Cross-Border Collaboration in Practice: A Case Study of Deliberative Democracy

As part of our work on cross-border collaboration across the community and voluntary sector, The Wheel is showcasing how organisations are working across jurisdictions to address shared challenges and strengthen communities. 

Cross-border collaboration can open up new opportunities for learning, innovation and impact, but it also brings unique challenges. For organisations working on shared social, environmental and civic issues, collaboration across jurisdictions can help create stronger networks, amplify community voices and tackle problems across borders. 

In this Q&A, we speak with Rebekah McCabe from Involve, a charity dedicated to public participation and deliberative democracy. From launching the All-Island Better Democracy Network to delivering the island of Ireland's first-ever cross-border citizens' jury, Involve has been at the forefront of creating opportunities for people to come together and shape decisions that affect their lives. They share their journey, the lessons they learned along the way, and their advice for others considering cross-border collaboration.  

Tell us a bit about your organisation 

Involve is a charity that works on public participation and deliberative democracy. We work all across the UK, and have a permanent base in Belfast, allowing us to work with partners across the border too. 

What was your journey towards cross border collaboration like?  

We've long been passionate about cross-border collaboration on democracy. Many of the challenges we face in the North don't begin or end at the border, issues like climate change and biodiversity loss, infrastructure, and shared resources. In 2024, we launched the All-Island Better Democracy Network to help others interested in citizen-led democracy connect, learn, and collaborate. Then in 2026, we had an extraordinary opportunity to do something genuinely groundbreaking: the first ever cross-border citizens' jury. Using a method called democratic lottery, the jury brought together ordinary people from both the northern and southern shores of Carlingford Lough to deliberate on the Lough's future and on how best to balance economic development with ecological recovery.

This matters because, although both communities are equally affected by activities on the Lough, the border adds considerable complexity to how they get their voices heard. Our project was a way of bringing those ordinary residents into conversation with one another, and with the people who decide what happens to the Lough. They are passionate about their shared landscape and want a future of deeper connections, greater equity between the shores, better governance and transparency, and stronger protections for the Lough itself. 

What have you learned from the experience? Are there any challenges you have had to overcome?  

Designing a citizens' jury on a cross-border basis is far more challenging than working within a single jurisdiction, and most of what we learned came from problems we didn't anticipate. 

The practical mechanics double. Winter storms affected An Post more than Royal Mail, creating postal delays on the southern shore, a reminder that even something as basic as sending invitations can't be assumed to work the same way on both sides of the border. In the end, after adapting our recruitment methods, the Jury's membership was balanced, and we learned to build in extra time and redundancy at every logistical step rather than treating the two jurisdictions as interchangeable. 

Information is rarely symmetrical. Data, records, and public reporting often exist in different forms or to different standards on each side, which made it harder to give jurors a shared factual starting point. Reconciling that took real effort, and we didn’t manage to find symmetrical information in many cases.  

There are simply more people to bring along. Twice the elected representatives, twice the public bodies, twice the stakeholders to engage and keep informed. We were fortunate to have brilliant partners in The Wheel's Shifting Tides project team, who had already done a great deal of work building those cross-border networks. We also convened an Advice and Impact group that reflected the cross-border nature of the location: both ports were represented; we involved people with expertise in cross-border governance, economy, and civic collaboration who could keep us pointed in the right direction; and membership was evenly distributed between those living in either jurisdiction more broadly. 

And the right expertise is scarce. Finding experts who genuinely understood the cross-boundary nature of the Lough rather than just one side of it was its own challenge. Happily, those who did have that expertise were generous with their time, and we were lucky to have people who could speak to both sides of the border. Even so, some evidence skewed more heavily towards one jurisdiction than the other, local businesses being one example, which is something we had to stay alert to. 

How has this experience helped to grow or strengthen your organisation? 

In more ways than we expected when we started. 

It built relationships that will outlast the project. The networks we developed with The Wheel's Shifting Tides team and with the cross-border experts who guided our Advice and Impact group haven't dissolved now that the jury has concluded. We've come out of this with a standing set of partners and contacts across both jurisdictions that simply didn't exist for us before, and that we can draw on for whatever comes next. 

It gave us a method we can repeat. Having actually designed and delivered a cross-border citizens' jury and not just theorised about one - we're now among a small number of organisations anywhere who know how to do this in practice. We understand where it gets hard, what to plan for, and how to hold a deliberative process together across a border. That's expertise we can offer others, and increasingly people are coming to us to ask how it was done. It expanded our sense of what we can take on. Pulling off something this logistically and politically complex has shifted our own expectations of ourselves. Challenges that would once have seemed prohibitive now feel like problems to be solved, and it has given us the confidence to consider bigger and more ambitious cross-border work in future. 

It raised our profile and credibility. Delivering a genuine first - the first ever cross-border citizens' jury on the island of Ireland - has opened conversations and doors that even parallel projects within each jurisdiction wouldn't have. In an often divided place, demonstrating that ordinary people can find agreement on big, complex and deeply serious issues is an important thing to do. 

What would you tell others who are embarking on their cross border collaboration journey? 

A few things we wish we'd fully appreciated at the outset. 

Plan for two of everything. Two postal systems, two sets of public bodies, two regulatory contexts. Even if you are familiar with both jurisdictions (I'm from Roscommon and have lived in Belfast for 17 years!) don't assume that anything will carry over cleanly from one side to the other, and build in extra time wherever the logistics cross the border. 

Find your bridge-builders early. The single most valuable thing we had was people and partners who genuinely understood both sides. They're scarce, but they're worth seeking out from the very beginning, and in our experience they were incredibly happy to help.  

Mind the asymmetries. Information, data and evidence rarely exist in the same form or to the same standard across a border. If those things are part of your project, map where the gaps are early - and be honest, with yourself and anyone relying on the work, about where the picture is fuller on one side than the other. 

Build relationships that outlast the project. The networks you create are as much an outcome as anything the project itself produces. Treat them as something to sustain. 

Remember that ordinary people often find it easier to collaborate across a border than institutions do. The divisions that complicate things at an official level matter far less to residents who already share a landscape, a livelihood, or a concern. That instinct to cooperate is something to build on. 

And do it anyway. It is harder than working within a single jurisdiction, but meaningfully harder. If you're considering it, we'd encourage you to take it on.  

The launch event for the Citizens' Jury on the Future of Carlingford Lough report will take place on Friday 26 June. Register here: https://luma.com/tndqelxf