Participatory city budgets: behind the words, the euros. Empirical study of 4043 projects in Paris (2014-2021)[Budgets participatifs urbains : derrière les mots, les euros. Étude empirique de 4 043 projets à Paris (2014-2021)]

The participatory budget of cities AQ1 (see https://www.participatorybudgeting.org/) has become an instrument widely promoted by New Public Management as a means of involving citizens in public policies. Beyond the conceptual appeal of empowering the citizen-user, the reality of the funded projects sometimes reflects trending topics that are more about communication than about a committed citizen footprint capable of shaping public decision-making in the city. To explore this phenomenon, the corpus studied includes the 4,043 projects identified and funded by the City of Paris from 2014 to 2021 (see https://parisdata.opendatasoft.com/pages/home/). A comparison, using smart data methods under R software, is conducted between the projects voted on by citizens and those actually finalized by the Paris City Hall. The results show that the project title (i.e., the descriptive terms used) determines the value of the project, and that it is the least salient words that influence the amount of budget allocated. Ultimately, the participatory budget may function as an additional instrument of political communication serving a fantasized and illusory participatory democracy.