Published Articles, Interviews & Op-Eds

It’s quintessentially American. But in geopolitics, it’s more than an aphorism – it’s a playbook. Being the “good guys” isn’t just ethical; it’s strategic.

In 2021 Pakistan tried introducing electronic voting machines. In 2022 that decision was reversed. What went wrong and what can we learn?

Escalating tensions between the U.S. and China have brought fresh urgency to discussions at a United Nations working group on space law.

Every year the Innovation in Politics Institute gets together for a pub quiz. This year was a little different. Here’s what we learned.

The use of satellite technology to track and halt real-time cases of deforestation in a country like Malaysia could become a “blueprint” for ending deforestation in the Amazon, writes Daniel Mackisack.

Trump, Borisov and Bolsonaro have all done it: Spreading lies about voting machines to feed doubts about the outcome of a democratic election.

A Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) that runs on a blockchain and uses tokens to fundraise is planning to send somone into space

Our team has been speaking to leaders and professionals from across Europe. We asked them to describe some of the challenges they’ve faced in implementing participatory processes using technology. Answers included mobilising the population, engaging different age groups and getting politicians to take action.

Shai Bargil is co-founder and CEO of Sequent – an Israeli e-voting start-up building an end-to-end verifiable online voting platform for public and private sector elections. We spoke to him about his motivations, the need for trust and the future demand for transparent electronic voting platforms.

Moritz Ritter is the Managing Director of Liquid Democracy — a Berlin based non-profit based on the concept of the same name. Here, he talks to us about the importance of creating more ‘fluid’ forms of political engagement and improving both deliberative and representative processes through technology.

A resurgent space race pits USA and China against one another in an effort to secure territory and resources on the Moon.

The city impressed a citizens jury, with projects including Decidim — a modular open source digital participation platform now in use around the world.

For so many of us, democracy technology isn’t just a burgeoning industry we happen to fall into, it’s a passion and something we see as deeply important to the future of democratic society. Rarely is that more true than for the dedicated open source developers who spend countless hours building and bug-fixing the democratic platforms of the future. We decided to shine a light on some of their motivations, challenges and views of the future.

Disinformation has long infected discourse in digital spaces. But with the digitisation of participatory processes, is there a risk that this affects democratic outcomes directly?

Confusing terminology aside, we need to talk about the delegation of political authority, why it’s a big deal, and how it could impact political participation as democracy goes digital.

It’s easy to become caught up in election cycles in party politics, and representative democracy more broadly. Results need to be now, not later. But prioritising rapid (and often fleeting) political results, usually has an opportunity cost that is far more valuable. Pause before you pounce Let’s imagine a scenario. We’re up against the wall,

Polyas is an e-voting company from Germany. Jan Wegner, CEO at Polyas talks about the company’s recent achievements and trust in e-voting.

Yesterday saw the release of People Powered’s latest Digital Participatory Platforms Ratings, via digital launch event. We joined in to hear the latest, see the results and learn about the process.

‘Your Priorities’ is developed by the Icelandic Citizens Foundation. We spoke to president Robert Bjarnason about the future of the platform.

A group of researchers and non-profits have released an open document asking leaders to urgently fill the void in lunar policy. The post Space Activists Take Action At United Nations Conference To Reduce Lunar Tensions appeared first on Zenger News.

Citizen participation tool ‘CitizenLab’ has emerged as one of the leading platforms in the global market. We spoke to CEO Wietse Van Ransbeeck about his thoughts on growth and the future of the industry.

As part of its campaign to promote global democracy and a UN Parliamentary Assembly, Berlin-based Democracy Without Borders is developing a platform to simulate what that might look like, and encouraging everyone to give it a go.

With the release of the report on ‘Democracy Technologies in Europe’ from the Innovation and Politics Institute (IPI) and the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA), we thought we would wrap up some encouraging notes on the future of the DemTech market.

As the amount of hardware on and around the Moon increases, so does the need for coordination, writes Daniel Mackisack. Daniel Mackisack is a former diplomat and social entrepreneur. He has worked with the World Bank, the UK and New…

At a panel last Thursday, leaders from two of Europe’s most successful democracy technology platforms sat down with two civil society leaders in the same space for a conversation about the changing shape of democracy.

The Civic Tech Field Guide is a catalogue of tools and resources covering the full breadth of ‘tech for the common good’. For curator and co-founder Matt Stempeck, the journey behind it has fuelled a passion for all the projects out there getting good things done under difficult circumstances, and a deep appreciation for the positive role tech can play in democracy - if we’re ‘curious’ enough.

On the dangers of letting a positive surge in citizen participation dull the pain of a broader democratic decline.

Deforestation has increased drastically over the last decade and studies have found that this could have played a leading role in permitting the spread of the coronavirus. Through changing technology to a space-based approach we could collectively address these mounting global challenges, argues Daniel Mackisack.

The British government knows three things for certain about space. It’s big. It’s cold. It’s expensive. For a small country, the scale of the challenge is daunting — and lonely. Not long ago, the United Kingdom had access to the joint space initiatives of the European Union such as the Galileo program, a global navigation [...]

New Zealand has now gone 100 days without community transmission of Covid-19. Over the last few months, the country has emerged as a poster child for how