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Living, belonging and participating: The relationship between neighbourhood and citizen participation in Santiago de Chile

Abstract:

As this is the spatial environment closest to the individual, different disciplines have approached the neighbourhood to investigate its role in different manifestations of citizen participation. In this exploratory work we ask ourselves if the attitude towards the neighbourhood itself can be a predictor of citizen participation. The objective of this study, in addition, is to investigate if the eventual resulting participation is of civic or political type. To investigate the subject, we developed a descriptive analysis of data referred to neighbourhood perception and citizen participation in Santiago de Chile. Our results provide evidence of how much the social dimension of the neighbourhood (sense of belonging, social capital and sociability) is an antecedent of civic participation and, secondarily, of political participation.