Mass Citizen Input

agreed, aggregating citizen input is a key issue. However from the perspective of methodology it is also one of the most difficult to do "right". For some thoughts on the change.gov-achievments, emerging deliberation-tools and predictions of obama's team-strategy see also:

http://pep-net.eu/wordpress/?p=300

http://opentopersuasion.com/2009/01/20/obama-making-sense-of-the-world/

posted about 1 year ago

Thanks, Hans, you are obviously more of an expert on this than me. Can you give me a few examples of interesting attempts to aggregate citizen input? I think what David Price is doing with debatemapper (http://opentopersuasion.com/category/debatemapper/) is very interesting, but I think we need much simpler tools (and of course there will be different tools for different situations).

posted about 1 year ago

Two interesting websites were launch today, both with potential to reinforce citizen's engagement:
 
the first is Who Runs Government and is a Washington Post initiative. It offers a look at the world of Washington through its key players and personalities, from the White House to the Congress, from the Federal Agencies to the Military. "Our goal is to become the web destination for business, opinion and political leaders – as well as students, educators and engaged citizens - looking for crucial, real-time information on the individuals who shape the policy-making process in the nation’s capital". For our initial site launch, creating and editing profiles will be limited to the editorial staff; in its second phase, our site will evolve into a moderated wiki.  Later in 2009, we will allow registered users to revise existing profiles or create new ones."
 
The second is called Innovations in Government and is the product of the leading good government groups. InnoGOV.org is a collection of forums, research and recommendations to bring insight and transformation to the federal government. The goal is to centralize the importance of performance, accountability and transparency in government. "Our task is to disseminate the leading best practices to government managers. Our promise is to help you build the capacity to serve and defend our citizens". The InnoGOV.org agenda is built on the recommendations of The Government Performance Coalition, that includes Cisco's IBSG.
 
American democracy is definitively more alive than ever.

posted about 1 year ago

Here is another interesting example of online accountability: PolitiFact, a project of the St. Petersburg Times (Tampa, Flo).

"Every day, reporters and researchers from the Times examine statements by members of Congress, the president, cabinet secretaries, lobbyists, people who testify before Congress and anyone else who speaks up in Washington. We research their statements and then rate the accuracy on our Truth-O-Meter – True, Mostly True, Half True, Barely True and False. The most ridiculous falsehoods get our lowest rating, Pants on Fire. We also rate the consistency of public officials on our Flip-O-Meter using three ratings: No Flip, Half Flip and Full Flop. We created the Obameter to help you assess the Obama presidency. Our reporters have compiled a database of more than 500 individual promises that Barack Obama made during the campaign. We research and rate their status as No Action, Stalled or In the Works and then ultimately determine whether it earns a Promise Kept, Compromise or Promise Broken."

See the example of the Obameter here The in the Works rulings on the Obameter...

posted about 1 year ago

Paul, thanks for asking. I think all tools for aggregating citizeninput are still in its alpha phase. There is MixedInk.com or DeepDebate.org which offer some interesting ways of doing it. However both of them are tools and have to be embedded into a process. At BürgerForum2009.de we try this (see http://www.zebralog.eu/en/000242.html for a description in English) and we get some promising feedback, that it works in a framework of some hundred people. Scaling it up is the next big step.

posted about 1 year ago