Speakers Speakers (Decidim Fest 2024)

Ana Valdivia is a Departmental Research Lecturer in Artificial Intelligence (AI), Government & Policy at the Oxford Internet Institute (OII). Ana investigates how datafication and algorithmic systems are transforming political, social, and ecological worlds. With a background in mathematics and computer science, her research focuses on the impact of AI on local communities, borders, and territories. Her current work aims to examine the environmental impact of AI across its supply chain—from mineral extraction to chip manufacturing, data centres, and electronic waste dumps. She is also interested in analysing algorithmic resistance and oppression through a feminist lens.

Ana is currently a Visiting Research Fellow at the UCL Centre of Advanced Studies where she investigates AI supply chains. In 2023, her research on AI supply chains was awarded by the British Academy. In 2022, Ana received the Post-Doctoral Enrichment Award by The Alan Turing Institute. She is also a former fellow of Data Science for Social Good program at the University of Chicago (USA). Ana has recently been invited as a keynote speaker by Tecnológico de Monterrey (México).

She actively collaborates with international grassroot tech organisations such as AlgoRace and Tierra Común to raise awareness of how algorithmic harms affects racialised communities. Her work garnered attention from international media outlets such as the Washington Post o El País.

Andreu Francisco is since 2019 General Director of the Localret Consortium, formed by 920 local administrations in Catalonia with the mission of accompanying municipalities in the digital transformation of their towns and cities.

He holds a degree in Business Administration and Management from the University of Barcelona, an Executive Master in Public Administration from ESADE and an Executive Programme in Digital Transformation from La Salle University.

He was Mayor of Alella from 2003 to 2019. He was president of the University School of Maresme attached to the UPF between 2007 and 2008, president of the University Studies and Research Council of the Tecnocampus Foundation during the period 2009-2011, and vice-president of the Tecnocampus Foundation during the period 2011-2015.

She holds a PhD in Political Science from the University of São Paulo (USP) and a Bachelor of Law from the University of Brasília (UnB). Professionally, she has worked both as a practitioner and as a scholar at different stages of her career. She is a member of the Federal Civil Service as a specialist in public policy and government management, with more than 12 years of experience in the public sector. She is currently the Director of Digital Participation and Network Communication at the General Secretariat of the Brazilian Presidency of the Republic, in charge of the Brasil Participativo [brasilparticipativo.presidencia.gov.br] platform.

Previously, she has worked in different agencies such as the Government Transition Cabinet, the Secretariat for the Promotion of Racial Equality and the Secretariat of Management of the Government of the State of São Paulo. As main achievements, she highlights the creation of the Youth Participatory Observatory, which received the ARede award for the best public interest content site in 2014, and the general coordination of the 3rd. National Youth Conference, an event that brought together more than 3,000 people from across the country in 2015.

As a researcher, she has worked at IPEA (Institute for Economic Applied Research), a think tank of the Brazilian government, where she coordinated the

Civil Society Organizations Map [mapaosc.ipea.gov.br] | She is also a collaborating researcher at the Brazilian Center for Analysis and Planning (Cebrap) and a visiting researcher at the University of California Berkeley. She has articles published in Brazilian and international journals such as Critical Policy Studies, Brazilian Political Science Review, Revista Brasileira de Ciências Sociais and Georgetown Journal of International Affairs. She has also been interviewed and published in various media such as: Vox.com, Jornal Nacional (Rede Globo), O Assunto (Podcast G1), Folha de São Paulo, O Globo, Estado de São Paulo and Nexo Jornal. In 2022, she received awards for the best article and best policy brief in papers presented on Participatory Budgeting at an ICLD event.

Cristian Palazzi is a teacher, philosopher and head of citizen mobilisation and advocacy at Platoniq. He also advises several social welfare organisations on ethical development.

Senior administrator specializing in system cybersecurity. Auditor and data protection analyst. Forensic technician in data recovery from storage and encryption systems. Pentester and ethical hacker.

Software Engineer graduated from the University of Brasília, passionate about creating exceptional software experiences and fostering collaborative team environments. Currently serving as the tech lead for the Brazil Participativo project, contributing since its inception in May 2023.

PhD in Sociology on the Information and Knowledge Society from the Internet Interdisciplinary Institute (IN3). Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC) working in co-creation methodologies and citizen social science at Dimmons.net – transdisciplinary research group on digital commons, feminist / social economy, public policies and platform cooperativism. Member of the Peer-Produced Research Lab (U1284 INSERM – Université Paris Cité) led by Bastian Greshake Tzovaras, studying the implementation of commons-based peer production in citizen science and personal science. President of the Platoniq Foundation and co-founder of the open source Goteo.org platform for civic crowdfunding. Previously postdoctoral researcher at the Austrian Centre for Digital Humanities (Austrian Academy of Sciences), research fellow at CECAN (University of Surrey), vice-president of the Observatory for CyberSociety and associate professor of software studies at the UOC’s Faculty of Computer Science and Multimedia.

Fieke Jansen is a co-pi in the critical infrastructure lab at the University of Amsterdam where she leads the environment track on scarcity approaches to data centre governance. She is also the co-lead of the Green Screen Climate Justice and Digital Rights Coalition. Prior to the work on environment and infrastructure Fieke worked as a researcher, tech critique, trainer on the intersection of human rights and technology.

Fieke holds a PhD from Cardiff University, her research looked at the societal and institutional implication of data-driven policing. Prior to her PhD she worked at Tactical Tech and Hivos on data, privacy, digital security and human rights. Her interest in the relationship between AI and the environment began during her Mozilla fellowship. She is interested in understanding the new spaces, gray areas and changing dynamics that technology bring to the world.

Architect, researcher and artist. She is part of the research group Aesthetics Fossil (CSIC) and specializes in urban political ecology. She has a long career in environmental activism. She has written numerous articles and given lectures and courses at institutions such as the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona (CCCB), Medialab Matadero (Madrid) or the Museo Nacional y Centro de Arte Reina Sofía (MNCARS). His lines of research and production address political ecology, the city, the modern body and the affective and aesthetic dimensions of energy.

Gerard is a design educator with over two decades of experience teaching interdisciplinary design as a catalyst of pragmatic invention. He advocates for a design mindset that integrates systems thinking, critical thinking, and design strategy to enhance learners' creative problem-solving capacities.

Assistant professor at the Vienna University of Economics and Business. His research mostly focuses on the complex elections we encounter in novel, often digital mediated, participatory processes like participatory budgeting and online deliberation. In particular, he is interested in the question how we can make such elections fairer, more representative and less majoritarian. Apart from his research, Jan Maly is also a co-founder of the European Digital Democracy Network, which brings together academics and practitioners actively working on or with digital democracy.

Expert in computer security, systems, and storage virtualization. Currently working on the optimization and security of various citizen participation platforms worldwide.

Kirsi Verkka is a passionate expert in democracy, participation, and development, combining extensive experience in education and sustainable development. She works as the Development Manager for the city of Helsinki, where she leads the innovative development and implementation of participatory budgeting. Kirsi’s visionary approach aims to promote active citizen engagement and sustainability, making her a key player in modern urban governance. Her work not only advances the principles of democracy but also creates bridges between communities and decision-makers, thereby strengthening social interaction and impact.

Councilor at the Consell Comarcal de la Selva and regidor at the City Council of Lloret de Mar, where she serves as the spokesperson for the Sumem Lloret Municipal Group. From 2019 to 2023, she was the second deputy mayor of the comarcal council and the delegated regidor for Finance, Citizen Participation, and Commerce. Previously, between 2011 and 2015, she served as regidor at the City Council of Blanes with responsibilities in City Promotion, Legal Services, Citizen Attention Office, Culture, and Festivals.

Lars Kaiser is an urbanist from Zürich, Switzerland and part of the association Urban Equipe. His work focuses on strengthening the voices in the civil society and advancing participatory formats in political and urban processes. His projects aim on combining the strengths of the physical and digital sphere, while maintaining a critical view on all hypes and megatrends.

Currently, he is the Councilor for the Neighborhood Plan at the Barcelona City Council. He has been a translator and activist in the neighborhood sphere, serving as President of the Federation of Neighborhood Associations of Barcelona from 2011 to 2015. From 2015 to 2017, he was a deputy in the Parliament of Catalonia.

Nadia Nadesan works with Platoniq with experience as a researcher, illustrator, facilitator, urbanist, and technologist. Her work focuses on civic tech + participation, data governance, and public space. As a founder of Design Justice Mediterranea, She is actively involved in creating collective spaces of resistance, knowledge sharing, and community.

She enjoys projects and networks that encourage re-learning, reorienting, and reclaiming narratives of who and why we are, especially how we tech and eat.

Political scientist specialized in public policies, citizen participation and technological sovereignty. He has worked for several years at the Ferrer i Guàrdia Foundation as a digital participation expert; he is currently Director of the Technical Office of the Decidim Association.

Degree in Sociology, master in public management and postgraduate in urban and environmental policies. During the last 7 years he has promoted deliberative democracy projects in the public sector, being technical coordinator of the Catalan Assembly for Climate Change. Previously he has worked in academia and public governance, as well as in national and international public policy and development cooperation projects.

A senior researcher in the Data Analytics and Visualisation Group at BSC. He leads the Urban Data Science research line, which focuses on evidence-based solutions for urban planning. The multidisciplinary approach of the research line is reflected in the diversity of the collaborations: visualisation experts, geographers, urban planners, policy makers, developers and researchers.

Co-founder of the company Pokecode and a member of the Decidim Association since the beginning. Educated at the University of Girona in Economics and Business Administration, he actively participated in student representation as the coordinator of the Student Council. Subsequently, he was also the coordinator of the 12 student councils of Catalan universities, acting as a liaison between the student body and the government. He is currently involved in the Basketball Board of Club Bàsquet Verges, as well as being a player on the senior men's team. His professional experience has always been linked to Decidim, first in development companies as a functional manager, then as a commercial manager. Finally, he co-founded Pokecode alongside Iván Vergés in the summer of 2022. He will present his bachelor's thesis in economics where he analyzes the relationship between the tragedy of the commons and Decidim.

Director of Instituto Cidade Democrática, he holds a master’s degree in Political Science from the University of Brasília. From 2011 to 2016, he coordinated digital social participation platforms for the Brazilian federal government. He is currently part of the senior research team developing the Brasil Participativo platform.

Lover of all things Open Source, community and technology! Currently working as Project Lead for the Mautic Community.

A doctoral student in the research group on mobility, transport and territory of the Autonomous University of Barcelona. She is currently a visiting researcher in the Urban Data Science research line at the Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC). Her research focuses on the relationship between social sustainability and urban form.

The product manager at Open Source Politics, aspiring to break the record for "most metaproposals submitted".

I am working as communication officer in the Directorate General for Communication of the European Commission in Brussels. Currently I’m the project manager responsible for the Citizens’ Engagement Platform. The platform uses DECIDIM as base and offers a space for discussion about various EU policy topics. Previously, I was involved in the development and operation of the online platform of the Conference on the Future of Europe. It took place between 2021 and 2022 and was also using DECIDIM as software base. Before moving to Brussels I worked 14 years as spokesperson for the Commission in Bonn/Germany, Dublin/Ireland and Munich/Germany.

Open Source Politics' co-founder and managing director, returning to the Decidim Fest for the first time since 2018.

Software Engineering student. He has almost 4 years of experience using Rails to solve complex real world problems. Also had to deal with roles of team management. He's currently working as a software developer at Lappis laboratory and at V360, a Brazilian fintech.