What next for digital social innovation? Realising the potential of people and technology to tackle social challenges

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Matt Stokes et al at nesta: “This report, and accompanying guide, produced as part of the DSI4EU project, maps the projects and organisations using technology to tackle social challenges across Europe, and explores the barriers to the growth of digital social innovation.

Key findings

  • There are almost 2,000 organisations and over 1,000 projects involved in digital social innovation (DSI) across Europe, with the highest concentration of activity in Western and Southern Europe.
  • Despite this activity, there are relatively few examples of DSI initiatives delivering impact at scale. The growth of DSI is being held back by barriers at the system level and at the level of individual projects.
  • Projects and organisations involved in DSI are still relatively poorly connected to each other. There is a pressing need to grow strong networks within and across countries and regions to boost collaboration and knowledge-sharing.
  • The growth of DSI is being held back by lack of funding and investment across the continent, especially outside Western Europe, and structural digital skills shortages.
  • Civil society organisations and the public sector have been slow to adopt DSI, despite the opportunity it offers them to deliver better services at a lower cost, although there are emerging examples of good practice from across Europe.
  • Practitioners struggle to engage citizens and users, understand and measure the impact of their digital social innovations, and plan for growth and sustainability.

Across Europe, thousands of people, projects and organisations are using digital technologies to tackle social challenges in fields like healthcare, education, employment, democratic participation, migration and the environment. We call this phenomenon digital social innovation.

Through crowdmapping DSI across Europe, we find that there are almost 2,000 organisations and over 1,000 projects using open and collaborative technologies to tackle social challenges. We complement this analysis by piloting experimental data methods such as Twitter analysis to understand in further depth the distribution of DSI across Europe. You can explore the data on projects and organisations on digitalsocial.eu.

However, despite widespread activity, few initiatives have grown to deliver impact at scale, to be institutionalised, or to become “the new normal”.

In this research, we find that weak networks between stakeholders, insufficient funding and investment, skills shortages, and slow adoption by public sector and established civil society organisations is holding back the growth of DSI…(More)”.

Most City Employees in US Not Engaged

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Steven Bosacker and Justin Bibb at Gallup: “Falling revenues, major demographic shifts and rising citizen demands have become the new normal for city governments across the U.S. If city halls want to deliver on their promises to provide high-quality services, they’ll need to find better ways to make government run more effectively.

One big way to do that is to view every city employee as a key contributor to their success.

Every single one.

Local elected officials who treat their public workforce as anything less than their No. 1 resource are missing the boat. City employees are usually the largest line item in the budget. They know firsthand the public’s concerns because they’re on the front lines, and often they exhibit the exact depth of commitment to the community we’d want and expect from such service providers.

The problem is, only 29% of full-time local — as well as state — government workers are engaged at work, according to Gallup’s 2016 “State of Local and State Government Workers’ Engagement in the U.S.” report. This mirrors engagement for government workers at the federal level. (Among the U.S. workforce overall, 33% of employees are currently engaged in their jobs.) As a result, 71% of full-time state and local government workers are unhappy or disengaged with their jobs, and this creates a missed opportunity for city administrators to drive innovation and move their communities forward.

Gallup also finds that disengaged employees may meet their job expectations but do not expend discretionary energy or feel passion for their work.

Gallup estimates that a lack of engagement among government employees costs U.S. taxpayers an estimated $18 billion per year. That’s a high price tag for losing out on this discretionary energy. On the positive side, big productivity gains are possible when local governments fully and creatively deploy that same discretionary energy.

Many cities attempt to measure and increase their employees’ engagement and commitment to doing good work through regular employee surveys, often juxtaposed with equally important resident surveys to understand key issues of public concern. Gathering such information about what motivates and activates civil servants isn’t just cost-effective — it’s also smart….(More)”.

Tech Companies Should Speak Up for Refugees, Not Only High-Skilled Immigrants

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Mark Latonero at Harvard Business Review: “The Trump administration’s latest travel ban is back in U.S. federal court. The Fourth Circuit, based in Virginia, and Ninth Circuit, based in San Francisco, are hearing cases challenging the latest executive order banning immigrants and refugees from six Muslim majority countries from entering the United States. Joining the fray are 162 technology companies, whose lawyers collectively filed an amicus brief to both courts. Amazon, eBay, Google, Facebook, Netflix, and Uber are among the companies urging federal judges to rule against the executive order, detailing why it is unjust and how it would hurt their businesses.

While the 40-page brief is filled with arguments in support of immigration, it hardly speaks about refugees, except to note that those seeking protection should be welcomed. Any multinational company with a diverse workforce would be concerned about limits to international hiring and employee travel. But tech companies should also be concerned about the refugee populations that depend on their digital services for safety and survival.

In researching migration and the refugee crisis in Europe, my team and I interviewed over 140 refugees from Syria, and I’ve learned that technology has been crucial to those fleeing war and violence across the Middle East and North Africa. Services like Google Maps, Facebook, WhatsApp, Skype, and Western Union have helped refugees find missing loved ones or locate safe places to sleep. Mobile phones have been essential — refugees have even used them on sinking boats to call rescue officials patrolling the Mediterranean.

Refugees’ reliance on these platforms demonstrates what tech companies often profess: that innovation can empower people to improve their lives and society. Tech companies did not intend for their tools to facilitate one of the largest mass movements of refugees in history, but they have a responsibility to look out for the safety and security of the vulnerable consumers using their products.

Some tech companies have intervened directly in the refugee crisis. Google has created apps to help refugees in Greece find medical facilities and other services; Facebook promised to provide free Wi-Fi in U.N. refugee camps. A day after President Trump issued the first travel ban, which initially suspended the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program, Airbnb announced it would provide free housing to refugees left stranded….

The sector should extend these efforts by making sure its technologies aren’t used to target broad groups of people based on nationality or religion. Already the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CPB) is asking for the social media accounts — even passwords — of visitors from other counties. The Council on American-Islamic Relations has filed complaints against the CPB, stating that Muslim American citizens have been subjected to enhanced screening that includes scrutiny of their social media accounts and cell phones.

Trump has talked about creating a database to identify and register Muslims in America, including refugees. A number of companies, including IBM, Microsoft, and Salesforce, have stated they will not help build a Muslim registry if asked by the government. In addition, a group of nearly 3,000 American tech employees signed an online pledge promising they would not develop data processing systems to help the U.S. government target individuals based on race, religion, or national origin….(More)”.

Building a Better Relationship Between Citizens and Governments

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Felipe Estefan at Positive Returns: “Right now you don’t have to look very hard to find evidence of the tense, often broken, relationship between between citizens and their governments around the world.

Nowhere is this more apparent than in Brazil. In just the past couple of years the country has faced the impeachment of a President, numerous major corruption scandals, and most recently the news that investigations are being opened into the conduct of more than 100 high-ranking political officials.

Each of these incidents has deepened the distrust of government and those that hold privileged positions of power in Brazil. At the same time this is reinforcing the belief that those in power operate to a different set of rules that are focused on self-interest rather than public good….

When governments fail to listen to and provide the services citizens need, opportunities are removed. If we are to restore the relationship between citizens and governments many things need to change. Not the least is the ability of citizens to have their voices heard and their needs met by government, and in turn for governments to be more efficient and effective in their responses….Colab — a Brazilian civic technology startup which provides a social network for engagement between citizens and local governments.

Colab provides citizens an opportunity to report local issues and suggest urban improvements, such as potholes, illegal car parking, public lighting, broken sidewalks, among others. It also allows citizens to proactively participate in the decisions that will impact their future and the futures of those around them.

For local governments, Colab offers a workflow management and engagement tool, as well as a data analytics system to manage and respond to citizens’ requests and to better evaluate their own performance.

Colab has already reached over 130 municipalities in Brazil, including Santos, Campinas, Niteroi, and Teresina. Across the country, they have over 150,000 members. So far the platform has enabled citizens from across these municipalities to submit more than 85,000 reports, with local governments responding to over 75% of those.

For instance, in Niteroi a citizen reported an issue with the drainage in the streets. Government resolved the issue and informed the citizen through the Colab platform. In a similar case in Pelotas, a citizen reported an issue with a pothole which government didn’t address correctly. Using the Colab platform the citizen engaged with government again to ensure to appropriate resolution of the issue. Similar cases in which government has successfully addressed the issues reported by citizens can be found in municipalities from Teresina to Recife.

Colab has been so successful at creating a vital bridge between citizens and local governments that it is now being used for a wide-range of purposes, from conducting participatory budgeting consultations to managing the outbreak of Zika….(More)”.

Tragic Design

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Book by Cynthia Savard Saucier and Jonathan Shariat: “Bad design is everywhere, and its cost is much higher than we think. In this thought-provoking book, authors Jonathan Shariat and Cynthia Savard Saucier explain how poorly designed products can anger, sadden, exclude, and even kill people who use them. The designers responsible certainly didn’t intend harm, so what can you do to avoid making similar mistakes?

Tragic Design examines real case studies that show how certain design choices adversely affected users, and includes in-depth interviews with authorities in the design industry. Pick up this book and learn how you can be an agent of change in the design community and at your company.

You’ll explore:

  • Designs that can kill, including the bad interface that doomed a young cancer patient
  • Designs that anger, through impolite technology and dark patterns
  • How design can inadvertently cause emotional pain
  • Designs that exclude people through lack of accessibility, diversity, and justice
  • How to advocate for ethical design when it isn’t easy to do so
  • Tools and techniques that can help you avoid harmful design decisions
  • Inspiring professionals who use design to improve our world…(More)”.

Handbook of Behavioural Economics and Smart Decision-Making

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Handbook edited by Morris Altman: “… a unique and original contribution of over thirty chapters on behavioural economics, examining and addressing an important stream of research where the starting assumption is that decision-makers are for the most part relatively smart or rational. This particular approach is in contrast to a theme running through much contemporary work where individuals’ behaviour is deemed irrational, biased, and error-prone, often due to how people are hardwired. In the smart people approach, where errors or biases occur and when social dilemmas arise, more often than not, improving the decision-making environment can repair these problems without hijacking or manipulating the preferences of decision-makers. This book covers a wide-range of themes from micro to macro, including various sub-disciplines within economics such as economic psychology, heuristics, fast and slow-thinking, neuroeconomics, experiments, the capabilities approach, institutional economics, methodology, nudging, ethics, and public policy….(More)”.

Making cities wiser – Crowdsourcing for better decisions

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Maarit Kahila and Anna Broberg at FIG: “The need in urban planning to make knowledge-driven decisions has spurred the creation of new solutions to gather and utilize insight from residents. Participatory planning has often been realized through workshops and during face-to-face encounters, but little of the knowledge gathered in these situations is of use in further urban planning and city development. New technological innovations, such as map-based public participation tools, support gathering information that matters and makes cities wiser. Interaction with citizens not only creates information, but supports also learning and innovation building, and creates trusts.

Technological innovations like Maptionnaire help gather information that makes cities wiser. Maptionnaire is a leading solution for collecting, analyzing and discussing resident insight on a map. With the help of Maptionnaire, various cities have been able to change their modus operandi. Through these learning processes actors from different sectors of the city are brought together to create joint understanding of the possibilities of public participation. Cities have started to value and use resident input as an equally important part of its knowledge base for planning. There is a great potential for more efficient use of participatory tools to make processes smoother and to save money. Future development work is needed to further facilitate knowledge transfer from residents to the use of planners and other city officials.

In our presentation we will present different innovative case studies from Finland and abroad where Maptionnaire has been used to support two-way communication in different phases of planning processes. Based on our findings we will draft a new public participation model that assist the effective gathering of experiential knowledge from inhabitants, provide high quality place-based data for various analysis and informs participants about the stage and goals of the planning process more innovatively….(More)”.

CityDash: Visualising a Changing City Using Open Data

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Chapter by Christopher Pettit, Scott N. Lieske and Murad Jamal in Planning Support Science for Smarter Urban Futures: “In an increasingly urbanised world, there are pressures being placed on our cities, which planners, decision-makers, and communities need to be able to respond to. Data driven responses and tools that can support the communication of information, and indicators on a city’s performance are becoming increasingly available and have the potential to play a critical role in understanding and managing complex urban systems . In this research, we will review international efforts in the creation of city dashboards and introduce the City of Sydney Dashboard, known as CityDash. This chapter culminates in a number of recommendations for city dashboards’ implementation. The recommendations for city dashboards include: consolidated information on a single web page, live data feeds relevant to planners and decision-makers as well as citizens’ daily lives, and site analytics as a way of evaluating user interactions and preferences….(More)”.

Internet of Things: Status and implications of an increasingly connected world

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

GAO Technology Assessment: “The Internet of Things (IoT) refers to the technologies and devices that sense information and communicate it to the Internet or other networks and, in some cases, act on that information. These “smart” devices are increasingly being used to communicate and process quantities and types of information that have never been captured before and respond automatically to improve industrial processes, public services, and the well-being of individual consumers. For example, a “connected” fitness tracker can monitor a user’s vital statistics, and store the information on a smartphone. A “smart” tractor can use GPS-based driving guidance to maximize crop planting or harvesting. Electronic processors and sensors have become smaller and less costly, which makes it easier to equip devices with IoT capabilities. This is fueling the global proliferation of connected devices, allowing new technologies to be embedded in millions of everyday products. The IoT’s rapid emergence brings the promise of important new benefits, but also presents potential challenges such as the following:

  • Information security. The IoT brings the risks inherent in potentially unsecured information technology systems into homes, factories, and communities. IoT devices, networks, or the cloud servers where they store data can be compromised in a cyberattack. For example, in 2016, hundreds of thousands of weakly-secured IoT devices were accessed and hacked, disrupting traffic on the Internet.
  • Privacy. Smart devices that monitor public spaces may collect information about individuals without their knowledge or consent. For example, fitness trackers link the data they collect to online user accounts, which generally include personally identifiable information, such as names, email addresses, and dates of birth. Such information could be used in ways that the consumer did not anticipate. For example, that data could be sold to companies to target consumers with advertising or to determine insurance rates.
  • Safety. Researchers have demonstrated that IoT devices such as connected automobiles and medical devices can be hacked, potentially endangering the health and safety of their owners. For example, in 2015, hackers gained remote access to a car through its connected entertainment system and were able to cut the brakes and disable the transmission.
  • Standards. IoT devices and systems must be able to communicate easily. Technical standards to enable this communication will need to be developed and implemented effectively.
  • Economic issues. While impacts such as positive growth for industries that can use the IoT to reduce costs and provide better services to customers are likely, economic disruptions are also possible, such as reducing the need for certain types of businesses and jobs that rely on individual interventions, including assembly line work or commercial vehicle deliveries…(More)”

Dubai Data Releases Findings of ‘The Dubai Data Economic Impact Report’

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Press Release: “the ‘Dubai Data Economic Impact Report’…provides the Dubai Government with insights into the potential economic impacts of opening and sharing data and includes a methodology for more rigorous measurement of the economic impacts of open and shared data, to allow regular assessment of the actual impacts in the future.

The study estimates that the opening and sharing of government and private sector data will potentially add a total of 10.4 billion AED Gross Value Added (GVA) impact to Dubai’s economy annually by 2021. Opening government data alone will result in a GVA impact of 6.6 billion AED annually as of 2021. This is equivalent to approximately 0.8% to 1.2% of Dubai’s forecasted GDP for 2021. Transport, storage, and communications are set to be the highest contributor to this potential GVA of opening government data, accounting for (27.8% or AED1.85 bn) of the total amount, followed by public administration (23.6% or AED 1.57 bn); wholesale, retail, restaurants, and hotels (13.7% or AED 908 million); real estate (9.6% or AED 639 million); and professional services (8.9% or AED 588 million). Finance and insurance, meanwhile, is calculated to make up 6.5% (AED 433 million) of the GVA, while mining, manufacturing, and utilities (6% or AED 395 million); construction (3.5% or AED 230 million); and entertainment and arts (0.4% or AED27 million) account for the remaining proportion.

This economic impact will be realized through the publication, exchange, use and reuse of Dubai data. The Dubai Data Law of 2015 mandates that data providers publish open data and exchange shared data. It defines open data as any Dubai data which is published and can be downloaded, used and re-used without restrictions by all types of users, while shared data is the data that has been classified as either confidential, sensitive, or secret, and can only be accessed by other government entities or by other authorised persons. The law pertains to local government entities, federal government entities which have any data relating to the emirate, individuals and companies who produce, own, disseminate, or exchange any data relating to the emirate. It aims to realise Dubai’s vision of transforming itself into a smart city, manage Dubai Data in accordance with a clear and specific methodology that is consistent with international best practices, integrate the services provided by federal and local government entities, and optimise the use of the data available to data providers, among other objectives….

The study identifies several stakeholders  involved in the use and reuse of open and shared data. These stakeholders – some of whom are qualified as “data creators” – play an important role in the process of generating the economic impacts. They include: data enrichers, who combine open data with their own sources and/or knowledge; data enablers, who do not profit directly from the data, but do so via the platforms and technologies they are provided on; data developers, who design and build Application Programming Interfaces (APIs); and data aggregators, who collect and pool data, providing it to other stakeholders….(More)”