The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has recognised the project titled ‘Municipal Authorities in Türkiye Realising Alliances with Citizens’ Assemblies’ (MATRA-CA) as a leading innovation. The project was funded by the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs via its representation in Ankara, and implemented by VNG International (the International Co-operation Agency of the Association of Netherlands Municipalities), in partnership with the Union of Municipalities of Türkiye (UMT).

As part of the OECD public governance directorate, the Observatory for Public Sector Innovation (OPSI) was founded in 2011 based on the growing need for governments to adopt new approaches to address society’s complex problems. Each year, OPSI conducts comprehensive innovation reviews, and captures and analyses hundreds of innovations from all around the world and surface key trends in government innovation. In October 2022, an application was submitted by the MATRA-CA Project Team to OECD-OPSI briefly describing the MATRA-CA intervention, and the innovative approach of the creation of Participation Task Forces composed of elected municipal councillors, appointed municipal officials, and members of citizens’ assemblies. On 13 January 2023, updates were received on the results of the application, which was reviewed and analysed among 1.084 innovations submitted from 94 countries around the world.

As a proud and exciting achievement at the international level, the MATRA-CA project will be mentioned as a leading innovation in the upcoming report of the OECD titled Embracing Innovation in Government: Global Trends 2023 to be launched at the World Government Summit (13-15 February 2023). In addition, the case of Participation Task Forces has already been published on the Case Study Library of the OECD Observatory of Public Sector Innovation .