Grassroots Politics and Participatory Budgeting in Poland
Milena Kowalska, Poland’s youngest municipal councillor, tells us about her experiences with participatory budgeting.
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Can Citizens Influence Europarty Manifestos?
As the 2024 EU election campaigns loom, the question arises: How can ordinary citizens play a more active role in shaping the activities of Europarties? To shed light on this vital issue, we spoke to Alberto Alemanno, founder of The Good Lobby.
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Preventing Green Backlashes
The recent ULEZ protests in London were just the latest in a series of backlashes against new climate policies. Green participatory platforms could be the key to ensuring that new measures are fair and meet with widespread public approval.
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Brussels Permanent Citizens’ Assembly on Climate
Brussels is now home to the world’s first permanent Citizens' Assembly on Climate. Can permanent climate assemblies like this one help overcome the short term thinking of representative democracy and make our societies stronger and more cohesive?
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Growing A Culture of Participation in Luxembourg
When Luxembourg set out to simplify its administrative procedures, the country’s Ministry for Digitalisation launched an online platform to allow citizens to get involved. We spoke to Martine Kerschen and Paula Almeida from the Ministry for Digitalisation about the platform.
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Rethinking Participatory Processes and Public Representation in Ireland
With a Master's in Multimedia Systems and a PhD in Political Science, Vanessa Liston founded CiviQ in 2013 to equip Irish local authorities with consultation tools rooted in deliberative democracy. We spoke about her experience of democracy, the values behind CiviQ, and her project to reshape public representation in Ireland.
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Participation Needs Better Storytelling
Participative processes are often depicted as a quick and easy way of achieving political change. This makes them attractive to the public – but it can lead to frustration when results don't follow immediately. Gianluca Sgueo argues that citizens' participation needs to develop a new kind of storytelling that acknowledges the complexity of political processes.
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AI in Digital Citizens’ Participation – Where Do We Stand?
Webinar Recap | On 10 August, democracy-technologies.org hosted the webinar “AI in Digital Citizens Participation – Where do we Stand?” Robert Bjarnason (Citizens Foundation), Bianca Lüders (Agency for Geoinformation and Surveying, City of Hamburg) and Eva Mayer (CitizenLab) joined us to talk about how they are integrating AI into their platforms.
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“Pirate is a State of Mind”
From file sharing advocates and anonymous hacktivists to the halls of power, the global network of Pirate Parties has pioneered the application of digital technologies to democracy and the promotion of human rights.
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How Ukraine Is Involving Citizens In Its Reconstruction Efforts
Interview | Ukraine may still be fighting a war, but its reconstruction efforts are already underway. As a pioneer in digital participation, the country is developing a digital tool that will increase transparency and allow citizens to help shape the rebuilding process.
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Brussels Voice – Can Participatory Democracy Replace the Right to Vote?
One in three people living in Brussels is non-Belgian. This means they cannot vote in regional elections. This year, Commissioner Brussels is working with the regional parliament to set up a citizen panel of international citizens of Brussels. The goal: to give them a voice in how the city where they live is run. Democracy Technologies spoke with project officer, Bryn Watkins, about what they hope to achieve and why it’s complicated
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Balancing Analogue and Digital in Participation Projects
When it comes to participation, digital tools might not always be the best fit for the job. We spoke to Participation Factory project manager Renáta Balogh about her work on different projects in the Czech Republic, how every project needs a unique approach and some of the challenges in applying technical solutions.
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Can EurHope Involve 1 Million Young People in EU Politics?
EU Public Affairs Manager, Nahr, is upbeat in spite of the polycrises Europe currently faces as it looks towards next year’s European elections. “The good news is that destiny is in our hands – we’re not doomed, there is space for hope and destiny”, he says. Nahr is referring to the EurHope project that launched […]
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Scotland Embraces Digital Democracy at Parliamentary Level
What happens when digital approaches to deliberative democracy are adopted at parliamentary level? The Scottish parliament tells us more.
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What If Participation Was More Like A Game?
If you’ve recently spent time on Duolingo, claimed airmiles or downloaded an exercise app like Zombies, Run!, you’re familiar with the basic elements of gamification. Commercial enterprises have used features that we typically associate with games – goals and challenges, point scoring, personalisation and rapid, visible feedback for decades to increase consumer engagement. But what […]
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