Good things happen when you collaborate: when collaboration leads to innovation
In the new paradigm of connectivity and connectedness where the so-called wicked problems cannot be addressed by providing single solutions the role of partnership working has been gaining momentum. Archaic and siloed approaches that do not make allowance for involvement of private and public sector as well as other stakeholders in the collaborative process can no longer yield expected results and meet multiple demands. Instead, multidisciplinarity, interdisciplinarity and transdisciplinarity are becoming the new order and, fuelled by the use of technology, they are reinventing how local and national governments work, and redefining the role of citizens in this co-creation process.
Civic technology is most likely one of the greatest examples of both collaboration and multidisciplinarity, as it pulls together diverse expertise with a common overarching purpose. Civic tech not only opens up the space for open innovation, but also involves citizens to have a say in the process. By bringing together coders, designers, policy makers, researchers, and activists, the process of public co-creation gets equipped with the necessary ingredients: a diversified expertise rallying around common social problem. And, it is exactly this that allows citizens to reclaim an active role in society through the medium of technology.
In the aftermath of political disillusionment, widespread corruption scandals, democratic deficit and accountability crises, civic tech has almost become the light at the end of the tunnel that slowly but firmly indicates a change in a global paradigm. In this ongoing search towards a provision of solutions that furthers the public good and addresses local challenges with data and technology, collaborations with local governments have been mushrooming.
Created as an international network of organizations that aim to empower citizens, Code for All members have a track record of collaborating across both the network and with local governments. Coming up with innovative approaches to problem-solving in cities that can be replicated with local governments across the globe. Despite facing push backs and challenges, there are various worthwhile practices from all over the world in places such as Taiwan, Germany, Poland, United States and Romania already underway.
To pick one, Code for NL (Code for the Netherlands) is a great illustration of collaboration with multiple stakeholders where cooperation with the local governments has been put in the front row seat in an organic way. Building upon the core values and principles, right from its establishment Code for NL has been encouraging local government entities to replicate practices, learn lessons from one other and not doing things in silos. Code for NL has been making successful efforts towards embodiment of the perception that technology and policy-making follow an intertwined and overlapping trajectory, rather than being non-directly correlated elements that can function separately. It has managed to identify gaps in working practices and filled them up innovatively.
To illustrate this argument, Dutch local government has previously been working in collaboration on a number of initiatives in the governance context, yet these only focused on including various policy makers and not the tech community and beyond. The network of tech savvy people at Code for NL instead decided to bring together the network of programmers and designers to come up with innovative solutions that would serve the public, together with local government representatives. This practice has scaled up as getting people active in the network and bringing their own ideas to issues across environmental, societal, economic and other spheres. This has allowed trust to be built and has subsequently created informal insights into the governance process. This, in turn has contributed to pushing the agenda for the government to work more using open source tools and technology. What’s more, on the topic of influencing the agenda, Code for NL has managed to establish a Fellowship program where coders work with the policy-makers in Amsterdam and Eindhoven. These Fellowships encourage technically savvy people within governments and governmental organization to develop practical solutions that address societal problems.
When asked about the best example of collaboration between the network and the local government in Netherlands, one of the founders of Code for NL referred to a legacy of working together and being recognized by the government. The recognition of the expertise of the skills of the team at the Code for NL has allowed for creating a long-term collaboration where Code for NL is asked for input on policy documents, gets advised and contributes to various events organized on the local and sub-national level.
While surely multi-stakeholder collaboration is not a straightforward task, looking at the examples from around the world it can be said that benefits outweigh the challenges. The latter include handling conflicting interests and individual aims, muddling through bureaucratic processes and changing the mindset of people that would in turn allow for taking an active role in collaboration. On the contrary, benefits of the collaboration between the civic tech and governments include delivery of a better, more agile and responsive service to citizens, reinvigoration of citizen engagement, increased participation in the decision-making process, making government more accountable and responsive by enabling citizens to hold governments to account, enlarged transparency, and broadening of a public debate.
Although various tips for successful collaboration in the context of civic tech can be listed, this article outlines a few that seem to be of particular importance. Firstly, when collaborating it is important to be inclusive and recognize that while working in a team there is no single expertise that is more important that the rest and that no one’s efforts should be unrecognized. All stakeholders in the process, whether they are programmers, city hall representatives, or activists should have an equal stake in the process. Secondly, successful collaboration requires ability to achieve a compromise and be able to adjust one’s position with the end goal of reaching an overarching, pre-established aim. Thirdly, trust is at the core of collaboration, therefore it should be worked on in both, online as well as offline scenarios.
Innovation in governance processes that include the use of technology and open data, created using data-driven, user-centered and iterative methods, offers the potential to address and prevent political bitterness, strengthen limited accountability and enhance democracy. The civic tech movement is no longer perceived via the lenses of ad hoc and patchworked efforts, but instead has paved the way to altering traditional ways of governing and leveraging the power of digital tools to the benefit of the public. Civic tech has become the answer of how strengthening of civic engagement and promoting collaboration can bring real benefits locally.
