The document discusses innovations in public engagement and civic participation using online tools. It notes that social media sites are increasingly where people discuss public issues, rather than formal government websites. It proposes that governments create an online "civic space" to bring democratic activities and discussions from social media into one place, and engage citizens in co-creating outcomes. Examples discussed include using petitions, webcasting meetings, and moderated discussions to increase transparency and public input into the democratic process.

2. How do you map participation? Arnstein 1969 Social / informal interactions Hyperlocal websites Non-Participation Council hosting discussions Consultations Citizen Panels Tokenism Petitions Participatory Budgeting Elected Representation Citizen Power

3. The new social web is an environment superbly suited to Participatory Design: Co-creation

4. Social Web: The Wild West Local Government: The Law How can you map this relationship? Formal Consultation Alchemy News and social networking sites Managed services like webcasting or online consultations We need to use tools like petitions which can transition people from informal to formal Social Web: The Wild West Social Web: The Wild West Informal Social Participation Social Web: The Wild West Informal Civic Participation Social Web: The Wild West Government: The Law Formal Democracy Social Web: The Wild West

5. Old web v. New web Collaboration / XML Presentation / HTML Engagement Content Communities Websites Widgets Portals Old eGov Gov 2.0 From a presentation by http://dontapscott.com/

6. Old web v. New web Listen Inform Discuss Consult Empower Involve Old eGov Gov 2.0

8. You’ll have seen this before….. But it makes an important point

9. Why ? Because the social web is not a trend that can be ignored….. … ..some facts….

10. This confusing collection….

11. … can be organised….

12. And is used democratically….

13. … .by councils

14. And also other parts of the civic sphere… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84qMBR4UaVc http://twitter.com/hotelalpha9

15. And the public use it….. http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/12/31/top-social-media-sites-of-2008-facebook-still-rising/

16. Some more facts….. Oxford Internet Surveys: http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/microsites/oxis/ Social networking sites are not only growing in terms of people – they also have an increased share of online time

21. Widgets can be located out on the wider web as well as within the container

27. Where to start? Petitions

29. Introduction to Petitioning 10 Downing Street : http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/ “ We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to..” Launched in November 2006 the No 10 Petitions website has become one of the the largest non-partisan democracy sites by volume of users ever, with over 8m signatures from over 5m unique email addresses, representing around 10% of the entire UK population. 200 signatures on an epetition will trigger an email response from the UK Government.

30. Introduction to Petitioning Public-i worked with Bristol, with help from Napier University, to rewrite the system as a piece of open source technology The views and opinions of citizens living in the Bristol region can now be collected and discussed through their ePetitions and AskBristol site. The discussion results are forwarded to government officials and media representatives. The goal is to thereby achieve the citizen-oriented design of future plans for the Bristol region. Bristol ePetition website http://epetitions.bristol.gov.uk/

31. Introduction to Petitioning The Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames offers the option of submitting petitions online as well as supporting or commenting on the requests of other petitioners. Each e-petition also has its own discussion forum, where citizens can discuss the petition and surrounding issues online. Kingston ePetition website http://www.kingston.gov.uk/epetitions

33. Local Petitions This petition gained rapid online support and resulted in a policy re-think by members

34. Where to start? Meetings

36. http://www.tunbridgewells.public-i.tv/site/player/pl_compact.php?a =12926&t=0&m= wm&l = en_GB#the_data_area

40. http://cimarkpayne.wordpress.com/

41. Thank you Email: [email_address] Blog: Curiouscatherine.wordpress.com Twitter: @curiousc