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In how we’re framing TICTeC and our wider work, we’re talking less about civic tech and more about what we’re calling Pro-Democracy Tech (PDT).
The reason for this is we’re finding civic tech is a less helpful term for the kind of convening work we want to do. It won the argument of its time, and there is much less need to make the basic case for technology as part of the civic tool kit. But as a result, it has less to say about the situation we’re in now. Instead, we need framing that better talks to the range of people and institutions who are doing civic and democratic work with technology today.
What is Pro-Democracy Tech?
Pro-Democracy Tech describes digital tools aimed at realising and defending democratic values.
A key motivation of this approach is that authoritarianism isn’t standing still – and is learning how to use technology to extend its surveillance and control over people. Democracy’s reaction to this needs to be not to reject technology but to use it to evolve and compete. Democracy needs to be fast, effective and popular, while not conceding that the only way to do this is by becoming more centralised and authoritarian itself.
Within this, there are two key activities:
- Defensive democratic tech – defending the open society: anti-corruption, anti-misinformation, etc.
- Constructive democratic tech – empowering technologies that build democratic fibre and capacity: participation and deliberation, community tools, civic response tech.
These are interconnected, and not hard divides. Defensive approaches safeguard the openness which democracy needs to function, while constructive approaches build the capacity of the engine of democratic progress.
There are tools and approaches that apply to both. Access to Information laws are both vital anti-corruption tools, and part of capacity building through lowering costs of accessing information. Democratic transparency organisations (PMOs and similar) are both about increasing anti-corruption surveillance, and transforming the capacity and connections of democratic institutions.
Where they differ is in their approaches to new technological tools. Defensive democratic tech is in an arms war with anti-democrats. We have to keep moving and innovating to stay in place. It is reactive against a well-financed opponent, and needs to understand how to bend tools (often developed by those with deep pockets and their own motives) to democratic purposes.
Constructive democratic tech is less of a zero-sum game. Just as there are technological approaches that make authoritarianism much more effective, there are approaches that make democracy much more effective. Here the enemy is less organised but omnipresent: inertia, low expectations, and a belief that things can’t be better. The goal of this approach is developing civic capacity, and taking us on the path from “citizen sensors” to “citizen thinkers” – where the extraordinary capacity and cognitive diversity in a democracy are fully enabled to work together to solve the big problems of the age (such as climate change).
Why do we need this shift?
Going back twenty years (or even just ten years to the first TICTeC), what the “civic tech movement” is trying to get across is that there are civic-minded people who are using technology to create new kinds of organisations and services. Civic tech is a term to describe this novelty, make the case to funders, and advocate for this idea that technology isn’t just about online shopping, but can help people work together to improve the society they’re in.
The good news is that these people mostly won. Governments, journalism and NGOs have generally taken on the lessons of the early civic tech movement. A wider range of governments and organisations understand the value of technology in helping them achieve their purpose, and there are more outlets for the kind of people who originally would have founded civic tech organisations.
As a result, when we look internationally, we see very few organisations where the core identity is “civic tech” and that run a range of services in the same way that mySociety does. Instead, we tend to see organisations more tightly focused on an area of work (like access to information), and tech is one of a range of skill sets represented, or where civic tech-like work is part of a broader portfolio of more traditional research and advocacy work.
As civic tech is speaking to problems that no longer exist in the same way, the phrase doesn’t apply well to the problems we have now. We need language and terms to bring together people who are using tech as part of the work to defend and enrich our democratic societies.
Putting this into practice
The purpose of this framing is to create practical language. At TICTeC 2025, we’re exploring how we’ll use constructive/defensive framing to structure the conference – across specific areas of work we have a focus in: democratic transparency, access to information and climate change. We also want to use it to be clearer about the broader range of organisations and projects we ‘d like to see there.
Pro-Democracy Tech reflects both the purpose of the technology, a general attitude that pro-democracy tech is possible, and a recognition that there is anti-democratic technology out there. It was really helpful putting this together to see some similar language and divides in this NED/IFDS essay collection.
Leaving the tech aside, the spirit of civic tech is about challenging low expectations of how things are, and demonstrating that things can be done better. As mySociety, we still see ourselves as a civic tech organisation, and the idea of a civic tech movement as important to understand ourselves and our history. But we also need language that helps us understand how we relate to others that don’t share that history.
A feature of the current moment is that ideas of democracy are under attack, and authoritarians have embraced and made technology core to how they work. What is up for debate is the orientation of the pro-democracy side towards technology. We think ceding the ground would be a mistake and through TICTeC we want to incubate the best version of the pro-democratic tech argument. At the same time, we want to stay true to an important value of the civic tech movement: that the best advocacy is the demonstration of what’s possible.
Header image: Photo by Bhushan Sadani on Unsplash
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/RSS FeedTICTeC, the Impacts of Civic Technology Conference from mySociety, runs for just two days – but those two days are packed with civic tech practitioners sharing insights and experience from projects along the world.
We share most of the sessions as videos on our YouTube channel, and to help you decide what to watch first, we’ve asked mySociety staff to pick their favourites and chat about what they found so interesting. In this episode, Alice, Gemma and Myf discuss “Have you empirically improved transparency and accountability?” from Sean Russell of OpenUp South Africa. (more…)
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Welcome to autumn, and as we have breezed past Right To Know day let’s take a look at what the Access to Information network have been up to this month.
FragDenStaat: released their most recent “redaction art” for Right to Know day on September 28th 2024, this piece comes from Saxony – an area which only ratified their access to information law in 2023, the last of the federal states to do so.
mySociety: has been experimenting with AI in our Projects data analysis service, with mixed results, and kicking off our new round of support for marginalised groups in the UK. We’re also busy designing some exciting learning opportunities coming in October and November 2024!
Access Info: have a winner for their inaugural Impact Award! Lighthouse Reports won with their brilliant Suspicion Machines investigation and their leadership of the collaboration around this work. The other finalists were really strong contenders and worth checking out too!
SPOON: announced their collaboration with Access Info and their intent to work on important topics such as introducing Information Commissioners to the Netherlands system.
Sieć Obywatelska Watchdog Polska: On September 28-29, the 3rd Openness Fans’ Convention took place. 110 people from all over Poland took part in the two-day meeting. There were meetings with journalists, talks about technology, legal advice and a presentation of monitoring results conducted by graduates of the Watchdog School. On the evening of September 28, we also raised a toast to openness and FOI.
Ma Dada: Ma Dada held its General Assembly and welcomed new board members from a variety of backgrounds. We also ran training sessions for journalists and kept digging through data for our observatory.
ForSet: had a fantastic Datafest, and are now taking a well deserved breather to take stock and share insights.
Transparencia: After the belgian elections in june, we made lobbying towards the new regional government for stronger FOI regulation in walloon region
ImamoPravoZnati: Gong held its second annual School for Democracy for young politicians and activists. The programme covered a range of civic literacy topics, including new forms of democratic participation and digital tools which can be used for conducting public oversight (such as IPZ).
KiMitTud: have been investigating topics such as Lithium mining in Serbia and oversights in safety zones near factories in Göd. They’re also looking for developer support for 10 hours per month – so if you’re a Ruby whizz and want to support another partner in the network drop us a line!
Vouliwatch/Arthro5A: In view of the government’s initiative to update article 5 of the Code of Administrative Procedure (regarding the right to access to public documents), Vouliwatch submitted a set of proposals during the public consultation process. The proposals submitted aimed at aligning the provisions of the article in question with the standards set by the Tromso Convention. In addition, Vouliwatch proceeded to contact MPs to inform them about its submission and ask for their support during the debate in parliament.
PPDC: We held the Freedom of Information (FOI) Ranking 2024, where we celebrated the strides made in promoting transparency and accountability in governance. This annual event showcases the achievements of public institutions in upholding the principles of openness and citizen participation.
Abrimos Info: has published “Millions of requests: the evolution of the massive use of access to information and the role of INAI”, a data analysis of the impact that the creation of the National Institute of Transparency, Access to Information and Protection of Personal Data (INAI) and the entire National Transparency System had on the right of access to information in Mexico. This op-ed is especially relevant given the possibility of reform or disappearance of these institutions. Read here (spanish)
CITAD: CITAD held its fifth Annual Kano Social Influencers Summit (KANSIS24) with the theme ‘Artificial Intelligence in Election and Governance’ which was attended by over 1000 people.
Other news:
We’ve created a directory of the partners in this Community of Practice in the Civic Tech Field Guide. You can view it here.
If you’d like to add your organisation or project, add a free contact form to your listing, or make any changes, please write to matt@civictech.guide.
Photo by Alexandre Chambon on Unsplash
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/RSS FeedIt’s our first ever podcast at mySociety! Heeey how about that?
Myf, our Communications Manager, runs you through all the stuff we’ve been doing at mySociety over the last month. It’s amazing what we manage to fit into just 30 days: you’ll hear about a meeting of Freedom of Information practitioners from around Europe; our new (and evolving) policy on the use of AI; a chat with someone who used the Climate Scorecards tool to springboard into further climate action… oh, and there’s just the small matter of the General Election here in the UK, which involved some crafty tweaking behind the scenes of our sites TheyWorkForYou and WriteToThem.
Links
- TICTeC videos on YouTube
- TICTeC photos on Flickr
- Browse the TICTeC 2024 schedule, find slides etc
- Matthew’s post on updating TheyWorkForYou on election night
- Sign up to get an email whenever your MP speaks or votes
- Democracy resources and our future plans in Alex’s post
- Local Intelligence Hub lets you access and play with data around your constituency
- Matt Stempeck’s summary of the Access to Information meetup
- Our summary of Matt’s summary of the meetup
- Updates from all those ATI projects around Europe
- New in Alaveteli: importing & presenting blog posts; request categories and exploring csvs in Datasette
- Fiona Dyer on how volunteering for Scorecards upped her climate action
- Where to sign up if you fancy volunteering as well
- mySociety’s approach to AI
- Contact us on hello [at] mysociety.org if you have any questions or feedback.
Music: Chafftop by Blue Dot Sessions.
Transcript
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Well, hello and welcome to mySociety’s monthly round-up.
My name is Myf Nixon, Communications Manager at mySociety.
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This is part of an experiment that we’re currently running where we’re trying to talk about our work in new formats, to see if that makes it easier for you to keep up with our news. (more…)
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Summer is finally upon us, and though things are slowing slightly in the heat there’s been lots of amazing work happening on Access to Information across Europe this month!
NB: Our TICTeC community of practice is Global and we’d love to hear updates from our global members too in the future!
Without further ado:
FragDenStaat: are working on a long running investigation into a funding scandal at the Ministry of Education looking at the withdrawal of funds from critical scientists. More on that here
mySociety: are working on a new release of Alaveteli to bring some of our new features into your platforms. We’re also getting WDTK Projects as a self serve option into the Alaveteli Codebase, investigating AI for assessing batches and talking about our marginalised communities work at the Women’s Aid 50th Anniversary Conference. We’ve also finally released our Resource Hub, can you spot the pre-September event doc? Hint hint
Access Info: are working on legal reform projects with Moldova and Greece, as well as supporting Serbia with some legal challenges and convening a group of CSOs and activists around the 1049 Article.
SPOON: just got a win from the court in Amsterdam (more here) on rejections based on draft documents! There’s been some support from a minister who suggests the house waits to see what happens with FOI before talking about Abuse of the law and dealing with the complexities of things passing through the house when trying to ask for information about bill proceedings.
Transparency International Slovenia: have been Releasing their global integrity report with Ernst Young and going into conversation with Ernst and Young about what this means for Slovenian businesses.
Transparencia: is using FOI campaign to change 7 Belgian FOI regulations. Our actual campaign is on the federal Belgian law. We have collaborated with mainstream media to support that goal Transparence : ces documents que l’on ne veut pas (facilement) rendre publics – Le Soir and we presented to the press an FOI-investigation on fraud in covid-government contracts Des espions dans le Covid #1 : Vaccins périmés, manipulations et vidéos, le scandale belge qui éclabousse la France et l’Europe (blast-info.fr)ImamoPravoZnati: are sailing along smoothly this month; Users are sending their questions, receiving answers and they calculated they receive around 6% of all the FOIs sent in the Republic of Croatia to public authorities!
KiMitTud: Atlatzso (KMT’s parent company) have been using FOI to investigate fraudulent calls for vote recounts and uncovered that almost half the calls (114) for a recount in one constituency were made by the candidate themselves, not the vote counters.
Arthro5A: Vouliwatch (Arthro5a’s parent organisation) ran their first workshop around Access to Information to encourage journalists and CSOs to make requests and use their right to information. It was well attended and 18 CSOs signed up to the campaign afterwards. The event was supported by Access Info and Open Knowledge Germany.If you’re in our Network and Community of Practice and have something to share for August monthnotes – drop Jen a line!
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Whether or not you were lucky enough to attend TICTeC in person earlier this month, you can now experience it all over again.
Where there are videos and slides for a session, you can access them via the Schedule page. Just click on ‘see session detail’ to see which resources there are. Or discover all the videos via the TICTeC 24 YouTube playlist.
Note: Videos and slides are only available for sessions that were recorded, and where presenters gave consent to share.
Plus: browse through photos from the two days of TICTeC 24 on our Flickr page, here. All photos are available under a non-commercial Creative Commons licence, so please do share them where you like.
Don’t miss TICTeC 2025!
Work with us at TICTeC 2025: we’re open to suggestions from organisations who might like to partner with us to host TICTeC in your region; and we’re also always happy to talk to potential sponsors. Drop us a line if you’d like to discuss more.
Subscribe to updates: Be the first to know when we put out the call for papers, open bookings and announce the location for next year’s TICTeC — sign up here.
Thanks for your feedback
We love hearing what other people got out of TICTeC! Special thanks to those who have taken time to feed back on what those two days meant to them.
Here are just a couple of the comments we’ve received: follow us on Instagram to see more over the next few weeks.
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We’ve just come back from two intense days packed with presentations from the wonderful global community of civic tech practitioners. Heartfelt thanks to everyone who made TICTeC 2024 possible: our wonderful speakers, delegates both on the ground and joining us remotely; sponsors the National Endowment for Democracy, the team of red-shirted mySociety staff who made everything run so smoothly (including our volunteer for the day, Teona); venue Mary Ward Hall; and the videography team from AV Projections who gave our online attendees a seamless experience.
Each attendee will of course have their own highlights, but they surely must include some of the following: María Baron and Nick Mabey OBE igniting each day’s proceedings with relevant and provocative keynotes; a panel of seasoned civic technologists reflecting on what happened the day they woke up and realised their project had become critical national infrastructure; first-person testimonies from practitioners operating in hostile or war-torn environments; and deep dives into where AI can be helpful and where it has inherent dangers.
The last in-person conference was in 2019, and to be completely honest, we did wonder whether we’d be able to fully recapture the TICTeC spirit. Fortunately, people’s reactions, messages and social media posts — not to mention the buzz of excitement throughout the two days — has put those concerns entirely to rest. There’s as much affection and appreciation for TICTeC as there ever was.
Thanks to everyone who was a part of it – not least our own Gemma Moulder who pulled off her usual seemingly effortless, but in reality massive, feat of organisation.
We’ll be sharing slides, videos and photos as soon as they’ve all been processed, so watch this space.
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Photo: Alice Williams
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Yes, it’s that marvellous time for the Civic Tech community: the full TICTeC schedule is now online and you can browse it to your heart’s content, picking which sessions you’ll attend — not always an easy decision when there’s so much to choose from!
As usual, TICTeC promises access to civic tech around the world with insights you won’t get elsewhere, presented by a truly amazing roster of international speakers. This year we have a focus on threats to democracy and climate, and the tools that are working to counter them.
You’ll find grassroots NGOs, making a difference through their on-the-ground technology; representatives of governments; tech giants; and of course the academic researchers that make sense of everything we do in the civic tech world.
- Hear from Mevan Babakar, News and Information Credibility Lead at Google;
- Learn how tech has shaped citizen-government communication from the Taiwan Ministry of Digital Affairs;
- See what happens when you wake up and realise your civic tech project is now critical national infrastructure, with Alex Blandford of the University of Oxford
These are just a few of the 60+ sessions from an international range of perspectives that you can dip into across TICTeC’s two days. Which will you choose?
Come along in person, or tune in from home
This year, most of TICTeC’s sessions will be livestreamed, so you can tune in no matter where you are (the workshops won’t be broadcast, as they don’t lend themselves to online participation). If you’d like to attend virtually, you can book a ticket via Eventbrite for just £50.
Or, if you’d prefer to join the conference in person, enjoying all that a real-life meet-up entails, with sessions interspersed with networking, nibbles, and socialising, make sure you snap up one of the limited slots. But hurry – TICTeC always sells out, and this year is looking like no exception.
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Hot on the heels of our last big announcement, we’re very happy to confirm our second keynote for TICTeC, The Impacts of Civic Technology conference 2024: Nick Mabey OBE.
If you’d like to hear from one of the big players, really making a difference to the UK’s climate change response, you’ll want to make sure you’re at TICTeC this year.
Nick is a founder of E3G (Third Generation Environmentalism), an independent climate change think tank with a goal to translate climate politics, economics and policies into action — and is now its co-CEO.
He has previously worked in the UK Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit, UK Foreign Office, WWF-UK, London Business School and the UK electricity industry. As an academic he was lead author of Argument in the Greenhouse, examining the economics of climate change.
He also founded London Climate Action Week, one of the world’s largest climate festivals, which takes place on 22-30 June — so if you’re in London for TICTeC and you have an interest in climate, it might be worth sticking around for that!
Nick will open the second day of proceedings at TICTeC, setting the scene for presentations and workshop sessions that strive to examine the central question: What is needed to make civic tech tackling problems around climate change more successful and impactful on a global scale?
Few people are better equipped to bring such a broad spectrum of knowledge and experience to this complex issue. If you’d like to tap into some of that, then make sure to snap up your tickets to TICTeC.
The TICTeC 2024 schedule will be published very soon, so watch this space.
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We’re excited to announce the first keynote speaker for our 2024 Impacts of Civic Technology Conference (TICTeC)!
Join us on 12 and 13 June — in London or online — and you’ll hear from María Baron, founder and now Global Executive Director of Directorio Legislativo.
This year, one of the major themes at TICTeC will be the role of civic tech in safeguarding and advancing democracy where it is under threat. María and Directorio Legislativo’s work explore both the problem, and how we can collectively roll up our sleeves and do something about it.
María has a long career in transparency and democratic institutions, working first across Latin America and then globally with both Directorio Legislativo and the Open Government Partnership. Along the way, María also founded the Latin American Network for Legislative Transparency, convening 24 civil society organisations from 13 countries.
With her team at Directorio, María developed a methodology for building consensus across polarised stakeholders on tricky issues — and has brought many of those agreements to Congress, where they were signed into law.
The Regulatory Alert Service, also from her Directorio team, enables political analysts to predict changes in regulation across 19 countries.
Among many other achievements, María has been awarded the NDI Democracy Award for Civic Innovation. In short, we can guarantee you’ll gain a massive dose of inspiration and hope from her session.
And that’s just the first speaker announcement from this year’s TICTeC. Make sure you’re a part of the “best concentration of practitioners, academics, and thinkers in this field” (Fran Perrin, Indigo Trust) and book your place now.
It’s been a while since we convened the wonderful, industrious, inspiring global civic tech community in one place, face to face — we’re ready to reignite those amazing conversations, connections and deep dives into democracy at the Impacts of Civic Technology Conference, this June.
