed at obtaining metadata (Figure
2), such as those pointed out in Table 1 (for example, date
and location of the meeting, among other aspects), which
already provide information relevant to the identication
of the variables of meeting frequency, diversity of social
actors, representation, and those that can be indexed as
primary variables of the minutes database, to be mobilized
quickly with the aim of producing information relevant to
the design.
e analysis of the deliberations can be the second step
in the organization of the minutes database. Information
of this type can be mobilized, comparing the number and
quality of meeting agendas and their resolutions (Figure 2,
Table 1). It is the analysis of empowerment that requires
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
14
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
more analytical and reective time because it directs the
analysis to the development of the discussions presented
in the minutes and requires the most active mobilization
in the categorical content analysis, as well as the use of
qualitative analysis tools (such as NVivo software). e
transformation of this information into categorical data
that can be translated into quantitative data depends
on these previous processes of analysis and contextual
information, which provide context for the discussions.
e interpretation of analyses derived from council
meeting minutes may indicate problems in the council’s
institutional design that lead to low social participation
and deliberation. As an example, if there is a low diversity
of institutions and low attendance of non-state actors
at meetings, this may indicate that the mobilization for
meetings is not necessarily sucient or that the social
actors are not recognizing the council space as sucient
to meet their needs for civic responsibility. If there are
deliberations of the agendas inserted in the meeting,
including the participation of non-state social actors,
this variable may indicate that the institutional design is
aimed toward popular control. ere are other possible
combinations of variables for dierent purposes (for a
more in-depth discussion see Sessin-Dilascio (2014) and
Sessin-Dilascio et al. (2015), depending on the interest of
the manager or researcher.
Once the quantitative values of the variables selected
by the application of the technique are dened, it is
possible to submit them to descriptive statistics analysis or
the cross-referencing of variables (for example, correlation
analysis), depending on the number of minutes analyzed
(n greater than 100 is suggested).
It is important to emphasize that the application
of the binary decomposition technique for the analysis of
minutes is only possible in spaces where written records of
the meetings are used and where a determinate template is
followed (Figure 2). e description of the discussions is the
essential point for enabling the analysis of empowerment.
Inserting the name of the people who had the space to
speak is recommended in order to better understand the
division of powers and identify those who actually make
the decisions. e variation in the writing of the minutes
can be mitigated by choosing a minimal format and
incorporating this practice into the institutional culture of
the council. e organization and an indexed database of the
minutes, including space for continuous systematization
in a spreadsheet, are recommended to facilitate the access
and systematization of metadata, which can later be easily
mobilized into variables of interest.
CONCLUSIONCONCLUSION
e article presents how an analytical possibility of
document analysis of the minutes of council meetings can
improve the institutional design of these spaces, toward
enhancing participation, empowerment, and democratic
deliberation. e minutes are incorporated in many
structures of the state apparatus, often being used only as a
merely bureaucratic instrument for archival purposes. e
technique of binary decomposition and the presentation
of the derived variables, from the meticulous study of the
Cardoso Island State Park Management Council meeting
minutes, presents a new perspective on the use of this
material, which can be used to improve the institutional
design of councils with the intent to enhance empowered
participatory governance.
e technique points out ways of systematizing and
building a database of the minutes (document analysis) as
a rst step in data indexing. e next stage would be the
systematization of this indexing in a spreadsheet, based on
basic metadata (Figure 2, Table 1) aimed at understanding
social participation. e analysis of more supercial content
of the minutes from dened variables (Table 1) generates
information on the deliberative processes, which can be
quantied using the binary decomposition technique. Only
these two concepts, participation and deliberation, can be
extracted from the minutes with less analytical eort (Figure
2). e analysis of empowerment, however, requires greater
specication in the description of the meetings’ discussions
in the minutes, as well as greater eort in the categorical
content analysis, which may require the use of qualitative
analysis software (such as NVivo).
e analysis of the minutes using the binary
decomposition technique requires the council environment
to incorporate the systematization of the discussions in
structured records through documents such as meeting
minutes, including greater detail in the description, in
addition to their archiving and availability to directors
responsible for planning the institutional design of councils
or representatives interested in proposing changes in the
direction of EPG. is type of analysis makes it possible to
nd ways to promote greater diversity in the representation of
traditional communities and point out aws in institutional
design, including from the quantiable variables of diversity,
representativeness, and deliberation, central to the diagnoses
of deliberative councils.
e eects of social inequality and the low social
participation of vulnerable populations in decision-making
within council spaces have long been discussed in the
literature (as, for example, within the theoretical scope of
socioeconomic status and civic voluntarism), as well as
problems associated with the sharing of power, the levels
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
14 15
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
of its decentralization, and the extension of deliberative
processes. is article presents a technique that can help
managers and researchers who are interested in identifying
the possible causes related to these problems. With the
systematic analysis of meeting minutes and the reection,
through the variables indicated in this article, of the
institutional design of these bodies of institutionalized social
participation, this article contributes to the promotion of
new strategies for social inclusion and the construction of
deliberative practices guided by and for the popular control
of vulnerable populations, minorities, and traditional
communities.
NOTES
1. To analyze the background and more detailed discussions
on the subject, we suggest Allebrandt (2008), Allebrandt
(2003) and Allebrandt, Siedenberg, Sausen and Deckert
(2011).
2. According to art. 3 of Federal Decree No. 6040/2007:
“Traditional Peoples and Communities: culturally
dierentiated groups, who identify themselves as such,
which have their own forms of social organization and
occupy and use territories and natural resources as a
condition for their cultural, social, religious, ancestral,
and economic reproduction, using knowledge,
innovations, and practices generated and transmitted by
tradition.”
3. Technical document similar to a master plan or ecological
economical zoning applied to a conservation unit. e
document points to zones and rules for soil and natural
resource use, as well as management guidelines for the
unit.
4. Since the advisory council eectively operated as a
deliberative management council, the initialism DMC
was chosen to refer to this council.
5. e law denes that the councils of full protection
conservation units must be advisory and not deliberative.
e PEIC council, during the years of adaptive co-
management (1998-2008), acted in a deliberative manner,
reorganizing the federal/state norms for local needs.
6. is datum is the result of the compilation of empirical data
collected during the eldwork in the Marujá community,
which provided the genealogy of the community’s families,
published in Sessin-Dilascio (2014).
REFERENCES
Abers, R., & Bülow, M. U. (2011). Movimentos sociais na teoria e
na prática: Como estudar o ativismo através da fronteira
entre Estado e sociedade? Sociologias, 13(28), 52–84.
https://doi.org/10.1590/S1517-45222011000300004
Allebrandt, S. (2008). Conselhos distritais e a gestão do
desenvolvimento local: Relações de poder e participação
na gestão pública. In M. Baquero & D. Cremonese
(Orgs.), Desenvolvimento regional, democracia local e capital
social (pp. 173–210). Ijuí, RS, Brazil: Unijuí. Retrieved
from https://www.unisc.br/site/sidr/2006/textos3/07.pdf
Allebrandt, S. L. (2003, September). Conselhos municipais:
Potencialidades e limites para a efetividade e ecácia de um
espaço público para a construção da cidadania interativa.
Proceedings of the Encontro Anual da ANPAD, Atibaia, SP,
Brazil, 27.
Allebrandt, S., Siedenberg, D., Sausen, J., & Deckert, C.
(2011). Gestão social e cidadania deliberativa: Uma
análise da experiência dos Coredes no Rio Grande do
Sul, 1990-2010. Cadernos EBAPE.BR, 9(3), 914–945.
https://doi.org/10.1590/S1679-39512011000300012
Alonso, A. (2009). As teorias dos movimentos sociais: Um balanço
do debate. Lua Nova: Revista de Cultura e Política, 76, 49–
86. https://doi.org/10.1590/S0102-64452009000100003
Avritzer, L. (2012). e dierent designs of public participation
in Brazil: Deliberation, power sharing and public
ratication. Critical Policy Studies, 6(2), 113–127.
https://doi.org/10.1080/19460171.2012.689732
Barber, B. (2003). Strong democracy: Participatory politics for a new
age. Oakland, CA: University of California Press.
Bardin, L. (2011). Análise de conteúdo. Lisbon: Edições 70.
Campolim, M. B., Parada, I. S., & Yamaoka, J. G. (2008). Gestão
participativa da gestão pública na comunidade do Marujá
- Parque Estadual da Ilha do Cardoso. IF Série Registros,
(33), 39–49. Retrieved from https://smastr16.blob.
core.windows.net/iorestal/RIF/SerieRegistros/IFSR33/
IFSR33_39-49.pdf
Diegues, A. C. (1996). As populações humanas em áreas
naturais protegidas da Mata Atlântica [Working paper].
Universidade de São Paulo, Faculdade de Filosoa, Letras e
Ciências Humanas, Centro de Culturas Marítimas, Núcleo
de Apoio à Pesquisa sobre Populações, São Paulo, Brazil.
Retrieved from https://nupaub.ch.usp.br/sites/nupaub.
ch.usp.br/les/color/ConitosnaMataAtlantica.pdf
Diegues, A. C., & Nogara, P. J. (1994). O nosso lugar virou parque:
Estudo socio-ambiental do saco de Mamangua, Parati, Rio de
Janeiro. São Paulo, Brazil: USP/NUPAUB.
Fung, A., & Wright, E. O. (2003). Deepening democracy: Institutional
innovations in empowered participatory governance (Vol. 4).
New York: Verso.
Fung, A. (2006). Varieties of participation in complex governance.
Public Administration Review, 66(S1), 66–75.
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6210.2006.00667.x
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
16
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
Fung, A. (2009). Empowered participation: Reinventing urban
democracy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Garcia, M. de O., Rodrigues, P. E. L., Emmendoerfer, M. L.,
Gava, R., & Silveira, S. de F. R. (2016). Usos da pesquisa
documental em estudos sobre administração pública no
Brasil. Teoria e Prática Em Administração, 6(1), 41–68.
Retrieved from https://periodicos.ufpb.br/ojs2/index.
php/tpa/article/view/25211
Gaspardo, M. (2018). Democracia participativa e experimentalismo
democrático em tempos sombrios. Estudos Avançados, 32(92),
65–88. https://doi.org/10.5935/0103-4014.20180006
Kerstenetzky, C. L. (2003). Sobre associativismo,
desigualdades e democracia. Revista Brasileira
de Ciências Sociais, 18(53), 131–142.
https://doi.org/10.1590/S0102-69092003000300008
Lavalle, A. G. (2011). Após a participação: Nota introdutória.
Lua Nova: Revista de Cultura e Política, (84), 13–23.
https://doi.org/10.1590/S0102-64452011000300002
Lavalle, A. G., & Vera, E. I. (2011). A trama da crítica democrática:
Da participação à representação e à accountability.
Lua Nova: Revista de Cultura e Política, (84), 95–139.
https://doi.org/10.1590/S0102-64452011000300005
Leite Filho, G. A. (2008). Padrões de produtividade de autores
em periódicos e congressos na área de contabilidade
no Brasil: Um estudo bibliométrico. Revista de
Administração Contemporânea, 12(2), 533–554.
https://doi.org/10.1590/S1415-65552008000200011
Neves, E. G. (2006). Arqueologia da Amazônia. Rio de Janeiro:
Jorge Zahar.
Olson, M. (2015). A lógica da ação coletiva: Os benefícios públicos e
uma teoria dos grupos sociais. São Paulo: Edusp.
Patsias, C., Latendresse, A., & Bherer, L. (2013). Participatory
democracy, decentralization and local governance: e
montreal participatory budget in the light of ‘empowered
participatory governance’. International Journal of
Urban and Regional Research, 37(6), 2214–2230.
https://doi.org/10.1111/J.1468-2427.2012.01171.X
Pereira, B. E., & Diegues, A. C. (2010). Conhecimento
de populações tradicionais como possibilidade de
conservação da natureza: Uma reexão sobre a perspectiva
da etnoconservação. Desenvolvimento e Meio Ambiente, 22,
37-50. https://doi.org/10.5380/dma.v22i0.16054
Prado, D., Araujo, L., Chamy, P., Dias, A., & Seixas, C. (2020).
Participação social nos conselhos gestores de unidades de
conservação: Avanços normativos e a visão de agentes do
ICMBio. Ambiente & Sociedade, 23, e00362. https://doi.
org/10.1590/1809-4422asoc20180036r2vu2020l5ao
Rosenstone, S. J., & Hansen, J. M. (1993). Mobilization,
participation, and democracy in America. London:
Longman Publishing Group.
Santilli, J. (2005). Socioambientalismo e novos direitos: Proteção
jurídica a diversidade biológica e cultural. São Paulo:
Editora Peirópolis.
Sattler, C., Schröter, B., Jericó-Daminello, C., Sessin-Dilascio, K.,
Meyer, C., Matzdorf, B., Wortmann, L., Sinisgalli, P. A.
D. A., Meyer, A., & Giersch, G. (2015). Understanding
governance structures in community management
of ecosystems and natural resources: e Marujá
case study in Brazil. Ecosystem Services, 16, 182-191.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecoser.2015.10.015
Schlozman, K. L., Verba, S., & Brady, H. E. (2012). e unheavenly
chorus: Unequal political voice and the broken promise of
american democracy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press.
Schröter, B., Sessin-Dilascio, K., Jericó-Daminello, C., & Sattler,
C. (2018). De espectadores impotentes a cogestores
adaptativos: Uma comunidade no Parque Estadual da
Ilha do Cardoso (Cananeia, São Paulo, Brasil). Revista
Brasileira de Gestão Ambiental e Sustentabilidade, 5(9),
329–347. https://doi.org/10.21438/rbgas.050922
Schröter, B., Sessin-Dilascio, K., Meyer, C., Matzdorf, B.,
Sattler, C., Meyer, A., Giersch, G., Jericó-Daminello,
C., & Wortmann, L. (2014). Multi-level governance
through adaptive co-management: Conict resolution
in a Brazilian state park. Ecological Processes, 3(1), 6.
https://doi.org/10.1186/2192-1709-3-6
Sessin-Dilascio, K. (2014). Cogestão adaptativa e capital social
na gestão de unidades de conservação integrais brasileiras
com comunidades: O estudo de caso do Parque Estadual
da Ilha do Cardoso e da comunidade do Marujá (Master
thesis). Universidade de São Paulo, Instituto de Energia
e Ambiente. https://doi.org/10.11606/D.106.2014.tde-
19012015-161740
Sessin-Dilascio, K., Prager, K., Irvine, K. N., & Sinisgalli, P. A. D.
A. (2015). e dynamics of co-management and social
capital in protected area management—e Cardoso
Island State Park in Brazil. World Development, 67, 475–
489. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2014.11.004
Shepard, G. H., Jr., Clement, C. R., Lima, H., Santos, G. M.,
Moraes, C., & Neves, E. (2020). Ancient and traditional
agriculture in South America: Tropical lowlands.
Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Environmental Science.
https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780199389414.013.597
Silva, J., Emmendoerfer, M., & Cunha, N. (2020).
Análise documental ilustrada em administração
pública: Uma proposta operacional (re)aplicável.
Teoria e Prática em Administração, 10(2), 23–41.
https://doi.org/10.21714/2238-104X2020v10i2-51394
Vello, B. G. (2018). Inovação democrática e desconança: O
controle das políticas públicas nos conselhos (Master
thesis). Universidade de São Paulo, Faculdade de
Filosoa, Letras e Ciências Humanas, São Paulo, Brazil.
https://doi.org/10.11606/D.8.2018.tde-10072018-155747
Verba, S., Schlozman, K. L., & Brady, H. E. (1995). Voice and
equality: Civic voluntarism in American politics. Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press.
Weiss, J. S. (2019). Movimentos socioambientais: Lutas, conquistas,
avanços, retrocessos, esperanças (1 ed.). Formosa, GO,
Brazil: Editora Xapuri Socioambiental.
K. Sessin-Dilascio, C. B. Rossi, P. A. de A. Sinisgalli
Technique for the analysis of social participation in councils: Operationalizing
concepts
16 17
Revista de Administração Contemporânea, 2022, Early access | doi.org/10.1590/1982-7849rac2022210258.en| e-ISSN 1982-7849 | rac.anpad.org.br
Authorship
Karla Sessin Dilascio*
Universidade de São Paulo, Instituto de Energia e Ambiente,
Programa de Pós-Graduação em Ciência Ambiental
Av. Professor Luciano Gualberto, n. 1289, Butantã, 05508-010,
São Paulo, SP, Brazil
E-mail: karla.dilascio@usp.br
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3799-0568
Charles Borges Rossi
Universidade Federal do Acre
Rua Estrada da Canela Fina, KM 12 Gleba Formoso, São
Francisco, 69895-000, Cruzeiro do Sul, AC, Brazil
E-mail: charles.rossi@ufac.br
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6811-0116
Paulo Antônio de Almeida Sinisgalli
Universidade de São Paulo, Escola de Artes, Ciências e Humanidades
Av. Professor Luciano Gualberto, n. 1289, Butantã, 05508-010,
São Paulo, SP, Brazil
E-mail: psinisgalli@usp.br
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7822-3499
* Corresponding Author
Funding
e authors thank the European Commission, Seventh
Framework Programme, FP7 International Cooperation
(#282750) for the nancial support for the research in this article.
Conict of Interests
e authors have stated that there is no conict of interest.
Plagiarism Check
e RAC maintains the practice of submitting all documents
approved for publication to the plagiarism check, using
specic tools, e.g.: ienticate.
Copyrights
RAC owns the copyright to this content.
Authors' Contributions
1st author: conceptualization (lead); data curation (lead);
formal analysis (lead); investigation (equal); methodology
(lead); project administration (equal); validation (equal);
writing – original draft (lead); writing – review & editing
(lead).
2nd author: formal analysis (equal); methodology
(supporting); supervision (equal); validation (equal); writing
– review & editing (equal).
3rd author: formal analysis (equal); funding acquisition
(lead); investigation (equal); methodology (equal); project
administration (lead); resources (lead); supervision (lead);
validation (equal); writing – review & editing (equal).
Peer Review Method
is content was evaluated using the double-blind peer review
process. e disclosure of the reviewers’ information on the
rst page, as well as the Peer Review Report, is made only after
concluding the evaluation process, and with the voluntary
consent of the respective reviewers and authors.
Data Availability
e authors claim that all data used in the research have
been made publicly available through the Harvard Dataverse
platform and can be accessed at:
Dilascio, Karla Sessin; Rossi, Charles Borges;
Sinisgalli, Paulo Antônio de Almeida, 2022,
"Replication Data for: "Technique for Social
Participation Analysis in Councils: Concept’s
Operationalization" published by RAC-Revista
de Administração Contemporânea", Harvard
Dataverse, V1.
https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/481AAI
RAC encourages data sharing but, in compliance with
ethical principles, it does not demand the disclosure of any
means of identifying research subjects, preserving the privacy
of research subjects. e practice of open data is to enable
the reproducibility of results, and to ensure the unrestricted
transparency of the results of the published research, without
requiring the identity of research subjects.
RAC is a member of, and subscribes to the principles of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) for scholarly publication
