Civic Tech in Calgary
Download as PPTX, PDF3 likes553 views
The document discusses the potential for developing a civic tech community in Calgary, highlighting the importance of technology in enhancing public participation and improving government services. It outlines various categories and functions of civic tech, and compares Calgary's current status with other Canadian cities that have established vibrant civic tech initiatives. The gathering aims to explore strategies for leveraging technology to better engage citizens and address civic challenges.
Civic Tech in Calgary
- 1. Exploring the Potential of Civic Tech in Calgary Geoff Zakaib, P.Eng., MBA Civic Innovation YYC Gathering June 20, 2017
- 2. Agenda • Background • What is Civic Tech? • Civic Tech across Canada • Calgary Civic Tech Ecosystem
- 3. Background • There is a growing global movement that is using technology for public good. In many cities this is being manifested through a variety of Civic Tech initiatives. • In Canada, vibrant Civic Tech communities have been launched in Toronto, Ottawa and Edmonton. • Even though Calgary has all of the components that are critical to the success of Civic Tech, a focused initiative has yet to emerge. • The purpose of the this gathering is to explore the potential for the formation of a Civic Tech community in Calgary.
- 4. Definitions • Technology that enables greater participation in government or otherwise assists government in delivering citizen services and strengthening ties with the public. • Tools or processes that people as individuals or groups may use for public good and that betters the lives of the many, not just the few. • Technology projects involving intentional collaboration between technologists, bureaucrats, entrepreneurs and nonprofit employees to engage the public or solve civic problems. • Use of data, technology and connectivity to address challenges that citizens are facing and to improve the services that governments are delivering.
- 5. Categories of Civic Tech • Citizen to Citizen (C2C): Technology that improves citizen mobilization or improves connections between citizens • Citizen to Government (C2G): Technology that improves the frequency or quality of interaction between citizens and government • Government Technology (Govtech): Innovative technology solutions that make government more efficient and effective at service delivery Engines of Change: What Civic Tech Can Learn From Social Movements
- 6. Categories of Civic Tech
- 8. Image from the 2013 Knight Foundation report “The Emergence of Civic Tech”
- 9. WHAT IS CIVIC TECH: TOWARD FINALIZING A BASIC FRAMEWORK SO THAT WE CAN MOVE ON WITH IT ALREADY MICAH SIFRY, FOUNDER AND EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, CIVIC HALL MATT STEMPECK, DIRECTOR OF CIVIC TECHNOLOGY, MICROSOFT ERIN SIMPSON, PROGRAM DIRECTOR, CIVIC HALL LABS
- 10. CIVIC TECH IS THE USE OF TECHNOLOGY FOR THE PUBLIC GOOD TOPLINE DEFINITION
- 11. RE THE PUBLIC GOOD: IT IS CULTURALLY AND HISTORICALLY SUBJECTIVE. WE USE PUBLIC TO DISTINGUISH FROM PERSONAL AND PRIVATE. “PUBLIC GOOD” DEALS WITH SHARED PUBLIC CHALLENGES.
- 12. COMMON FUNCTIONS • Crowdfunding platforms • Benefit navigation tools • Campaign organizing platforms • Check-in tools • Constituent to Government communication tools • Crowdsourced data collection • Data schemas and standards • Data Visualization tools and Platforms • Event organizing tools • Freedom of Information tools • Government to constituent communications • Group communication tools • Group decision-making tools • Ideation tools • Issue reporting platforms • Legislation engagement platforms • Mapping platforms • Marketplaces and Clearinghouses • Neighborhood forums • Online Petition sites • Open data publishing platforms • Opinion matching platforms • Resource matching/sharing sites • Sensors • Service alerts • Watchdogging and Transparency projects
- 13. BUT ISN’T CIVIC TECH MORE THAN JUST TECH? It’s, even more importantly, the people and how they do things together.
- 14. COMMON SOCIAL PROCESSES CONVENE Civic hacking meetups Backchannels Roundtables Working Groups Physical gathering places, hubs Tech translators & intermediaries Talent Pipeline Peer networks Partner networks Datapalooza Conferences INFORM Journalism, books, podcasts, blogs Educational programs and courses Online Forums Research Centers and Projects Digital Literacy groups Workshops Data analysis for public good BUILD Innovation teams, Labs Open source projects Social impact design groups Foundation initiatives Accelerators Incubators Tech companies with civic teams Behavioral economics programs Open governance initiatives Data sourcing Civic & social good hackathons Civic tech competitions
- 15. AGITATE Politics (electoral + activism), campaigns Artistic interventions Investigative journalism CODIFY Field Definition and Governance Playbooks and design principles Toolkits SUPPORT Accelerate public sector work Fellowship programs COMMON SOCIAL PROCESSES
- 16. WAYS TO ORGANIZE Degree of Change Conformist Reformist Transformist Who Pays (Customer) Government Philanthropy Private Who Uses (User) Gov Organization Individual How Civic Civic Feature Civic Product Civic Externality
- 18. Citizens and Communities / Social Innovation / Civil Society Technology Industry and Alliances / Smart Cities / Regional Partnerships City of Calgary / Digital Strategy / Open Gov-Data-City Civic Innovation / Gov Tech & Services Entrepreneurs and Startups / Research and Education / Knowledge Mobilization CIVIC TECH COMMUNITY Calgary Civic Tech Ecosystem
Editor's Notes
- #10: MICAH We’re presenting these four things to you today. Micah introduces Matt and Erin Micah: Been tracking this for dozen + years, PDF, Civic Hall, etc. Matt: representing cross-sector experience of the fields converged into civic tech Erin: Microsoft, thesis on digital equity and community institutions, White House, CGI and now Labs
- #11: -The point of this definition is to communicate what we do externally. We would like to propose that when someone asks you in the elevator, you can answer with this. -It's intentionally broad - we see civic tech as an umbrella term which captures and includes subcategories like gov tech -Not bound to government--depending on context, the best thing for the common good might not be working with your government--civic tech is bigger than that
- #12: IT IS CULTURALLY AND HISTORICALLY SUBJECTIVE. WE USE PUBLIC TO DISTINGUISH FROM PERSONAL AND PRIVATE. “PUBLIC GOOD” DEALS WITH SHARED PUBLIC CHALLENGES.
- #13: Erin: Our methodology took the approach of going from the specific to the general: we looked at what tools and companies actually existed and then worked to group them by technical function. We chose to stay out of domains -- like ed tech, or smart cities -- and instead focus on what the technology enables, making most of these categories domain agnostic. . So you’re seeing here our list of common functions, each identified through analysis of a couple of hundred civic tech tools and companies. These are not mutually exclusive or collectively exhaustive. Part of our purpose in being here today is to gather additional data from you and get your criticisms on our work in order to improve it. Now, we’re going to go through and talk about three categories that we think are representative. We didn’t pick these out for any critically important reason, there are dozens of verticals to populate, we just want to show you how it works.
- #14: BUT ISN’T CIVIC TECH MORE THAN THE TOOLS AND PLATFORMS AND COMPANIES AND ORGANIZATIONS WHO MAKE THEM? OF COURSE. In doing this work, we realize that civic tech ECOSYSTEM is not just about new technology. It is the social processes on top of the technologies that are key to driving impact in civic tech. So we inventoried dozens of the social processes, from the new class of hackathons and open source projects to time-honored traditions like gathering in shared spaces, that people engage in Our shorthand for this is social processes Which are how people employ the tech to actually drive the impact
- #17: Erin: We view this work as a prerequisite to asking more critical research questions. Thus, we’ve also developed a handful of suggested horizontal ways to organize the field that, together with our categories, can be particularly useful to researchers, funders, and wonks seeking to understand the space. Categorizing civic tech projects horizontally across the ecosystem by such meta-questions as “who pays” or “what degree of change are they seeking” may allow us to see the broader patterns in the forest, rather than the individual trees. It can also help a newcomer--for example, if it turns out that of the many sites around the world devoted to legislative transparency, 90% are funded by foundations, if you are thinking of starting one in your country, you probably want to make sure you have foundation support. Essentially, these help us think about the question “to what end?” How much change are we asking for? Who is it for? And how do we fund it?