Looking forward

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Looking forward

Looking forward, we've identified several trends to watch. Many groups working to connect people to power (especially those located in the Global South) report that their time is better spent cultivating communities than developing software. They've found that building a community of practice and helping people use existing digital tools, like mainstream chat apps, are more effective than building or learning to use digital participation platforms. Further research should investigate the creative and low-cost ways institutions and organizations are using to empower communities.

This trend is driven in part by a growing recognition from funders that supporting the development of new technology isn't the best use of their resources, given the strength of existing open source platforms. Meanwhile, interviewees commonly reported that even existing open source platforms require significantly more support, documentation, and (affordable) consulting services than is currently available. Philanthropic groups should consider dedicating resources to strengthening the ecosystem surrounding existing digital platforms so that more communities can benefit from them.

In the private sector, the digital participation platform industry is becoming increasingly professional and consolidated. The creation of an industry trade group in Europe, called Association Civic Tech Europe, and the acquisition of several major platforms by larger firms, like Neighborland, SeeClickFix, and Open Town Hall, signal that this trend will continue.

Emerging tech

As digital participation platforms continue to evolve, here are some new developments to watch for:

  • Increasing transparency around how a platform’s algorithms work. For example, how is the list of proposals ordered, and why?

  • Potential use of blockchain technology, such as to verify that participants are constituents while preserving their anonymity.

  • Expanding use of artificial intelligence (AI):

    • Several participation platforms already use Natural Language Processing (NLP) to summarize large volumes of text submitted by participants and identify topical clusters in conversations. As more people participate on digital platforms, these solutions will become more necessary, since few institutions have the capacity to read millions of submissions. IBM Watson's Project Debater is an example of how multiple AI models can be integrated to summarize political arguments.

    • NLP can also be used to categorize the emotional tone of feedback through sentiment analysis, although this technology still isn't reliably accurate. 

    • A hybrid model that combines AI, crowdsourced filtering, and expert human intelligence could help ensure the success of large-scale engagements. 

    • AI also can flag efforts to subvert a vote with fake levels of support by identifying identically phrased language.

    • Speech-to-text technology is rapidly evolving to produce more accurate transcripts of phone conversations and meetings.

It is important to note, however, that AI could also have negative effects on participation:

  • People are already able to use AI to generate significant volumes of text with a simple prompt. For example, today's AI software can instantly generate a large volume of content to support a simple, initial statement like, "We shouldn't build a park here." Such bot-generated text can be used to pollute the participatory process and, in turn, diminish the value of contributions from actual humans.

  • "Deepfake" technology allows people to generate realistic-seeming images, video, and audio of people who don't really exist. As this technology becomes more effective and readily available, it will be easier to generate authentic-seeming audio and video clips from fictional personas.

Conclusion

We've covered a very wide range of considerations in this guide. Hopefully, we've provided a sense of what to look out for without being overwhelming. The best way to learn is by doing, so start small, talk to people outside of your institution, and simply try it. In many cases, the specific digital participation platform you choose will matter less than the program you build around it. If it's your job to coordinate both the participants and the tech, and then connect them to your institution, the most important piece of advice is to start. In doing so, you will find other people, inside and outside of your institution, interested in connecting people to power. 

Develop the community over time, amplify it with a digital platform, and you're on your way.

Next: Additional Resources
Previous: Running a Process on a Digital Participation Platform