Storlek och påverkansmöjlighet: Om hur medborgarråds förutsättningar att påverka politiken varierar med kommunstorlek.

Sammanfattning: The problem of the perfect territorial size is an old one. It was discussed as early as in ancient Greece and picked up again by Dahl and Tufte with their book Size and Democracy. In this thesis, the subject is further developed when participation by citizens in politics is studied. The conditions for influencing the political decisions are investigated and citizen boards are chosen for studying. The design is qualitative and comparative, and focus groups are the main method used. Apart from the theory of size and democracy, the thesis also uses political efficacy to give a greater understanding of the results. The analysis shows that five conditions are affected by municipal size. The recruitment process is more socially based and the members have a lower degree of internal political efficacy in a smaller municipality. The channels for contacting politicians are also more informal and the communication is more personal. Consequently, politicians have a bigger responsibility for showing interest and supporting participating citizens. Due to a larger system, transparency is lower in a big municipality. The risk of being forgotten as a citizen board is also greater with the increase in size.