Is civic technology the killer app for democracy?

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

 at TechCrunch: “Smartphone apps have improved convenience for public transportation in many urban centers. In Washington, DC, riders can download apps to help them figure out where to go, when to show up and how long to wait for a bus or train. However, the problem with public transport in DC is not the lack of modern, helpful and timely information. The problem is that the Metro subway system is onfire. 

Critical infrastructure refers to the vital systems that connect us. Like the water catastrophe in Flint, Michigan and our crumbling roads, bridges and airports, the Metro system in DC is experiencing a systems failure. The Metro’s problems arise from typical public challenges like  poor management and deferred maintenance.

Upgrades of physical infrastructure are not easy and nimble like a software patch or an agile design process. They are slow, expensive and subject to deliberation and scrutiny. In other words, they are the fundamental substance of democratic decision-making: big decisions with long-term implications that require thoughtful strategy, significant investment, political leadership and public buy-in.

A killer app is an application you love so much you buy into a whole new way of doing things. Email and social media are good examples of killer apps. The killer app for Metro would have to get political leaders to look beyond their narrow, short-term interests and be willing to invest in modern public transportation for our national capital region.

The same is true for fixing our critical infrastructure throughout the nation. The killer apps for the systems on which we rely daily won’t be technical, they will be human. It will be Americans working together to a build a technology-enabled resilient democracy —one that is inclusive, responsive and successful in the Information Age.

In 2007, the I-35 bridge in Minneapolis collapsed into the Mississippi river. During his presidential bid, Senator John McCain used this event as an example of the failure of our leaders to make trade-offs for common national purpose. Case in point, an extravagantly expensive congressionally funded Alaskan “bridge to nowhere” that served just a handful of people on an island. But how many apps to nowhere are we building?.

In DC, commuters who can afford alternatives will leave Metro. They’ll walk, drive, ordera car service or locate a bikeshare. The people who suffer from the public service risk and imbalance of the current Metro system are those who have no choice.

So here’s the challenge: Modern technology needs to create an inclusive society. Our current technical approach too often means that we’re prioritizing progress or profit for the few over the many. This pattern defeats the purpose of both the technology revolution and American democracy. Government and infrastructure are supposed to serve everyone, but technology thus far has made it so that public failures affect some Americans more than others. …

For democracy to succeed in the Information Age, we’ll need some new rules of engagement with technology. The White House recently released its third report on data and its implications for society. The 2016 report pays special attention to the ethics of machine automation and algorithms. The authors stress the importance of ethical analytics and propose the principle of “equal opportunity by design.” It’s an excellent point of departure as we recalibrate old systems and build new bridges to a more resilient, inclusive and prosperous nation….(more)”

NEW Platform for Sharing Research on Opening Governance: The Open Governance Research Exchange (OGRX)

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Andrew Young: “Today,  The GovLab, in collaboration with founding partners mySociety and the World Bank’s Digital Engagement Evaluation Team are launching the Open Governance Research Exchange (OGRX), a new platform for sharing research and findings on innovations in governance.

From crowdsourcing to nudges to open data to participatory budgeting, more open and innovative ways to tackle society’s problems and make public institutions more effective are emerging. Yet little is known about what innovations actually work, when, why, for whom and under what conditions.

And anyone seeking existing research is confronted with sources that are widely dispersed across disciplines, often locked behind pay walls, and hard to search because of the absence of established taxonomies. As the demand to confront problems in new ways grows so too does the urgency for making learning about governance innovations more accessible.

As part of GovLab’s broader effort to move from “faith-based interventions” toward more “evidence-based interventions,” OGRX curates and makes accessible the most diverse and up-to-date collection of findings on innovating governance. At launch, the site features over 350 publications spanning a diversity of governance innovation areas, including but not limited to:

Visit ogrx.org to explore the latest research findings, submit your own work for inclusion on the platform, and share knowledge with others interested in using science and technology to improve the way we govern. (More)”

Startup Helps Cities Launch Crowdfunding Campaigns

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

 in Government Technology: “Popular crowdfunding platforms like Kickstarter and Indiegogo have been a hotbed for the aspiring to fund product prototypes, publish artistic works and create everything from films to trendy foods. Now governments are stepping into the mix to harness the low-risk funding method for community parks, gardens, sidewalks and more. And as public-sector interest in crowdfunding has grown, so too has interest from startup companies.

One of those, Citizinvestor, offers a crowdfunding platform tailored for government. Co-founders Tony DeSisto, Jordan Raynor, and Erik Rapprich launched the Tampa, Fla.-based civic tech company in 2012 to help localities raise thousands of dollars for numerous projects across the nation. Public officials simply add photos and a description of projects and the Web app pitches them to interested citizens.

While still a young company, Citizinvestor compares well with the more established Kickstarter, notwithtanding Kickstarter’s success — that since launch in 2009, has generated more than $2.2 billion for 100,000-plus projects. Citizinvestor’s own project funding success rate of 60 percent is higher than market leader Kickstarter’s rate of 36 percent. Funded projects have run from an $81,000 dog park to a roughly $1,000 set of bicycle racks….(More)

Private Provision of Public Goods via Crowdfunding

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Paper by Robert Chovanculiak and Marek Hudík: “Private provision of public goods is typically associated with three main problems: (1) high organization costs, (2) the assurance problem, and (3) the free-rider problem. We argue that technologies which enable crowdfunding (the method of funding projects by raising small amounts of money from a large number of people via the internet), have made the overall conditions for private provision of public goods more favorable: these technologies lowered the organization costs and enabled to employ more efficient mechanisms which reduce the assurance and free-rider problems. It follows that if the reason for government provision of public goods is higher efficiency as suggested by the standard theory, then with the emergence of crowdfunding we should observe a decline of the government role in this area….(More)”

Democracy Reinvented: Participatory Budgeting and Civic Innovation in America

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Book by Hollie Russon Gilman: “Democracy Reinvented is the first comprehensive academic treatment of participatory budgeting in the United States, situating it within a broader trend of civic technology and innovation. This global phenomenon, which has been called “revolutionary civics in action” by the New York Times, started in Brazil in 1989 but came to America only in 2009.  Participatory budgeting empowers citizens to identify community needs, work with elected officials to craft budget proposals, and vote on how to spend public funds.

Democracy Reinvented places participatory budgeting within the larger discussion of the health of U.S. democracy and focuses on the enabling political and institutional conditions.  Author and former White House policy adviser Hollie Russon Gilman presents theoretical insights, in-depth case studies, and interviews to offer a compelling alternative to the current citizen disaffection and mistrust of government. She offers policy recommendations on how to tap online tools and other technological and civic innovations to promote more inclusive governance.

While most literature tends to focus on institutional changes without solutions, this book suggests practical ways to empower citizens to become change agents. Democracy Reinvented also includes a discussion on the challenges and opportunities that come with using digital tools to re-engage citizens in governance….(More)”

New York City BigApps Winners Show How Civic Tech Is Maturing

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Alexander Howard at Huffington Post: “Winners of the latest version of New York City’s BigApps Challenge, announced Thursday, show how tough lessons from the first generation of city apps contests are now helping to creating civic value and community.

New York’s experience will help demonstrate to mayors around the world how to get the most social impact and economic value from government data: Start with the civic problem you want to target, then find the data, partners and community to make the changes….

The evolution brings civic apps contests a long way from the Washington, D.C., local government’s “Apps for Democracy” contest in 2008, which hinted at the promise of opening up data for public benefit, but failed to deliver meaningful long-term social change or services.

Below are this year’s BigApps winners for affordable housing, zero waste, connecting cities, and civic engagement, each of which will receive $25,000, and two judge’s choice winners, each of which will receive $10,000.

….Winning BigApps doesn’t mean that a given idea will work out in the long term. Some past winners of New York’s contest, including Embark,HealthyOut, Ontodia and Poncho, have endured. Many others have not — as is the case for many startups.

When asked about the longer-term sustainability issues that have plagued apps developed in these kinds of contests, Springer emphasized the endurance of apps like Hopscotch, which helps kids learn how to code, and HeatSeak, which is being installed in buildings across the city. ….(More)

UK police force trials virtual crime visits over Skype

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Nick Summers at Engadget: In an effort to cut costs and make its officers more efficient, police in Peterborough, England are asking citizens to report their crimes over Skype. So, whereas before a local “bobby” would come round to their house, notepad in hand, to ask questions and take down what happened, the entire process will now be conducted over webcam. Alternatively, victims can do the follow-up on the phone or at the station — handy if Skype is being its usual, unreliable self. The system is being trialled for crimes reported via 101, the police’s non-emergency contact number. The force says it’ll give people more flexibility with appointment times, and also ensure officers spend more hours each day on patrol. We suspect it also has something to do with the major budget cuts facing forces up and down the country….(More)”

Who Benefits From Civic Technology?

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Report by Rebecca Rumbul at MySociety: “This research seeks to begin at the beginning, asking the most basic questions about who actually uses civic technology and why. Gathering data from civic technology groups from around the world, it shows the variations in usage of civic tech across four core countries (US, UK, Kenya and South Africa), and records the attitudes of users towards the platforms they are using.

Download: Who Benefits From Civic Technology? Demographic and public attitudes research into the users of civic technologiespdf“

The Quantified Community and Neighborhood Labs: A Framework for Computational Urban Planning and Civic Technology Innovation

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Constantine E. Kontokosta: “This paper presents the conceptual framework and justification for a “Quantified Community” (QC) and a networked experimental environment of neighborhood labs. The QC is a fully instrumented urban neighborhood that uses an integrated, expandable, and participatory sensor network to support the measurement, integration, and analysis of neighborhood conditions, social interactions and behavior, and sustainability metrics to support public decision-making. Through a diverse range of sensor and automation technologies — combined with existing data generated through administrative records, surveys, social media, and mobile sensors — information on human, physical, and environmental elements can be processed in real-time to better understand the interaction and effects of the built environment on human well-being and outcomes. The goal is to create an “informatics overlay” that can be incorporated into future urban development and planning that supports the benchmarking and evaluation of neighborhood conditions, provides a test-bed for measuring the impact of new technologies and policies, and responds to the changing needs and preferences of the local community….(More)”

(US) Administration Announces New “Smart Cities” Initiative to Help Communities Tackle Local Challenges and Improve City Services

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Factsheet from the White House: “Today, the Administration is announcing a new “Smart Cities” Initiative that will invest over $160 million in federal research and leverage more than 25 new technology collaborations to help local communities tackle key challenges such as reducing traffic congestion, fighting crime, fostering economic growth, managing the effects of a changing climate, and improving the delivery of city services. The new initiative is part of this Administration’s overall commitment to target federal resources to meet local needs and support community-led solutions.

Over the past six years, the Administration has pursued a place-based approach to working with communities as they tackle a wide range of challenges, from investing in infrastructure and filling open technology jobs to bolstering community policing. Advances in science and technology have the potential to accelerate these efforts. An emerging community of civic leaders, data scientists, technologists, and companies are joining forces to build “Smart Cities” – communities that are building an infrastructure to continuously improve the collection, aggregation, and use of data to improve the life of their residents – by harnessing the growing data revolution, low-cost sensors, and research collaborations, and doing so securely to protect safety and privacy.

As part of the initiative, the Administration is announcing:

  • More than $35 million in new grants and over $10 million in proposed investments to build a research infrastructure for Smart Cities by the National Science Foundation and National Institute of Standards and Technology.
  • Nearly $70 million in new spending and over $45 million in proposed investments to unlock new solutions in safety, energy, climate preparedness, transportation, health and more, by the Department of Homeland Security, Department of Transportation, Department of Energy, Department of Commerce, and the Environmental Protection Agency.
  • More than 20 cities participating in major new multi-city collaborations that will help city leaders effectively collaborate with universities and industry.

Today, the Administration is also hosting a White House Smart Cities Forum, coinciding with Smart Cities Week hosted by the Smart Cities Council, to highlight new steps and brainstorm additional ways that science and technology can support municipal efforts.

The Administration’s Smart Cities Initiative will begin with a focus on key strategies:

  • Creating test beds for “Internet of Things” applications and developing new multi-sector collaborative models: Technological advancements and the diminishing cost of IT infrastructure have created the potential for an “Internet of Things,” a ubiquitous network of connected devices, smart sensors, and big data analytics. The United States has the opportunity to be a global leader in this field, and cities represent strong potential test beds for development and deployment of Internet of Things applications. Successfully deploying these and other new approaches often depends on new regional collaborations among a diverse array of public and private actors, including industry, academia, and various public entities.
  • Collaborating with the civic tech movement and forging intercity collaborations: There is a growing community of individuals, entrepreneurs, and nonprofits interested in harnessing IT to tackle local problems and work directly with city governments. These efforts can help cities leverage their data to develop new capabilities. Collaborations across communities are likewise indispensable for replicating what works in new places.
  • Leveraging existing Federal activity: From research on sensor networks and cybersecurity to investments in broadband infrastructure and intelligent transportation systems, the Federal government has an existing portfolio of activities that can provide a strong foundation for a Smart Cities effort.
  • Pursuing international collaboration: Fifty-four percent of the world’s population live in urban areas. Continued population growth and urbanization will add 2.5 billion people to the world’s urban population by 2050. The associated climate and resource challenges demand innovative approaches. Products and services associated with this market present a significant export opportunity for the U.S., since almost 90 percent of this increase will occur in Africa and Asia.

Complementing this effort, the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology is examining how a variety of technologies can enhance the future of cities and the quality of life for urban residents. The Networking and Information Technology Research and Development (NITRD) Program is also announcing the release of a new framework to help coordinate Federal agency investments and outside collaborations that will guide foundational research and accelerate the transition into scalable and replicable Smart City approaches. Finally, the Administration’s growing work in this area is reflected in the Science and Technology Priorities Memo, issued by the Office of Management and Budget and Office of Science and Technology Policy in preparation for the President’s 2017 budget proposal, which includes a focus on cyber-physical systems and Smart Cities….(More)”