When a plan, a meeting, or a way of running things is participatory, the people who will be affected help decide — not only the people in charge. The word is a little formal. You hear it with towns, schools, and public money: a participatory process, participatory budgeting (people in the town help choose how some of the money is spent). It describes the method, not the person. You participate; the method is participatory. People stretch it: a meeting may get called participatory even when only a few voices really count.