Sentavio // Shutterstock
March 8, 2023
Hollie Russon Gilman and Grace Levin co-authored an article for Next City about digital tools used to amplify community engagement.
Digitization. It’s the threat that modern democracies, and especially cities, must solve – at least according to current dialogues on digital regulation.
Many of the social and political problems our cities face today have been exacerbated by technology. Social media and other digital tools have increased the spread of misinformation and overall weakened public trust in our civic, social and political institutions. Recent developments in virtual reality and artificial intelligence raise new concerns for issues around surveillance, bias, automation and exploitation, especially with increasing public scrutiny on technology giants like Meta and Google.
The very nature of these technologies seems antithetical to the principles of humanity and collective decision making that underpin our democracy.
Despite the concerns, cities around the world are experimenting with technology like AI and VR as part of the solution, rather than the problem, to strengthen democratic institutions. From Helsinki to Louisville, digital tools are creating new opportunities for communities to engage in processes of collective decision making and imagine new visions of what democracy can look like.
The City of Helsinki has been testing the potential of artificial intelligence and augmented reality to bring new audiences into city decision making and to transform its public spaces.
Helsinki’s Youth Services runs a youth participatory budgeting process both in-person at schools and youth centers as well as online using the digital platform Nuortenbudjetti. Anyone between the ages of 12 to 17 is invited to create and vote on youth-led projects across the city, ranging from a Halloween walk to an afterschool club. The platform has experimented with AI to analyze common themes from surveys and online voting to help drive consensus.
Helsinki has also experimented with augmented reality to co-design green infrastructure projects with the mobile app Green Kalasatama. Citizens were invited to co-create the app, developing an engaging experience where users are able to place street trees and other green infrastructure elements in their surroundings.
The digital platform Pol.is uses machine learning to gather citizen input and drive collective decision making on tough political issues. Pol.is has popularly been used in Taiwan to crowdsource solutions on controversial topics like Uber regulation, but it has also been used in cities including Louisville, Kentucky to host civic dialogues on topics ranging from public safety to the environment.