My paper will, firstly, review the concepts of participation as encountered in mainstream planning theory and practice throughout the 20th century. Secondly, it will question their assumptions on the enactment of urban democracy, the production of urban space as well as the organization of participation itself. Thirdly, it will present a relational perspective on the production of the city, and from there reformulate participation as a contested political concept, which recreates the relational city's orderings on a daily basis and thus make urban life risky, uncertain - and finally, also quite beautiful.
