Participatory budgeting is a process of democratic decision-making where ordinary people decide on allocating part of a municipal budget. Iceland and Estonia are some of the champions of this process, while Latvia and Lithuania are yet to launch their first participatory budgeting attempts. Therefore, we intend to organize capacity-boosting masterclasses for Latvian and Lithuanian organizations on participatory budgeting. These masterclasses would be led by Icelandic and Estonian organizations that have experience in setting-up a participatory budgeting process in their own countries. The masterclasses would be followed by two advocacy meetings with municipal councils on launching participatory budgeting in two municipalities in Latvia. These advocacy meetings will be organized by Providus in cooperation with regional organizations Jūrmalas Aizsardzības biedrība and Saldus Aizsardzības biedrība.

The second cutting-edge issue is that of getting out of one’s own information bubble by means of a small budget for Facebook advertising. Here, the Icelandic organization Citizens Foundation is the best source for know-how suitable for organizations in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. Additionally, these organizations and other civil society activists will share best practices on being effective on Facebook and on other social media even if they do not have a designated advertising budget.