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In the evening of 25 February we hosted an event to co-create recommendations of good urban governance for the EU Urban Agenda. The cities of Bologna, Solin and Leeuwarden have used support of citizens and cultural change-makers to come up with creative solutions for social issues. Our speakers have tested alternative forms of cooperation and come up with new ways of participatory governance:
- Antonija Eremut has demonstrated with the City of Solin in Croatia, that citizens can work together effectively to reclaim public space that had been abandoned.
- Christian Iaione, founder of the think-tank Laboratory for the Governance of Commons (LabGov) is pioneering in Italy with students, citizens and the city government on institutional innovation, of which the Bologna’s Regulation for the Care and Regeneration of Urban Commons has been the most impactful.
- Sjoerd Feitsma, Alderman Leeuwarden. Leeuwarden-Fryslân, European Cultural Capital in 2018 has convinced the jury of the European Cultural Capital with their topic ‘mienskip’ (= community) that participation of communities and culture are driving engines for socio-economic development in Europe.
- Pedro Campos Ponce of the Dutch Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations is leading the process towards the EU Urban Agenda of which good urban governance, including citizens’ participation is one of the priorities.

This year’s European Urban Knowledge Network (EUKN) Policy Lab for Spain took place in Madrid and was organised in cooperation with the Ministerio de Fomento, Madrid on the theme of National Urban Agenda in Spain. The event aimed at supporting Spain's commitment to develop its urban agenda built on the existing urban policies at the national level.
The EUKN Policy Lab allowed for an exchange between Spanish experts and experts from national ministries in EUKN countries working in the field of National Urban Policies: France, Germany, Poland, the Czech Republic, and the Netherlands.