Enhancing connectivity between scientists, citizens and policy makers in the water sector and beyond

The goal of the AWARE project has been to demonstrate a new way of “connecting research, people and policy-makers in Europe to achieve sustainable water ecosystem management”. The project used a variety of methods and activities to achieve this aim – including workshops, interactive conferences, online surveys and personal interviews. This chapter review the ex-post evaluation of the AWARE potential impact, as ascertained in particular in a number of keynote interviews and in a final ex-post evaluation workshop with water managers held in Brussels, at the end of the project. Future prospects to achieve a snowball effect, deepening the AWARE method application to foster public participation to integrated coastal zone and river basin management in the water sector and to expand its application to other sustainability challenges in other sectors (e.g. energy and climate, transport, etc.) are discussed. Practical lessons drawn from the AWARE pilot experience are given as a guidance for future participatory processes. The lessons learned are presented as tips about how to better engage citizens, stakeholders and policy makers, scientists, and how to organise the knowledge brokerage process and deliver the outcomes in order to get effective results from the whole participatory process.JRC.H.1-Water Resource