Electoral participation allows citizens to elect their representatives.
From the Latin participatĭo , participation is the action and effect of taking part (taking or receiving part of something, sharing, informing). The term can be used to refer to the capacity of citizens to get involved in the political decisions of a country or region.
In this sense, we can talk about citizen participation through elections, referendums or plebiscites. The most common method of participation is voting every certain period of time to choose the representatives of the people. This is known as representative democracy (the people elect the members of the Executive and Legislative Branches ).
Beyond electoral participation , citizen participation in politics can be achieved through other mechanisms, such as action in non-governmental organizations or public demonstrations. For example: “We need the participation of the people to block this authoritarian project of the government” , “The plebiscite had a massive participation of the city” .
The concept in finance
Participation is also the part that a person or group owns in the capital of a business : "The Russian magnate has just acquired a minority stake in the telecommunications group" , "Telefónica decided to sell its stake in the Italian operator due to the increase in its liabilities" , "A young Englishman invested his savings in the purchase of a stake in the club he loves" .
Within this commercial sphere, it is worth highlighting the existence of what is known as a joint account , which involves merchants taking care of the operations of others without having established any type of formal contract between them.
Demonstrations and marches are a form of citizen participation.
Preferred shares
Similarly, we should refer to, for example, the so-called preferred shares . These are characterized by being an asset with a high financial risk, which means that thanks to them, numerous benefits can be obtained but also that everything invested can be lost.
These shares have become the focus of Spain's financial news in recent years, and various banking institutions in the country have not hesitated to sell them to their clients without properly explaining to them what risk they entailed and that what they were signing was an almost certain loss of their assets.
For this reason, they have filed complaints against the banks and savings banks that have carried out this fraud and many of these claims are still awaiting judgment before the relevant authority. However, in other places the financial institutions have returned all the money to the clients who bet on the preferred shares.
An invitation and a part of a lottery ticket
Participation is, on the other hand, a notice or part that is given to someone : "Did you know that Claudia is getting married? I received the participation yesterday" , "Don't worry, I'm going to send you a participation" .
However, we must not forget that the part of a lottery number that is played is also known as a share. Thus, for example, in many cases there are tickets and then there are shares, which cost less than tickets and are a part of them. Therefore, if the prize is won by the person who has a full ticket, he will get a larger amount than the person who had a share.