Participatory Processes
The Safe(r) Spaces Toolbox
This toolbox gathers a set of practical tools to support facilitators in designing, assessing, and sustaining safer and more inclusive participatory processes using the Safe(r) Spaces Playbook. It combines a workflow overview (the card deck), a pre-participation health check, participant onboarding …
[Safe(r) Spaces] Diverse Knowledges
Safe spaces are not about retreating from the world, but about resisting violence and enabling dignity, expression, and meaningful participation.
[Safe(r) Spaces] Relational Power
Power shapes who is heard, how decisions are made, and whether participation leads to meaningful outcomes. Safe(r) spaces make these dynamics visible, negotiable, and accountable.
[Safe(r) Spaces] Reflexivity and Iteration
Designing safer spaces is an ongoing practice. Reflexivity means paying attention to how power, safety, inclusion, discomfort, and silence unfold in real time, and being willing to adapt methods, roles, tools, and timelines in response.
[Safe(r) Spaces] Intersectional Inclusion
Intersectional inclusion means recognising that people experience participation differently, and actively addressing the visible and invisible barriers that shape who can take part, how, and on what terms.
[Safe(r) Spaces] Care, Safety, and Non-retaliation
This process explores how participatory spaces can be designed around care, safety, agency, and non-retaliation. Drawing on trauma-informed, feminist, intersectional, and participatory governance approaches, it proposes practical commitments for co-defining norms, making risks and responsibilities e…
[Safe(r) Spaces] Time
This process explores how time shapes participation in safe(r) spaces: who can join, when, for how long, and under what conditions.