Co-Creation and Coproduction in Public Services

Co-creation and coproduction represent collaborative paradigms in which citizens, users and professionals jointly design, deliver and evaluate public services. Moving beyond traditional top-down models, these approaches harness the lived experience, insights and creativity of stakeholders to generate services that are more responsive, effective and equitable. While coproduction typically focuses on shared delivery and management of services alongside professionals, co-creation often emphasises front-end design and innovation. Both rely on interactive methods—such as participatory workshops, living labs and digital platforms—to foster iterative feedback, mutual learning and trust. Applications span health care, social care, urban planning, education and digital governance, with examples including patient-centred health system redesign, community policing initiatives and policy innovation labs. Success depends on institutional support, facilitation capacities, clear role definitions and attention to power relations. Key challenges involve securing sustainable resources, avoiding tokenistic engagement and developing flexible impact-assessment frameworks. In an era of fiscal constraint and complex societal challenges, co-creation and coproduction offer a route to resilient, user-driven innovation and more democratic modes of governance.

Research from Nature Portfolio

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Co-Creation and Coproduction in Public Services publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in co-creation and coproduction in public services across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Co-Creation: A collaborative process in which service users and providers jointly develop new services or policies, emphasising front-end design and innovation.

Coproduction: A mode of service delivery where users and professionals share responsibility for planning, execution and evaluation of public services.

Experience-Based Co-Design: A method combining qualitative narratives from service users and staff with facilitated workshops to identify priorities for improvement.

Participatory Design: An approach that actively involves stakeholders in the design process of services or products to ensure outcomes meet their needs.

References

1. Detecting and managing the mechanism of perceived meaningfulness of work and digital transformation in public sector health and social care services. Technological Forecasting and Social Change (2023).
2. The co-production of what? Knowledge, values, and social relations in health care. PLOS Biology (2017).
3. In pursuit of rigour and accountability in participatory design. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies (2015).
4. Co-production for innovation: the urban living lab experience*. Policy and Society (2017).
5. Codesigning health and other public services with vulnerable and disadvantaged populations: Insights from an international collaboration. Health Expectations (2019).
6. Generating ‘good enough’ evidence for co-production. Evidence & Policy (2017).
7. Implementing patient-centred cancer care: using experience-based co-design to improve patient experience in breast and lung cancer services. Supportive Care in Cancer (2012).
8. Governing methods: policy innovation labs, design and data science in the digital governance of education. Journal of Educational Administration & History (2015).