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Participation is not an easy term to define. Several expressions are given as equivalent: empowerment, development of the power to act, self-determination..., and they are the subject of many debates. It can be most simply summarized as the exercise of a fundamental right to citizenship. There are, however, many difficulties, and these are compounded by the particular difficulties of vulnerable groups. What can be done for, and with, people who do not always have either the material means or the means of understanding to become involved on an equal footing with decision-makers? The question is one of democracy, but also of the forms of support, especially when the objectives of participation come up against professional cultures inherited from the past and from a past that is still close.