6 keys for the future of democracy & technology

#SWAP is an “international symposium on upgrading democracy in the internet era” organized by iMal in Brussels november 2017 with Michel Bauwens, MediaLab Prado, Digidem Lab, decidim.barcelona, Desis Network and many others.

As Civic Innovation Network, we facilitated a “walk the talk” fishbowl session with around 20 participants from all over Europe where we discussed how to integrate the learnings from the weekend in our daily lives. Gathered here, a few of the topics :

1. Ontological design applied to social structure

Everything we design is designing us back. We shape urban spaces and they are shaping us and our behaviours in return. But this also applies to ideological spaces like social media for example.

To take back the control on our lives, we need to be aware of the influence these structures have on us. Then only, we’ll be able to get back some control and to reshape them with a “people first” approach.

2. Activating the power of diversity

Actively valuing diversity means first to recognize what we have in common in order to create connexions and transform borders into bridges.

Every walls in our society begin with small barriers in our mind. In order to discover unknown territories, we need to go out of our comfort zone and this starts within ourselves.

Let’s first recognize these barriers in our daily thinking and actions in order to transform them into opportunities for understanding and growth.

3. Safe space

This means the creation of secured, inclusive and non-judgmental spaces allowing trust to be built. Spaces where we can share our stories and where we are not afraid to show our emotions. Spaces where we can feel a sense of togetherness again.

An effective critical reflexion focuses on the context rather than on the content. Let’s shift the debate and start asking ourselves the relevant questions in order to rethink our role in the design of these spaces and structures.

4. Experimentation

We sometimes think we can predict the future and plan our actions accordingly. But with increasing collaboration in this already global and interconnected world come more complexity and uncertainty. This makes safe and experimentation spaces needed more than ever. However, failure still has a negative connotation and distrust sometimes seems everywhere around us.

To facilitate the emergence of these experimentation spaces, we should first acknowledge our natural limits and incapacity to predict the future. Then only we can connect and start building the future of our dreams.

5. The Commons

Our common destiny needs “transcending objects” (Michel Bauwens) to gather us around a common objective and the Commons, known as “the third way”, could play this role.

By acknowledging their impact on society and the environment, corporations could finally assume their leadership and redefine their role as generative rather than extractive organisations.

With a shift towards alignment of economic and social/environmental interests in the long run, these structures have the capacity to take care of us & the planet on a massive scale (infrastructure, financial resources, communication, political support).

Let’s be open to this possibility and create space for it !

6. Radical inclusiveness

Moreover, inclusiveness also means stopping violence against these political and socio-economic structures that are still the main driving forces of our society today.

It’s time to create a network of agents and ambassadors able to permeate these organisations. This, in order to alter the elite’s reproduction system and to smooth the transition towards a more just & beautiful world.