Citizen participation in the budget process and local government accountability: Case studies of organizational learning from the United States and South Korea

Citizen participation in budgeting can be a governmental mechanism to minimize organizational learning pathologies resulting from sole reliance on an administrative accountability model. This study analyzes case studies of Los Angeles and Bukgu, South Korea, to show how participative budgeting combines exploration and refinement strategies to create processes that foster information exchange between citizens and public officials. Although the analysis finds representativeness problems in both cases, scholars, administrators, and citizen advocates should have an interest in the narratives on how cities construct and refine processes that can improve citizen-administrator information exchange.