The Sessions

Session 1: Illustrating the Use of Open Data

Open data is heralded as a game-changer for transparency and government accountability. Several civic tech organisations in Africa are using open data to allow citizens to hold governments accountable, and thereby drive better service delivery. The session explored how a few organisations in Africa are driving accountability and service delivery using open data technologies.

Two major research insights that emerged from the session:

(I) How to get the government to understand why citizens would want data

(II) How COVID-19 is driving innovation and has been good for the civic tech community

Session 2: Illustrating Regional Experiences in Implementing Civic Tech

The objective was to look at the common stories that emerged from the group discussion and explored the meaning and significance in the different stories. Listening to the stories of the other discussants, the group may discover possibilities for new perspectives on current challenges.  Implications for group collaboration, cross initiatives and across countries were initiated through the discussions.

Session 3: Business Models for Funding in Civic Tech

This session explored why many civic tech projects are not able to scale and what emerging business models and earned revenue sources for civic tech practitioners are available.

One major research insight that emerged from the session was that there is potential for scaling and developing business models among African civic tech, but it will be essential to create an “enabling environment” and via:

(i) Creating visibility of their platforms to commercial businesses
(ii) Engaging more citizens via their platforms
(iii) Creating a buy-in and develop trust with governments
(iv) Building the civic tech Infrastructure

Session 4: Civic Tech in Low Tech Environment: mHealth in Mozambique

In this session, the strategies used and lessons learned from implementing civic tech in a low tech environment (such as 2G) were explored. A representative of a civic tech initiative from Mozambique shared their stories and lessons.

The following themes and observations emerged from this discussion:

1. The problem, not the technology, should drive the project
2. About 90% of successful civic tech projects is non-tech related
3.  The political and political economy of civic tech is too often ignored

Our researcher is currently collecting case studies on civic tech practices and lessons in an urban African context from each session, these will be shared on our case studies database upon completion.

Tanzanian cartoonist Masoud Kipanya fashions himself as a protagonist for truth and a catalyst for change. With over 2-million followers on social media, he is one of the most outspoken satirists in his country, something which has led to him being seen by the ruling government as a tool for the opposition.

   “Being a cartoonist is more about how you think than how you draw”

His career began in 1989 when Tanzania was a single-party state and all the country’s broadcasters belonged to the government which meant political commentary simply “glorified the system”. He went on to launch a weekly tabloid featuring only political cartoons, adding that being a cartoonist is more about how you think than how you draw.

He said his cartoons were meant to spark conversations and move people to take charge of their lives by speaking out against injustice. “My cartoons are a reminder to the youth,” he said. “Politics can turn a generation from good to bad.”

Zimbabwe’s Magamba TV uses satire to speak truth to power as well as to laugh at power and the incredulity of what is happening in the country. “It’s comic relief packaged in a way that everyday Zimbabweans can relate to,” said satirist Tafadzwa Tseisi.

Zimbabwe’s youth are disillusioned and Magamba TV is a form of creative activism to expose the truth and a tool to fight state propaganda. Building the platform had not come without challenges, and Tseisi revealed how the organisation had been raided, their equipment seized, and how they had been arrested on baseless charges. But it has been worth the risk, he said.

The organisation is now focused on building a school of satire and wants to focus on becoming the launch pad of prominent female satirists.

Tomiwa Aladekomo, CEO of Big Cabal Media, a youth-focused Nigerian digital media company, said the #EndSARS movement against police brutality in Nigeria, had shown how communication was changing not just the tools we use but the way in which we use them. He added that traditional print media in Nigeria had largely towed the government line ignoring the protests, while digital publications “took up the slack” and chronicled the protest.

Mimi Kalinda, CEO of PR firm Africa Communications Media Group, called out African media for failing to adequately cover the protest in Nigeria. Instead, most of the coverage had come from western media. “All of us are media in 2020, we can capture news,” Kalinda said.

This was a double-edged sword she said as it could be helpful yet dangerous.

It was helpful because we live in an era where little can go uncovered. “We can get justice now more than ever and hold people accountable. It also works as a tool for the vulnerable.” The danger, however, was that we were seeing the rise of fake news and the spreading of dissent and bigotry, Kalinda said, pointing to the xenophobic movements we had seen springing up on social media in South Africa. Regulation by the government was another concern, where, in countries like Ethiopia, the government shuts down the internet when they don’t like the news. For Kags, shallow engagement meant we were losing user engagement but “we need to get comfortable with the death of homogeneity”, he said.

This session was hosted by Pierre Schoonraad, who is the Head of Research and Development at the Centre for Public Service Innovation (CPSI). He opened the interactive session with the catalytic statement that ‘Data is not just about trying to identify and understand what the problems are but is about guiding us to make better decisions.

Key Takeaways:

Organisations like Open Up is making data more and more accessible

How does Public Service look? At National Level, most people are in law enforcement On the provincial front, most people are in the education and health departments. 50% of departmental budgets are dedicated to administration and the rest dedicated to the mandate.

We need to look into automate admin processes and lock into auditable processes (PDUs, Blockchain) Can the geolocation of crime assist targeted/ intelligence-driven policing? Challenge is that the geo-locations are not the real locations of crime scenes; there is rather an approximation of where the crime happened. What does that mean for intelligence-driven policing? It means law enforcement cannot actually pinpoint the location of the crime.

The data is therefore problematic and therefore defies the purpose of what we want to do with geolocation data When we deal with data we assume that the data will give us the correct information Data capturing and computer programmes render data less useful Data points towards street intersections, public facilities Civic Tech finding the devil Linking communities directly with SAPS (Memeza, Namola) Supporting SAPS to improve data and share with CPFs When we have civic tech innovations we need to ask all the questions When we work from the Civic Tech perspective we need to work from an iterative way. Civic Tech finding the devil: Partnerships Facilitating real-time policing When we deal with data we need to do that within an ethical and human rights framework.

It cannot be outside our Bill of Rights How do you deal with wicked problems? We know what the underlying causes are. In order to deal with this right at the beginning, we have checklists and we try to understand what the risks are. We know what the pathways are We jump into solutions without understanding the underlying issues. We need to look at people as the centre of the solutions that we bring. In providing solutions, start with understanding human behaviour Find insights that can help leverage the system Design for complexity ‘Data is not just about trying to identify and understand what the problems are but is about guiding us to make better decisions.’

Masterclass slides

Using Public Data

Youtube: Please note this session was not recorded at the host’s request.

This session was led by Koketso Moeti, founding executive director of Amandla.mobi. Moeti showed the class how she has been using tech in her work and gave the participants practical guides on how they can use social mobilisation and activism to empower themselves and their communities. 

Digital activism can be defined as the use of digital tools such as mobile phones, the internet and social media to bring about change, political and social change. Moeti explained how digital activism is not a new phenomenon, adding that throughout history, communities have consistently used the tools and resources available to them to mobilise for social change, using the fax machine as an example of a communication tool that was used to mobilise. Although digital tools are useful, Moeti cautioned the participants against attempting to use digital tools to replace people. Tools are made to be used, who uses them and what they use them for determines their impact, she said. 

Speaking about social change, Moeti encouraged the participants to work within ecosystems. ‘You cannot affect change alone; you have to have the humility to work with others to mobilise’, she said.  Talking about effecting change, Moeti said ‘change is not linear, you must be in it for the long haul.’ Furthermore, she added that due to the volatility of mobile technology, people must think carefully about the decisions they make today and how they affect the future. She gave insights on the value of foresight; imploring the participants to be more forward-thinking in their attempts to make an impact, ‘forecasting connects the past, the present and the future’, she said. She continued to say, ‘activism is not only about using tech; you have to think deeply about the past, present and future to change the world.

The Masterclass was a session filled with provocative exercises, that required the participants to think about how they can build a shared vision for multiple futures. Moeti shared various strategic foresight toolkits like the Institute for the Future Foresight Essentials and Save the Children – the Future is Ours, that can help citizens think differently about digital activism and the use of technological tools to accelerate change.

This session was led by Alex Chandran, head of Partnerships at Citizen Lab, a citizen engagement platform, used by local governments and organisations to reconnect with their communities and engage them in the decision-making process.

Alex cited the issues with existing and former models of public engagement and participation, such as low efficiency with regard to both resources and processes, as well as a lack of transparency and public trust. To address these issues, Citizen Lab facilitates good, evidence-based, decision and policymaking by providing an e-democracy platform that enables co-decision making between communities and governments.

Public participation and deliberation present big challenges for public institutions and organisers even on the best of days. A myriad number of challenges are faced by public officials in trying to increase the levels of public engagement while also ensuring that these processes are effective for all those involved. 

Public engagement is an integral part of any functional democracy. Citizens Lab’s interest is in providing digital tools for cities and governments to enhance participation on local topics and include in decision-making processes.  Alexandra leads the Partnerships to work at Citizen Lab, growing the mission and impact with a variety of partners across different countries and organisations. She is currently working with and supporting in-country Partners in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Denmark, Germany, Kenya, Poland, Romania and South Africa. With these Partners, Alexandra is building a network of citizen participation experts who can develop the impactful use of Citizen Lab in their country market.

This masterclass provided a window into some key experiences from around the world of effective public engagement on both offline and online platforms. Alexandra Chandran also focused on the role of tech in ensuring effective public participation during the COVID pandemic. 

Public engagement pre-COVID-19 predominantly happened in physical locations where citizens could engage robustly with decision-makers and other stakeholders. Public officials were faced with pessimism from citizens who find them to be ineffective and lacking transparency. These perceptions eroded trust between public officials and citizens. Pessimism is a major challenge for democratic institutions especially because the levels of trust between institutions and citizens have an impact on the willingness of citizens to participate in decision-making processes. Citizens lab’s e-democracy platform is an attempt at resolving some of the challenges faced by public officials in engaging and deliberating with citizens. This platform seeks to resolve challenges around transparency and efficiency of institutions and to restore public trust in processes of deliberation and participation.

Some key lessons from this platform indicate that it is important to first understand the kind of engagement wants to have. Democratic institutions need to understand that participation and deliberation are not the same issue. Both these forms of engagement have implications for the kind of outcomes desired. Participation needs to be understood as simply the empowerment of citizens to take action. Taking action could be anything from taking part in a survey or a poll and even joining a  protest. Deliberation focuses on discussions and debates between citizens and stakeholders, and as such is a different type of engagement from participation by the sheer number of participants that could effectively take part. These forms of engagement should all form part of the decision-making process of democratic institutions. 

Deliberation requires that participants have some knowledge of what is being discussed to be able to engage with decision-makers effectively.  This process does not require the whole population but requires an inclusive number of representatives from each group of the population to engage decision-makers and other stakeholders. 

Participative processes are to be employed when an inclusive deliberative process has been completed. Participative processes could occur through surveys, polls, citizen proposals, option analysis and other similar methods. 

The 2020 OECD study revealed that methods of deliberation and participation have had positive effects on the relationship between citizens and institutions. These processes have contributed to better policy making processes and increased levels of trust and transparency between citizens and institutions. The report also revealed that employing deliberation and participation has broadened the democratic approach for citizens and lead to better decision making for institutions. According to the report, interest in deliberative methods of participation has increased, and there has been a shift away from only participation as a form of engagement with the citizenry.  

Often deliberative and participative measures happen offline but they can also happen online platforms. These processes could exclusively take place on online platforms or could occur concurrently through live streaming services for instance. Livestreaming is a good way to get citizens to participate without having to physically attend official events. Citizens could participate in the events though asking questions and giving their inputs from different locations. 

The government enforced lockdowns across the world meant that these engagements needed to happen exclusively online and by so doing presented new challenges for public officials. OECD presented four key elements to consider when deliberation exclusively goes online. According to OECD, officials need to consider whether these engagements should happen in real-time or asynchronously. This is especially important if institutions are to be inclusive during the decision-making process. The organisers need to ask themselves “will everyone be able to attend a live event”? It is also important to consider whether citizens can participate in public deliberations anonymously or with their full identity should they wish to. This will also help to determine whether these meetings need to happen in real-time or asynchronously.

There have been success stories across the world about how online tools have been used for effective deliberation and decision making. National and local governments have used online platforms during this pandemic to maintain a dialogue with citizens and coordinate local volunteering efforts (Rueil-Malmaison), international conferences have happened entirely online (UK Climate Assembly), and national governments have partnered with civic organisations to digitise application processes for social relief grants (GovChat). 

Online deliberation is expected to continue throughout the world during the Covid19 pandemic. Here are some key factors for officials to consider inclusive online deliberation: 

• Language

Officials should use appropriate language that can be understood by everyone. Ensure that there is no highlighting of stereotypes that may offend or exclude others. Officials should not make assumptions about their audiences 

• Communication

Ensure effective communication with key stakeholders and people of influence in the communities that are being engaged. 

• Privacy and data

Personal data should be always protected. There should be clarity about what the data being solicited is going to be used for. Data should be collected only when relevant to the work being done and not just for the sake of it. 

• Compatibility and accessibility 

Digital platforms being used for public engagement should be compatible with all devices

• Offline and Online 

Consider whether all participants have access to a digital device that they can participate from; if not, consider providing an offline platform for participants to be able to share their views as well.

• Measure levels of engagement 

Officials need to pay attention to who is participating and responding and whether they have been able to reach a diverse audience.

More information on Citizen Lab’s work can be found on their website

Masterclass slides:

CitizenLab_Civic Tech Africa slides

This masterclass was led by Wits School of Governance senior lecturer Halfdan Lynge-Mangueira and lecturer Rekgotsofetse Chikane lecturer.

They kick-started the workshop by sharing some insights on the topic of Digitalising Governance. Through a series of charts, they were able to highlight how the country of Estonia was able to implement key policy reforms by making use of technology and data science over the past 10-12 years. Halfdan shared three major trends happening in the space of data processing. 

1. The first trend is that ‘Data volumes are increasing’ where he displayed a graph showcasing how the data available to us is on an exponential upward rise between the year of 2010 and 2025.
2. The second trend pointed out was that ‘the nature of data is changing’ where we no longer are just obtaining organised structured data, but rather unstructured data that comprises of photos, text files and webpage posts.
3. The third trend happening is that ’our processing power is constantly improving’. As we take note of these three global trends happening in the space of data processing, the question arises as to what are the implications on how we engage with public policy?

Masterclass slides

Digital Governance and Public Policy