Participatory citizenship and its role in optimizing urban management (Case Study: Mashhad District One)

1. Introduction
Since the ancient times participation in its general sense has had a strong link to human life and, in its modern sense, it has begun from the politics after the World War II. This kind of participation in some industrialized countries (particularly those which had defeated in the War) began in economic and industrialized realm in order that it share people in ownership and reinforced sustainable pillars of industry and economics. By expanding the sense of participation and its penetration into all aspects of life, there are some conditions which all people consciously and really determine their own destinies.
The concept of participation covers the basic issue that individuals and all society can exploit their benefits by influencing directly or indirectly the urban affairs. Citizens by participating in urban affairs are connected to a network of relations which can play the supportive role for them in the future. Particularly, a society in which the number of vulnerable groups is more, their being participated in urban affairs causes increase in their self-esteem, social interaction and enhancement of their experiences and skills.
According to urban planning experts and specialists, citizens as the main suppliers of urban costs (taxes and complications) and also as the executives of urban regulations should participate and cooperate with the authorities of their cities about their future. However, the participatory dimension of people in the process of urban management has encountered a serious problem and challenge and lack of people's being participated in affairs related to urban management. The lack of people's interests in participating in affairs related to themselves have also faced urban management with a great problem and this is an obvious challenge which are observable in all cities of Iran.
2. Materials and Methods
This study has descriptive-analytical method which has been conducted by library and field study. The main part of this research is conducted by field survey. The population including all residents of Zone 1 of Mashhad City was174594 people according to the census of 2011.  Using Cochrane sampling formula, the sample size is including 384 participants. The sampling method was systematic random sampling.
3. Discussion
Among the discussed issues and data analysis using SPSS and field studies in the present study, it seems that in evaluating the participation rate in urban management for all the 384 participants of the study, 11 percent of them had low participation rate, 18 percent medium rate and 71 percent had high participation rate.
Regarding the Likert Scale in sense of security (from 1 to 5), the mean score of participation rate for citizens of Zone 1 was 3. As 40.6 percent of population had an income above 600 thousands Tomans and 41.6 percent between 400 to 600 thousands Tomans and about one half of them had an academic education, higher participation rate was expected, while the obtained figure is a little higher than medium level. Concerning the higher level of income and education in the status quo and the obtained figure of the participation rate, it can be expected that in the future the participation rate will be higher.
4. Conclusion
The descriptive results of the participation indicate that most of the citizens residing in the zone participate more in affairs such as protecting parks and green spaces, paying taxes and urban complications and participation in managing urban affairs. The citizen participation rate in presenting ideas and suggestions to urban managers is in lower level.
The analytical results indicate that there is a significant correlation between the variables of sense of belonging of citizens to their residing place and their participation rate in urban management. This means that those citizens who are loyal to their residing places and have great sense of belonging are more interested in participating in urban affairs than those citizens who have not such a sense and also those citizens who are more satisfied with urban managers.
The results of regression test indicate that based on the value of coefficients, i.e., beta variables of ownership type, education level, housing quality, marital status, income and type of job could determine 55 percent of variability of dependent variable (participation in urban management). Generally, the results related to correlations and regression analyses are consistent with theoretical approach of the research. The results also confirm the research hypotheses except the variable housing quality which had no significant correlation with urban management.
In other words, married individuals, citizens who are owners of their houses, those who enjoy high level of income and education and housing quality were more tended to participate in urban management.
Finally, it should be noted that citizens residing in the studied zone, regarding their medium and high social and economic status, have not understood that social participation is important for urban sustainable development.
Analytical results of data showed that as belonging sense of citizens to their residence heightened, their satisfaction with urban services and facilities increased and their socio-economic status promoted, their inclination toward participation in urban management increased. In general, findings suggest that all of the citizens resided in the understudied area, regarding their high and average socio-economic status, have not yet concluded that citizens’ participation is considered as one component of urban sustainable development.

Key Words: Participative Citizenship, Optimization, Urban Management, Mashhad City.