Lightning talks - Room #1

Room 1 - Ada Lovelace

The following talks will be held in this room:

1. Participatory project funding for grassroots climate projects: Experiences from Switzerland

2. Broadening horizons: Decidim as a tool outside the institutional environment

3. Data-driven democracy: empowering citizens with information in participatory budgeting

4. Decidim and the tragedy of the commons: Analysis and experience of free software under the principles of Elinor Ostrom

5. Mainstreaming emergent Computational Democracy Platforms

6. Data-driven assessment of climate shelters' accessibility in Barcelona

1/ Participatory project funding for grassroots climate projects: Experiences from Switzerland

Speaker: Lars Kaiser, Urban Equipe

Since 2019, processes based on the participatory budget format have been taking place in numerous Swiss cities as a result of digital transformation and the associated smart city strategies - most of them using decidim. While annual processes have been carried out in Lausanne since 2019, in other cities (Zurich, Aarau, Thun, Lucerne) they have so far been one-off pilot projects.

Unlike in the international context, where ideas submitted by the population are implemented by a city administration, the projects carried out in Switzerland require the idea providers to implement them themselves. They thus create a new way of promoting neighbourhood projects and neighbourhood networking, often addressing issues in the realm of climate adaptation or reduction in carbon footprints.

The lightning talk provides an insight into the findings of these processes, their similarities and differences and attempts to define success factors for the implementation of participatory budgets and highlighting ways on how these processes can be used in tackling the challenges of the ongoing climate crisis. Urban Equipe has been able to gain in-depth experience with this instrument since 2019. It acted as project organiser for the "Quartieridee Wipkingen" (2020/21) and as process facilitator for the "Stadtidee Zürich" (2021/22), the "Stadtidee Aarau" (2022/23) and the "Klima-Idee Thun" (2023/24).

Language of the session: English

2/ Broadening horizons: Decidim as a tool outside the institutional environment

Speaker: Alabs

In this 10-minute talk, we will explore how the Decidim platform is being used in various social projects in both the private and public spheres. We will present case studies that demonstrate the versatility and effectiveness of Decidim beyond its use in city councils. We will discuss how the platform has facilitated participatory processes in initiatives such as the Assembly for Climate Change, the Berkane participatory budgets, the YoSoyZonaSur project, the participation process in Cochabamba with JICA, and the ONIC congress, among others. At the end we will present participa.cloud, a tool developed by aLabs to offer an affordable Decidim service in the cloud accessible to any organisation.

3/ Data-driven democracy: empowering citizens with information in participatory budgeting

Speaker: Kirsi Verkka, Development manager. City of Helsinki

How would you make sure your proposal is fair and beneficial for different areas and groups of people? How would you use data to support your arguments and choices? These are some of the questions explored in an exciting project where we aimed to provide citizens with relevant and understandable information about the city's situation and development. The idea was to help citizens deliberate so that they could make informed and equitable proposals that consider the needs of different areas and population groups. The project was part of a participatory budgeting process in Helsinki, where residents could propose and vote on how to spend part of the city's budget.

In the core of the project was a use of service design methods to understand the different needs and motivations of citizens to participate and use data as well as information design methods to visualize and present information in an engaging and clear way.

In this talk, I will share the insights and outcomes of our project and discuss what challenges and opportunities strengthening the role of information in participation brings along. Join me to discover how data can enable citizens to have a voice and a choice in their city.

Language of the session: English

4/ Decidim and the tragedy of the commons: Analysis and experience of free software under the principles of Elinor Ostrom

Speaker: Pau Parals, Pokecode.

The aim of my work has been to answer the following questions:

• (i) In the digital commons, specifically Decidim (free software), can the design principles of Elinor Ostrom be identified and applied to provide solutions in the sustainable self-management of these goods?

• (ii) Are there differences in the sustainable self-management of digital commons compared to physical commons?

The work conceptualizes common goods and the interconnection between traditional and digital goods. We analyze the tragedy of the commons and the response in the form of self-governance to overcome its collapse. We will understand the philosophy behind free software and the particular problems of this type of goods. With the bibliographic review we propose a methodology that aims to identify and evaluate the Ostrom principles in the digital commons. The results have been obtained via field study (interviews and survey of the members of the association) which have allowed me to draw conclusions in the identification of an answer in the sustainable self-management (or not) of this type of goods , specifically free software.

The objective, then, would be to present the methodology and results of my work to the community. And, based on the Decidim case, discuss the satisfaction in the sustainability policies of the digital commons and present the possible differences of the collapse with respect to the traditional goods. It's a form of giving back that I'd like to do, after all the help I've received from the community <3 My work isn't perfect, and there's a lot to improve. That's why I would really like you to come and have your say

5/ Mainstreaming emergent Computational Democracy Platforms

Speaker: Gerard Fox, Lecturer/Researcher in Strategic Design in IADT Dublin, Ireland.

Exploring the potential of focused collaborations between three distinct but complimentary domains of expertise.

1. Computational Deliberative Democracy expertis [Decidim, Pol.is(External link), vTaiwan, Fora etc]

2. Social Sciences: eg. Political/Social/Behavioural Sciences expertise

3. Design: Co-Creation frameworks for Systems/Service/User-Experience digital product design. Also Storytelling, presentation, rhetoric to enhance buy-in.

Main principles covered:

• Problems with current Representative Democracy Systems

• Advantages of emerging Computational Democracy and deliberative democracy

• Citizens Assembly case study [case studies: Ireland, Marriage Equality + Pro Choice]

• Potential of collaboration to develop next phase of these platforms

• Creating Tipping Points: Potential of dissemination strategies: narratives, platforms, endorsements

Language of the session: English

6/ Data-driven assessment of climate shelters' accessibility in Barcelona

Speakers: Serena Mombelli, vCity visiting researcher (BSC DataViz) & GEMOTT (UAB) | Patricio Reyes, Senior researcher, Urban Data Science (BSC).

Cities around the world are increasingly affected by heatwaves, and many municipalities are looking for solutions to protect vulnerable groups. Barcelona has more than 360 climate shelters in public spaces such as schools, libraries and parks to provide protection during high temperatures. But do high-risk groups have adequate access to shelters during heat waves? This lightning talk will answer this question and show how data-driven analysis can support human-centred urban planning and policy-making. The analysis is the result of a collaboration between Barcelona City Council and the Barcelona Supercomputing Centre through vCity, a platform for urban digital twins that facilitates informed decision-making in urban development.

Location: Room Ada Lovelace