Polder parliament: artistic co-creation, ecology & social cohesion in the Hounspolder

Polder Parliament: Artistic Co-creation, Ecology & Social Cohesion in the Hounspolder investigates how participatory artistic practice can strengthen relationships between human and more-than-human communities in peri-urban landscapes undergoing ecological and socio-spatial pressure. Centred on the Hounspolder on the edge of Leeuwarden, the project combines artistic research, ecological and ornithological fieldwork, ethnography, and co-creative cultural programming to cultivate social cohesion, environmental awareness, and shared stewardship.
Structured through interconnected work packages, the project begins with knowledge exchange and preliminary research, followed by a co-created cultural programme and literature review, ecological field studies, and ethnographic impact monitoring. These processes feed into a culminating series of public outputs including the Polder Parliament Festival, the collaboratively authored Hounspolder Treaty, and a comprehensive suite of final research deliverables: a Field Guide, policy recommendations, a game, a digital toolkit, peer-reviewed article, and an impact assessment report.
The project is anchored in strategic pillars: fostering interspecies democracy through accessible cultural participation in free time; ensuring equality between partners by grounding research questions in the lived concerns of or consortium partner; and sustaining rigorous, iterative quality control through transdisciplinary methods. Through workshops, collective field encounters, storytelling, and site-specific artistic interventions, residents, artists, ecologists, newcomers, and volunteers reimagine the polder as a shared, multispecies commons with experience in democratic experimentations.
Expected outcomes include strengthened social networks, enhanced ecological literacy, and a deepened sense of belonging among diverse community members. By demonstrating how creativity and co-creation can support both social resilience and ecological care, the project generates a durable legacy: a replicable model for cultural co-creation in peri-urban areas that enhances civic participation, fosters inclusive environmental governance, and supports regenerative futures.