Since its inception in 2020, membership of the International Parliament Engagement Network (IPEN) has continued to grow, with new members joining us from different parts of the world on an ongoing basis.
We’re delighted to announce that we now have over 400 members in the network. The reach of our membership now covers over 70 countries and six continents.
Cristina Leston-Bandeira, Professor of Politics at the University of Leeds and Chair of IPEN, said:
“We never quite envisaged that our membership would expand this much. We’re delighted to have members recently joining us from such diverse countries as Australia, Ghana and Madagascar.
“The sharing of different experiences, knowledge and challenges from all corners of the world is what makes the IPEN community so rich.”
The International Parliament Engagement Network brings together academics, parliamentary officials and third sector representatives from across the world, to promote collaboration and encourage knowledge sharing around parliaments and public engagement.
IPEN connects its members through the sharing of research and reports, facilitating introductions, discussions and exchanges via MS Teams and hosting professional development seminars online. Being a part of a unique global network brings a range of benefits to IPEN’s 400+ members and, amongst other things, has initiated collaboration between officials from different parliaments and enhancement of engagement practices thanks to evidence-based research.
We asked our members to tell us (in just one sentence) the most important thing that being a part of IPEN has brought to their work or research.
Caroline Wallis is Education Lead at the New Zealand Parliament. Caroline has been a member of IPEN since 2021 and became the newest member of the Executive Board earlier this year. Caroline said:
“I think being a part of IPEN has opened my eyes to the depth and breadth of research based practice there is for parliamentary public engagement.
“It has helped me think about what is important to consider for initiatives, and gives me inspiration for future work.”
Other lovely feedback from our IPEN members indicates the range of benefits to being a part of our global network:
“It’s so hard to restrict this to one sentence, but I think being a member of IPEN has broadened my horizons in that it has enabled me to not only connect with people who work in and study other parliaments across the world, but I’m also able to listen and read first-hand about activities and operations from those parliaments. And that is something I cherish.”
“Becoming part of a rich network of nice people with interesting questions and helpful answers and getting a so much broader scope of parliamentary issues and practices all over the world. Big thank you to the team for facilitating this!”
“For me it is a gateway to facilitate further international engagements with parliamentary people who have similar experiences and a rich bounty of knowledge, expertise and assistance to share.”
“IPEN to me is a community of experience and professional experts who have really revolutionised various sectors of our society through idea and knowledge exchange, and in addressing the most critical issues facing leadership and Sustainable Development Goals. IPEN has been a professional learning space, value base network community and policy development springboard for me.”
“I am sorry, one sentence can’t be enough to write about the meaning and benefit of IPEN vision and mission in our world society today. Keep up the good work because the impact is an history [sic].”
“IPEN has been a pure joy since I joined. The webinars and data available on here are very crucial to my work.”
“My sentence is ‘I agree with all of the above’! Honestly – this is such an amazing space and I only wish I was able to spend more time here and my aim for 2024 is to do so! Thanks Cristina Leston Bandeira and team for your creation and curation of this space.”
“As a recent member, I’ve found IPEN provides an opportunity to learn from and network with others who value public participation in parliamentary practice and democracy generally, as well as offering a space to discover good practices around the world.”
We would like to offer a huge thanks to all of our members for being a part of our ever-growing network and for their many contributions – not only within the network itself, but more significantly in promoting and practicing parliamentary public engagement in their work and research across the globe.