Online Deliberation and #CivicTech: A Symposium

Weiyu Zhang,Anna Przybylska,Todd Davies

doi:10.16997/10.16997/jdd.988

Weiyu Zhang, Anna Przybylska + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.16997/10.16997/jdd.988

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Abstract

Online deliberation is one important instance of civic tech that is both for and by the citizens, through engaging citizens in Internet-supported deliberative discussions on public issues. This article explains the origins of a set of symposium articles in this journal issue based on the 2017 'International Conference on Deliberation and Decision Making: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Civic Tech' held in Singapore. Symposium articles are presented in a sequence that flows from designing decision making systems to platforms to specific technological nudges.

Highlights

Online deliberation is one important instance of civic tech that is both for and by the citizens, through engaging citizens in Internet-supported deliberative discussions on public issues
A number of international and multidisciplinary conferences, workshops, and seminars focusing on online deliberation have been held since the initial gathering at Carnegie Mellon University in 2003, more recently in a Special Interest Group (SIG) meeting as part of the ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing (CHI) in Seoul in 2015, and the Conference on New Perspectives for Dialogue: ICT and Inclusive Decision Making in Warsaw in 2016
International Conference on Deliberation and Decision Making: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Civic Tech. This symposium is organized in a sequence that flows from designing decision making systems to platforms to specific technological nudges (Menon, Zhang, & Perrault, 2020)

Summary

Introduction

Online deliberation is one important instance of civic tech that is both for and by the citizens, through engaging citizens in Internet-supported deliberative discussions on public issues. The report listed a wide range of technologies, including e-government (e.g., for public decision making) and community participation (e.g., neighborhood forums), as forming the spectrum (Boehner & DiSalvo, 2016). Zhang and her colleagues (2020) pointed out that civic tech needs to serve the citizens (i.e., for the citizens) and engage citizens in its design and implementation (i.e., by the citizens).

Results

Conclusion