The Project addresses innovation at three different levels:
• of process, as it addresses the need to complement post-earthquake physical reconstruction with initiatives for the revitalisation, creating connections between urban, economic and social, cultural and environmental dimensions.
• of method, as it promotes a decentralised, site-specific and bottom-up approach, based on the engagement of different levels of governance, citizens and local stakeholders and it grants local community its key role as driver of the territorial revitalisation.
• of outcome, as it returns a framework of plans and proposals for urban and socio-economic regeneration while at the same time ensuring that services and projects effectively respond to real needs; strengthening mutual trust between institutions and citizens; empowering local community; fostering inclusion and social cohesion; strengthening the sense of belonging and identity; legitimising and facilitating the implementation of policies.

The project, concerted in February 2023, was carried out from April to November, in particular through: questionnaires on the perception of the urban system; on-site collection of positive/negative impressions of the town users and visitors; workshop with children; workshop with the elderly; meeting between institutional and economic actors; round table between the administrators of now and then; meeting with citizens. As a outcome of this process, the Framework Document for Urban Regeneration and Participation in Santo Stefano di Sessanio was drafted, which gives an insight of the path undertaken, the themes and perceptions gathered and the lines of action and operational guidelines detected. The document was presented publicly in the presence of institutions and local actors on 16 December, opening the second, more operational phase of the project and giving start to a new participatory process that includes 7 other municipalities in partnership with USRC and the Abruzzo Region.

The municipality of Santo Stefano di Sessanio and USRC jointly promoted and implemented the project. They defined and oriented its development, identifying the techniques and methods for participation and interaction that best suited the specific context each time. USRC took care of the textual and graphic editing, both preparatory and of project closure; the municipality, besides providing physical spaces, played a central role in disseminating the initiatives and involving the participants.

All the actors and players of the project are at the same time the beneficiaries, including the promoting bodies and the municipality in particular. Central actors and active participants in the project were: citizens of all kinds and ages; specifically, the fragile - the elderly and children; users and visitors; economic operators and trade associations; municipal administrators from previous terms of office since 1975; mayors of neighbouring municipalities.

The Project led to the construction of a shared framework on strengths, issues, needs and proposals for a site-specific and bottom-up revitalization of Santo Stefano di Sessanio. Out of 115 inhabitants, a total of 159 people actively participated in the 7 stages organised. 7 lines of action were identified, articulated in a total of 26 operational guidelines, to which the municipal administration committed to refer to when planning initiatives/actions or submitting proposals under regeneration-dedicated resources. Moreover, realised that the challenges of today for this and other rural areas can only be faced at territorial scale, an inter-municipal path with 7 other municipalities has just been launched to pursue effective strategies.

Considered the very limited population size of the town, only 115 inhabitants, the first challenge was to manage to involve a minimum number of participants at each stage that could animate a constructive consultation and could be effectively representative of the territory. With regard to each individual event, due to the uncertainty of the actual number of participants right up to the end, combined with the occurrence of unforeseeable events such as adverse weather conditions and a bereavement in the community, the preconfigured participatory methods had to be adapted on the spot each time.

In order to ensure the effective success of the initiative and not to further fuel discontent in the local community, it is key for the decision makers to actually incorporate the contributes gathered along the process within planning acts and to progressively implement those projects lines over time. Moreover, it is important that the participatory process launched does not end for Santo Stefano di Sessanio with the conclusion of the project, but rather that the municipality pursues the appropriation, recognition and consolidation of the bottom-up approach to turn it in an institutional and permanent practice. The involvement of the regional authority is equally important so that this experience does not remain an isolated case in Abruzzo.

The project implemented in Santo Stefano di Sessanio was presented to neighbouring municipalities and the Abruzzo Region as a pilot project for the activation of bottom-up and participative initiatives aimed at the urban regeneration and socio-economic revitalisation of the Crater municipalities and rural areas in general. A first replication at inter-municipal scale was announced on 16 December and is about to happen, regarding Santo Stefano di Sessanio along with 7 other neighbouring municipalities, in partnership with the Region and USRC. It is plausible that other social innovation initiatives or bottom-up processes for revitalization of rural areas may be triggered by these experiences.

Participation creates an expectation that cannot be disregarded, otherwise risking to produce negative effects that exacerbate the disconnection and distance between local communities, especially those who already feel most excluded, and public administrations. People may be encouraged to get involved and engage in participatory process if there is assurance that it will have a real impact on their actual condition and if the appropriate methods are set up so that everyone, even the most fragile, is included and is guaranteed a free-of-conditions space to freely express themselves without fear of being compromised or judged. Finally, participation requires flexible methods and timeframes.

USRC was established in 2012 to provide technical assistance to the Crater municipalities, among which Santo Stefano di Sessanio, in the post-earthquake reconstruction processes. USRC, along with the municipalities, understood that the physical reconstruction process needs to be complemented by actions for the territorial revitalization; that it is key to include the re-built heritage within socio-economic systems capable of enhancing it and of stimulating its reappropriation by local communities; that is essential to promote initiatives to turn decaying towns into attractive and liveable places so that opportunities of negative-trends-reversal and growth may be generated. And that this transformation must be led by local communities.