Apollon - SOTAs For Eparticipation Through Emedia

DELIVERABLE
Project Acronym: APOLLON

Grant Agreement number: 250516
Project Title: Advanced Pilots of Living Labs Operating in Networks

Deliverable: D.5.1 SOTAs for eParticipation through eMedia

Revision: FINAL

Authors:

Sbastien Lvy (Issy Media)
Eric Legale (Issy Media)
Dave Carter (MCC, MDDA)
Paul Carruthers (MBS)

Project co-funded by the European Commission within the ICT Policy Support Programme
Dissemination Level
P Public X
C Confidential, only for members of the consortium and the Commission Services
ApollonDeliverableD5.1
Apollon ICT PSP Deliverable 2 FINAL Version, 22/02/2010
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indicatedotherwise.Acknowledgementofpreviouslypublishedmaterialandof
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Table of Contents

1. Project Summary ............................................................................................ 4
2. Scope and Context of the Deliverable ........................................................... 5
3. eParticipation .................................................................................................. 8
3.1 Introduction ....................................................................................................... 8
3.2 eParticipation methods, tools and ways ........................................................ 13
4. eParticipation in the European Union ......................................................... 16
4.1 eParticipation at the Local level ................................................................... 16
4.2 eParticipation at National & Regional levels..................................................32
4.3 European Cooperation Projects .................................................................... 45
5. eParticipation in other parts of the World.................................................. 51
6. eParticipation at the International Scale .................................................... 62
7. Conclusion ................................................................................................... 64

1. ProjectSummary
The main issues addressed by APOLLON (Advanced Pilots Of Living Labs Operating in
Networks) are the present lack of Living Lab harmonisation and collaboration, and the
serious difficulties of SMEs in engaging in cross-border innovation.

APOLLON will demonstrate the positive impacts of cross-border domain-specific Living
Lab networks, by setting up an advanced pilot composed of 4 thematically focused
European-wide Living Lab experiments. SMEs are enabled to take part in cross-border
Living Lab experiments beyond their home markets, and are supported by large
industrial companies, academic centres and other stakeholders.

The APOLLON pilot aims to share and to harmonise the Living Lab approaches and
platforms between exemplary European networks as well as the subsequent evaluation
results and the set up of sustainable domain-specific networks on a European and global
level.

APOLLON addresses 4 major domains in which ICT products and services innovation
may benefit most from cross-border Living Lab networking. These are:

1) Homecare and Independent Living
2) Energy Efficiency
3) eManufacturing
4) eParticipation

The project consortium of the domain 4 is composed of:

Issy Media ( France), Universit de Paris VIII (France), IBBT (Belgium), Manchester
City Council ( United-Kingdom), 3D2+ (France), Navidis (France), and People's
Voice Media (France)

2. ScopeandContextoftheDeliverable

This document is the first deliverable of Work Package 5: eParticipation. The objectives
of Work Package 5 are the following:

Sharing and comparing technologies/ methodologies in order to understand to
which local, regional, national results can be extended to other contexts and
which common technology/methodology can be built for generalization.
Adapting technologies/methodologies to the European context.
Integrating technologies/methodologies to overcome fragmentation of service
Promoting citizens innovation to eMedia participation in Europe and evaluating if
cross-border user testing can help existing projects to open to the European
audience.

The present deliverable as well as the second deliverable of Work package 5, "D5.2
Methodology for eParticipation Innovation will contribute to the definition of the project's
"Experimental Design, Scenario and Protocol (D5.3).
The realisation of the corresponding pilot should start in month 9.

Our vision of the eParticipation in the framework of APOLLON, is to "virtualize, through
the use of e-Media and 3D media, the real world in order to broaden and deepen political
participation in the decision-making process as well as citizens involvement in innovation
and creation processes and technologies development. "Typical eParticipation in Living
Labs consist on cooperation between firms, public authorities and citizens in order to
create, prototype, validate and test new services, businesses, markets and technologies
in real-life contexts, such as cities, city regions, rural areas and collaborative virtual
networks between public and private players. The citizens contribution in the real-life and
everyday contexts both stimulate and challenge research, development and an open
innovation process.
The case studies presented within this report seek to demonstrate the above points: that
social media tools are relatively easy to implement and the used examples could be
replicated in other localities, even taking into account geographical differences such as
language and organizational structures. The examples used aims to put in evidence that
eParticipation processes in the field of public and private e-Services are beneficiary for
citizens in both: services as such impacting per se on their lives and businesses and
of ICT based or supported services, where this novel user-centric approach can improve
customization to their individual needs and requirements.
Where the goal is to improve engagement with the general public, the examples cited
below could be 'packaged' as state of the art exemplars and applied elsewhere.

The objectives of the Apollon project in the domain of e-Participation are to:
Share and compare the various tools (blogs, online social networking,
broadcasting etc.) and mechanisms (eVoting, Internet petitions etc.) used, in
order to understand which of the local results can be extended to a broader scale
(regional, national, European) and to determinate what is the best and most
efficient technology and methodology that can be used as a model.

Adapt the technologies and methodologies to cope with users in other regions.
The Pilot must identify how to adapt the solution, while extending existing
technologies to the European context, taking into account country specificities
(such as habits, acceptability, involvement of the users, language, copyright, and
legal issues).

Integrate technologies and methodologies to overcome fragmentation of services
in specific domains. This is done through a common pilot test method of
"simulated technological integration and guidelines which will set-up cross
border experimentation in the future (given that cross border cooperation and
integration are innovation sources for new services, new technologies).

Promote citizens involvement through eMedia participation on an European scale
at the early phases of the designing process. This will help to evaluate if cross-
border user testing can help existing projects to open to an European audience.

The eParticipation experiment results in the development of integrated services using
various new technologies. These will be deployed and validated on a larger scale. The
services will increase the dialogue between citizens as well as between citizens and
governments or public and private organisations and thus contribute to the
empowerment of the users. The experiment will also provide practical insights and
guidelines on how to address and involve communities in eParticipation projects or
applications. On a more technological level the experiment will result in a better
understanding of new technologies like 3D, social media and RFID as such and their
value for eParticipation services.

The present deliverable provides a State of The Art on previous eParticipation projects
made in both Living Labs and eDemocracy. The second deliverable will be a
methodological approach and will highlight what are the most common pitfalls of current
eDemocracy experiences, such as: lack of active involvement from citizens and/or
stakeholders, mistrust from the people, skepticism from the politicians, and ultimately a
low reusability of upcoming results within the public decision making process. The aim of
the second deliverable is to provide a conclusion on what is the best methodology and
technology to use while developing European Living Labs scale eParticipation projects.

3. eParticipation
3.1Introduction

Over the last few years eParticipation - which is a concept that includes all the
processes of public involvement in government and governance, open innovation, urban
planning, economic and technological development via information and communication
technologies - became a highly political issue although it was formerly something only
experts were interested in.

Today, there is consensus to consider eParticipation as a fundamental right in a
democratic society. eParticipation is expected to improve a transparency, usability,
efficiency, economic competitiveness and cost effectiveness of the public and private
sector by giving to the citizens a possibility to co-creation to interact and to modulate
their local, national, regional environments
1
.

Moreover many of the old European democracies consider that eParticipation holds
potential to revitalize public deliberation and to overcome increasing political "apathy
and the decreasing citizens' involvement
2
.
For the UN organization, eParticipation has the potential to establish more
transparency in government by allowing citizens to use new channels of influence which
reduces barriers to public participation in policymaking
3
. As a matter of fact, it represents
a big challenge for a public administration to follow these changes and to encourage
citizens to become active participants in the public life. Moreover year 2009 will mark an
important stage in this domain. Barack Obama, first black president in the history of the
country, quickly required more transparency and more participation of the citizens in the
decisions of his Administration. According to the strategy which he had used to gain his
campaign, he recommended the appeal to the social media to reach these objectives.
1
TheimpactoftheEconomicandFinancialcrisisone-GovernmentinOECDMemberCountries,
http://www.epractice.eu/files/European%20Journal%20epractice%20Volume%2011.1.pdf
2
http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/egovernment/policy/eparticipation/index_en.htm
3
TowardsUnderstandingeParticipationfromanInstitutionalPerspective;ChristineSecher
http://www.gov2u.org/publications/Demo_net_MappingeParticipation.pdf
His arrival to the head of the country provoked a chain of reactions in the American
Administration, as well as in other countries in the world. In the months which followed
his election, a multitude of eParticipation Web 2.0 based projects appeared.

Table 1: the percentage of the eParticipation initiatives in the world
4

The Department of Economic and Social Affairs of the United Nations publishes every
two years an e-Government Survey
5
which measures how a country can access and
realize its eParticipation potential. This index assesses the quality and usefulness of
information and services provided by a country for the purpose of engaging its citizens in
public policy through information and communication technologies. n total, 21 citizens'
informative and participatory services and facilities were assessed across 189 countries,
in instances in which these services and facilities were online and where data was
available. The last edition of the eParticipation Index was printed in 2008 and we are
waiting for the 2010 edition in a few weeks.
4
Source:www.unpan1.un.org
5
http://unpan1.un.org/intradoc/groups/public/documents/un/unpan028607.pdf
Table 2: eParticipation Index 2008: Top 10 Countries

6

Ranking Country 2008 Index

1 United States 1.0000
2 Republic of Korea 0.9773
3 Denmark 0.9318
4 France 0.9318
5 Australia 0.8864
6 New Zealand 0.7955
7 Mexico 0.7500
8 Estonia 0.7273
9 Sweden 0.6591
10 Singapore 0.6364

eParticipation does not concern exclusively civil society-government collaborations on a
local, regional, national or international scale but as the projects range from research in
wearable computing involving test sites in the Aerospace, Construction and Automobile
industry to projects working on environmental friendly lighting in urban areas and
different ICT tools sets facilitating work environment. For example for the companies the
use of social media can be targeted at both improvement of internal and external
communication. Early adoption of social media within the public or private sector was
often focused on internal use, with the aims of improving collaboration amongst
individuals, teams, departments and entire organisations. Centrally funded projects such
as the Improvement & Efficiency Agencies Communities of Practice
7
and TALK
8
sought
to facilitate collaboration and communication within teams and departments through the
use of forum, blog and wiki technologies. Although their remit is to engender cross-
boundary collaboration, they remain internally focused and do not seek to engage with
the general public. Applied internally, social tools often change the way the people work.
6
Source:www.unpan1.un.org
7
http://www.communities.idea.gov.uk/welcome.do
8
http://www.talknet.eu
Wiki technologies may look to replace the use of word processors and the process of
creating such documents. However, the barriers to use remain high because wiki
technologies are not widespread in their use and are still alien to the vast majority of
people both in their work life and general use of the Internet. Put simply, they resist the
change as they do not yet see the benefit to do so essentially the technology is
outpacing the demand for change. UK TALK project was much more valuable as a
blogging community, again because blogs are better understood and the requirement to
change processes is low workers can just read a blog and there is little action required
on their part wiki's require much heavier involvement.
Similarly, the Communities of Practice website
9
saw much larger uptake because it is
rooted in the use of forum software. Forums have been around for many years and their
use in the public sector in the UK is widespread. Consequently they are well understood,
the barriers to use are perceived to be lower and people are more inclined to use them.
Many of the mainstream sites are free to use and hosted environments are now
common, meaning that organisations can outsource the implementations of systems that
they may have struggled to maintain internally. For example, Ning (http://www.ning.com)
enables any group or organisation the capability to build and promote a fully featured,
branded social network. eParticipation processes in companies can strengthen the
involvement of employees and their belonging feelings by giving them the opportunity to
bring new ideas, which often support innovation
There is a direct correlation to the application and use of social media technologies
when seeking to improve engagement on an external basis. As the use of social media
in the mainstream public has become more widespread, focus has shifted to improving
external communication and engagement from within organisations out to the general
public who 'consume' their services. In addition to that eParticipation procedures
applied at a company level can help these companies to increase the understanding of
their customers and thus allows the companies to better know their customers' needs.
The ENGAGEMENT db study
10
showed significant positive financial results for the
companies who measure as having the greatest breadth and depth of Social Media
9
http://www.communities.idea.gov.uk/welcome.do
10
www.engagementdb.com
Engagement. The social media use growth companies revenues on average by 18%
over the last twelve months. The study reviewed more than 10 discrete Social Media
channels including Blogs, Facebook, Twitter, Wikis, and discussion forums. The top
ENGAGEMENT brands are Starbucks, Dell, Ebay and Google
11
.
Today there are 1.73 billion Internet users in the world. When considering whether the
Internet has the potential to positively impact social capital, we can draw on evidence
gathered by Megan Alessandrini in 2006 stating that "it appears likely that those with
Internet access are more likely than those without to engage in activities normally
expected to create and enhance levels of social capital
12
. In support of this, the
December 2008 study of how Canadian residents' use of the Internet affects social life
and civic participation from Statistics Canada finds that "examination of different socio-
demographic groups reveals that they have embraced technology not to escape social
contact or other traditional activities but to enhance them.
13

In a purely business perspective, eParticipation can be seen as a service providing
organization concepts in the topic of R&D and innovation, contributing to more suitable
products and services design, development and testing.

An important point to keep in mind is that eParticipation is a recent concept still in its
infancy. As few countries have actively promoted it the examples of a good practice are
rare and eParticipation impact on the public life is not significant enough yet to be
generalized, confirmed or disapproved. To obtain serious results on the impact of the
eParticipation, the evaluations need to be made over the years.

11
http://www.engagementdb.com/Report
12
http://www.webology.ir/2006/v3n4/a33.html
13
http://chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman/publications/stats_can/statscan.pdf
Table 3. eParticipation projects themes
14
3.2eParticipationmethods,toolsandways
Today, a vast majority of the discussion about the social impact of ICTs are focused on
Web 2.0. The term Web 2.0 has many definitions, and includes the use of tools such as
social networking sites, video-sharing sites, blogs and wikis. However, what makes Web
2.0 new and important is its capacity to change the relationship between the Internet and
its users. Web 2.0 is about among others interacting with web-based content, adding
comments, or uploading files. Each visitor is able to have shared ownership over a site.
This implies a change in power structures and a shift in organizational thinking towards
models based on equal partnerships rather than elite dominance
15
.
14
Source:Momentum
http://www.epmomentum.eu/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=XqhojqGxEyw%3D&tabid=88&mid=489
15
Jackson,N.A.&Lilleker,D.G.(2009).'BuildinganArchitectureofParticipation?PoliticalPartiesandWeb2.0
inBritain',JournalofInformationTechnology&Politics,p.232-250
Some of the most popular Web 2.0 tools in terms of social networking and user contents
are Facebook, Linkedin, YouTube and Twitter. Younger generations expect now to
communicate using those sites. If continued engagement with the public is desirable,
organisations must seek to embrace social technologies to better ensure that they reach
the younger demographic. Underpinning this, recent statistics point to an upswing in
Twitter usage amongst the under 25's.
16

Tools
Worldwide Twitter users overtake 12 million, up an impressive + 700% vs. one year ago
making it the fastest growing site in the Member Communities category. In addition to
that 85% of the users publish at least one tweet per day.
Facebook has 350 million users in the world which represents 20 % of the worldwide
Internet users.
MySpace is downing with its users number and it's having this days 70 million users in
the world
17
.

The tools of expression allowing citizens to express their views online
x Publications Tools such as :
Blog platforms (Blogger, Typepad, Wordpress),
Wiki platforms (Wikipedia, Wetpaint, Wikia),
Mikroblog platforms (Twitter, Tumblr, Identica)
News and citizens journalism portals (Digg, Wikio, Le Post)
Livecast tools (JustinTV, Ustream, BlogTV)
x Discussion tools
Social network (Facebook, Myspace)
Forum platforms (phpBB, Phorum)
Video forums (Seesmic)
Services of the commentary management (IntenseDebate, Cocomment, Disqus,
BackType);
Services allowing publication and files sharing
16
,
17
http://www.socialmediatoday.com/SMC/174901
x Video (YouTube, DailyMotion, Vimeo),
x Pictures (FlickR, SmugMug, Picasa, Fotolog),
x Documents (Slideshare, Scrib, Slideo)

Table 4: Most popular eParticipation tools used by countries

22%
22%
30%
26%
Countries using email to
update their citizens
Countries using RSS to
update and involve their
citizens
Countries using Openweb
Forums for discussing
topics
Countries publishing results
of public opinons

4. eParticipationintheEuropeanUnion
4.1.eParticipationattheLocallevel

The good performance of local eParticipation initiatives can be explained by the
proximity with the interests, needs and questions of the citizens. The citizens are more
inclined to participate when the issues discussed have a direct interest for them. Indeed
citizens participate more easily and with a bigger interest for issues such as the
construction of a new kindergarten than the definition of being European launched by the
European Union.
The bigger successes of eParticipation initiatives at the local scale can also be explained
by a simple arithmetic's analyse: empowering a fewer number of citizen is easier and
more effective than empowering a large group of citizens.
These cases are funded in order by local resources, European Union, national funds and
regional funds. The voluntary funding is very rare.
At the local level the participation areas covered are first Deliberation followed by
Information Provision and Consultation.
18
One of the more surprising characteristics of local scale eParticipation initiatives is the
multilingualism. Indeed there are comparatively more multilingual cases at the local
scale than in national or regional scale. The importance of the multilingualism can be
explained by the fact that the local level initiatives take into account the different types of
population and the immigrants.
19

In the eParticipation case for the community, it is important to choose an existing popular
social platform (like Facebook or Youtube). Community Administrators should conclude
with this platform a partnership in order to promote it to the users, so that it is
emphasised as the service "recommended" or "legitimised" by the community.
18
http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/egovernment/docs/reports/eu_eparticipation_summary_no
v_09.pdf
19
http://www.epractice.eu/files/7.2.pdf
Technically, this strategy can be translated by the implementation of widgets (external
modules) integrated on the site of the community. In practice, the partnership takes
especially the shape of a simple exchange of link. The community thus has no direct
technical mastery of the actions. In practice it is integrating the social platform directly
into the site and into the information system of the community.

France
Issy-les-Moulineaux City Panel Case Study
In 2001, the city of Issy-les-Moulineaux (Paris, France) established a representative
panel of the population, composed of about 900 inhabitants. Members of this "Citizen
Panel" are regularly consulted to answer online consultations, on topics of local interest
and satisfaction with municipal services. The launch of this electronic tool should be put
in a double context: the early development of information and communication
technologies (ICT) in Issy on the one hand, and the efforts of the municipality in terms of
participative democracy, on the other hand.
Information and communication technologies have also been used to improve public
services to citizens. The city's website was launched in spring 1996 and recorded in
2009 1.2 million visits. Via Issy.com, people can order administrative documents, pay
school meals, make reservations in entertainment centers, book tickets to the theatre, or
manage their documents in the library. Issy was also the first French city to create a
local and interactive Web-TV: launched in 1997, T2i renamed Issy TV in 2000, provides
many videos about local life. In recent years the city has also developed mobile services,
enabling residents to receive information by SMS (weather warnings, dates of council
meetings, cultural events, etc..), or pay for car parking with their mobile phone, download
multiple podcasts (audio or video files), including those with major events in the town
every month. This global commitment of the city for the development of new
technologies has been awarded by the French label "Internet City" and the presidency of
the Global Cities Dialogue
20
, an international network of mayors committed to promoting
an "information society open to all". In addition, Issy-les-Moulineaux was ranked in 2005,
20
http://www.globalcitiesdialogue.com/
2007 and 2009 among the "Top 7 Intelligent Communities" worldwide (international
ranking of cities whose economies are strongly linked with their technology policy).
21

The development of e-democracy could not be properly completed if it was not based on
a positive and democratic culture embodied in the willingness to further engage citizens.
The citizen panel is part of the development of participative democracy, an ancient
approach in Issy since the city was the first in France to create a youth council in 1985,
and other committees such as: the Economic and Social Council (in 1989), the local
youth (for 18-25), and the council of elders (2001). Regarding the tools for electronic
democracy, in 1997 the city created interactive council meetings thanks to the local
web-TV: citizens can watch meetings live on the city's website and can intervene by
telephone or internet during breaks in the sessions (3 breaks each of 20 minutes) by
expressing their point of view or asking questions. The e-vote was also experimented
with on several occasions, notably during the elections for the residents' association in
2002, 2005 and 2008. As a sign of the city's commitment to e-democracy, in 2000 the
Mayor of Issy, Andr Santini, created the World Forum for e-Democracy, an international
meeting held annually.
The citizen panel is an additional decision-making tool for the consultation and
participation of citizens, in addition to traditional methods such as public meetings, the
opinions transmitted by the neighbourhood councils, the opinions of citizens expressed
during interactive council meetings, etc.
Created in 2001, the citizen panel is the product of a meeting between the city council
and OpinionWay, a consultancy specialised in opinion polls. OpinionWay had developed
a methodology for online surveys and the city, active for several years in the field of
electronic democracy, showed interest in the new tool. Issy-les-Moulineaux was the first
French city to put the tool into place. Today, several towns use this kind of panel
although its deployment remains relatively limited in France.
The Citizen Panel allows the state of opinion and its members generally express
themselves in a more direct manner, more spontaneously and frankly compared to other
consultation methods. The purpose of the Citizen Panel is not simply to gain knowledge
21
http://www.intelligentcommunity.org/
but also to facilitate the elaboration and evaluation of public policies. It can also play the
role of a warning by helping counsellors to better measure the importance of certain
issues among the population.
The participation in the panel is open to all residents who simply have to register online
via the city's website. Consultation is carried out in a regular manner: once or twice per
year the members of the panel are invited by email to reply to an online survey: a link in
the email connects them to the questionnaire which is generally composed of twenty to
thirty questions. The identity and the replies of the internet user communicated to
OpinionWay are anonymous and confidential, in respect of the law on IT and liberties.

The consultation lasts between ten and fifteen days maximum (sometimes a week) and
the results are delivered to the council within a couple of days. On average, between
300 and 400 people respond to each survey. To ensure the representativeness of the
sample results weight is based on a quota method. The data which form the basis for
establishing these quotas (in terms of age, sex, socio-professional categories) come
from the INSEE (Institut National de la Statistique et des Etudes Economiques) census.
Parallel surveys carried out by the municipality both to the citizen panel of internet users
and a group of the population questioned by "traditional survey have allowed the
similarity of responses of the two samples to be verified. The citizen panel presents
certain specificities when the subject relates to ICT, for the rest the members respond as
other residents would have.

The questionnaire includes stable indicators. It allows the evolution of opinion on
different subjects to be measured: opinion on quality of life and security in the town,
satisfaction and expectations with regard to municipal action in general and in specific
domains (activities, youth, ICT, economic development, senior citizens, schools, traffic,
etc), opinion on the evolution of the situation in Issy in general and concerning certain
subjects (employment, tidiness, cultural activities, etc), portfolios considered priority in
the coming three years or even confidence in the future. The internet users on the panel
are also questioned about current topics. In 2001 for example they gave their opinion on
security, associations, neighbourhood councils, traffic, postnatal support, online services
proposed by the council, urban projects such as the upper Issy transport link, etc. The
results of these surveys are published and are available on the city's website
22
.
The citizen panel contributes, alongside other consultation and participation methods, to
the improvement of the functioning of local democracy. It presents specific advantages
linked to the use of the internet: simple to use, the tool allows results to be obtained
quicker and at a lower cost. This allows consultation to be carried out more frequently
and numerous and diverse subjects to be addressed.
The use of a specialised and independent institute is a guarantee of seriousness and
impartiality, as much in the constitution of the panel as in the interpretation of the results
of the survey.

Two examples show the benefits which this instrument has provided for the municipality.
The results of a survey concerning traffic showed several years ago a state of great
dissatisfaction. Contrary to other cities, in Issy-les-Moulineaux traffic was considered a
primary problem; this encouraged counsellors to make it a priority and to take decisions
in this field. The policy was positively judged, the percentage of people "satisfied with
the actions of the municipality regarding the traffic having increased from 26 to 48%
between December 2004 and August 2006. In 2004 a survey carried out among mothers
on the citizen panel indicated real needs in terms of post-natal support. This allowed the
Deputy Mayor Responsible for Women's' Affairs, Marianne Buhler, to raise this topic at
the heart of the municipality and among actors in the sector (healthcare professionals
and social services). In 2005 an association supporting a project for a post-natal open
house was founded.

Today the municipality envisages developing further tools for consulting the population.
For one it would like to widen the methods used by including qualitative surveys in the
form of online focus groups (by chat), accompanied perhaps by a discussion forum.

I-Folio Case Study
22
www.issy.com

In January 2009 the city launched a new service called I-Folio , the first local network
for participative debate on the internet. A kind of local version of Facebook, as a local
newspaper called it. "The aim is to reinforce the debate on the major subjects
concerning life in ssy, for Mayor Andr Santini. "To love your town is to love
exchanging and dialoguing with all those that live and work there. We want to engage in
direct dialogue with the residents of our town using this site for debate, discussion and
the proposal of ideas. This is the message that the residents of ssy-les-Moulineaux can
read on the homepage of I-Folio. Each month several themes are proposed by internet
users in order to develop local democracy. The debates cover the actors of solidarity in
the city, redevelopment projects or the development of city transportation.

The principle is simple. Via the municipal website, the citizen connects to I-Folio. Once
"on site there are two scenarios. Firstly a simple visitor can consult all the contributions.
Then, if he wishes to contribute to a debate he will have to give his name, the area of
Issy where he lives and optionally a photo to be registered. I-Folio is based on the logic
of establishing a social network like MySpace or Facebook in order to constitute a truly
local network in order to create links between residents.

There are several others local eParticipation projects running in France like twitter for the
city of Rennes, Facebook application for the city of Paris, Flickr group for the city of Issy-
les-Moulineaux, DailyMotion and YouTube channels for the city of Lyon Culture site.

The 3D Living Innovation Case Study

La Fabrique de Future
23
, a French NGO has lately presented another interesting
eParticipation project conception called 3D Living Innovation
24
. The project is not
developed for the moment but is very interesting to follow the evolution of this case as it
seems to be very close to what will be developed in a framework of APOLLON project.
23
http://www.lafabriquedufutur.org/
24
http://www.lafabriquedufutur.eu/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=63&Itemid=37
It is a thematic, cross-border project consisting on a set of 3D-related resources and
tools aimed at offering organisations co-creative imagination and innovative solution by
the capability to interact directly with their markets to invent, to test and to evaluate
future new products and services. The project intended to soon become international as
3D Living Innovation wants to become a strong reference in Europe of the potential
offered by the 3D world. The goal of the system is to enhance creativity, develop
collaboration and reduce time to market while keeping costs as low as possible. The
services provided by this project will be:
- 3D Ideation
- 3D Co-conception
- This range of services aims at helping our clients and stakeholders to co-
conceive new innovative products and services. It can be declined in
several offers
- Rapid 3D Simulation
- Rapid 3D Prototyping
- Rapid 3D Testing
- 3D Promotion & marketing
- 3D Engineering, consulting & services
The application areas of the project are very wide as they potentially concern all sectors of
activities (of course with focus on B2C sectors, where users are involved): city planning
and housing, education, health, domestic services, aging and disabled population,
transport & mobility, tourism & leisure, eco-conception, etc.
The 3D Living Innovation is focused on the use of 3D and 3D related resources: Virtual
Worlds (metaverses), augmented reality, ambient intelligence, imagery technologies, etc.

United Kingdom
As part of Manchester City Council, Manchester Libraries and Information Service
25

(MLIS) deliver cultural, learning and information services through a network of more than
20 libraries across the Manchester region. With over 130,000 active library members,
MLIS issues over 2 million items and attracts more than 3 million visits each year.
25
http://www.manchester.gov.uk/libraries/
In 2008 MLIS began to use a range of Internet based social media sites and tools as
their presence on the main Manchester City Council site was difficult to find and
communication hampered by having to work through official channels. Implementing a
presence on various social media sites has sought to raise awareness, provide improved
communication to the community and build stronger links with existing and new service
users.
As part of this activity, MLIS maintain active profiles on Flickr
26
, Facebook
27
, Twitter
28

and a literary blog
29
.

PeopIe's Voice Media Case Study

People's Voice Media
30
are a not-for-profit social enterprise based in Manchester who
has expanded to include projects running in other parts of the UK. Their aim is to help
empower individuals, groups and communities to develop and promote social and
campaigning initiatives through the use of social media.
The individual is very much at the heart of this effort and significant emphasis is placed
on ensuring that those in the community are able to use and maintain social media skills,
thereby removing reliance on 3
rd
parties.
This ethos helps People's Voice Media promote principles of openness, transparency,
diversity and equality in the community.
A number of social media initiatives are currently active within local communities, initially
funded and supported by the organisation. Typically, People's Voice Media provide
services in disadvantaged and regenerating communities. In the Greater Manchester
region these areas include Ordsall and Broughton in Salford as well as the Beswick,
Clayton and Openshaw districts in east Manchester.
26
http://www.flickr.com/people/manchesterlibraries/
27
http://www.facebook.com/mancitycouncil
28
http://twitter.com/#!/ManCityCouncil
29
http://manchesterlitlist.blogspot.com/
30
http://peoplesvoicemedia.co.uk/
Three of the core offerings are the community reporters programme, the establishment
of social media centers and the content delivery network
31
.

Manchester Libraries on Flickr Case Study
Manchester Libraries maintain a profile on Flickr

32
that provides an additional channel for
visitors to access items of specific interest. Additionally, Flickr has been used to
crowdsource photographs from visitors to support specific initiatives of interest to local
communities, such as the opening of a new library and the temporary closure of the
iconic Central Library in Manchester city center.
Using a blend of traditional media, visitor workshops and Flickr, MLIS sought to promote
the opening of a new library in the city. The blended approach enables the service to
capture the interest of a wider range of the community than if they used a single, more
traditional media approach.
The project outline is as follows:
Visitor workshops at the library gathered photographs of the new facility. The workshops
enlisted the services of a number of photographers sourced through Flickr, who all gave
their time for free.
These workshops were attended by a mixture of local interest groups, children's
homework clubs and people who were just walking past the library.
The photographs were uploaded to Flickr thereby enabling access via the Internet and
exposing the participant images to a wider audience.
Some of the best images have been transferred to canvas and are now on public display
in the library
33
.
The event was very successful, in no small part due to the blending of social media and
face-to-face workshops, with the incentive of the participants knowing that their image
31
http://peoplesvoicemedia.co.uk/what-we-offer
32
http://www.flickr.com/photos/manchesterlibraries/
33
http://www.flickr.com/photos/manchesterlibraries/sets/72157604781859831/.
could be part of a public art installation at the end of the process. Flickr has been used to
re-inforce that incentive and bring the images to wider attention.
Overall, the library service has found that using Flickr has generated a small but
enthusiastic community around their activities. The 'Manchester Central Library' photo
pool
34
has attracted over 140 images and 40 members who are all motivated to add their
own small piece of photographic documentation of what is an iconic building in the city.

Manchester Libraries on Facebook Case Study
The Manchester Libraries page on Facebook

35
has attracted over 1,100 'fans' who are
interested in being kept up to date with library activity via their chosen social network.
At a first glance this may not seem to be impressive. However, if we consider that these
are potentially 1,100 people who may well not previously have engaged with the library
at all, who would have struggled to be aware of events and who would have no direct
communication channel to the library, then we can see that Facebook provides a
valuable engagement tool.
In fact, two recent events sold out following their promotion within libraries, the traditional
press and on Facebook. Staff at the libraries knew that the attendees were new to the
service as some became members and others commented that they didn't know that
events were held there.
The library uses their Facebook page as a direct channel. Anyone can come to the page
and write on the 'wall', enabling either the library or other fans to respond to their query.
Through the commenting or 'liking' features of Facebook it is possible for the library to
gain rapid feedback about events or features that they are promoting on the site. This
enables staff to fine tune the type of content that they display on the page, knowing that
this will increase the likelihood of their fans being interested in it.
There are many other facets to the use of Facebook by the library. Access has been
provided to the Central Library book and music catalogues via the page, giving visitors
34
http://www.flickr.com/groups/manchestercentrallibrary/
35
http://www.facebook.com/manchesterlibraries
easier searching capabilities for items they may be interested in borrowing. Similarly,
specific items of interest are highlighted via photos and events are promoted in calendar
and longer narrative formats.
Some use has been made of the Facebook Markup Language to customize the page to
the specific needs of the library. This has been done on a self-taught basis with the
author seeking and receiving assistance through both the Facebook and Twitter
networks.
Manchester Libraries on Twitter Case Study
Twitter
36
has proven to be particularly successful for the library team in raising
awareness about upcoming events or acting as a direct communication channel for their
followers.
With the directed nature of Twitter conversations it is easy for other users to ask specific
questions of the library and quickly receive a response. This has proven to be easier
than having to navigate the main City Council website searching for the correct person
or department to contact.
More importantly, Twitter has worked very effectively as a method of attracting new
attendees to events held at the library. In particular, the promotion of one upcoming
event via the channel has attracted over 30% of the attendees, highlighting that when
used in conjunction with more traditional promotional methods (posters in the library),
Twitter can extend the reach of the library to a demographic and market that they
wouldn't previously have had access to.
Use is carefully managed to ensure that the 1,400 followers do not feel they are being
'spammed' and a combination of useful links and promotional messages are used. t is
very important that followers feel they are receiving useful, additional information that
they wouldn't typically have access to as well as informational messages about the
library.

36
http://twitter.com/manclibraries
The Manchester Lit List Blog Case Study
The Lit List blog

37
aims to provide more in-depth insight into some of the campaigns and
events that the library runs than is possible on Twitter or Facebook. Blogs lend
themselves to this form of dissemination as readers expect the content to be more
detailed and thoughtful. Facebook and especially Twitter are more suited to short,
frequent updates that are designed to grab followers or fans.
The blog focuses on literature content ranging from the latest books in the library to
poetry and writing competitions. This is definitely an effort that is tuned specifically to
those who are literature buffs, in much the same way that the Flickr presence appeals to
those interested in photography.
Engagement is difficult to measure, but the library recognizes that in order to gain and
maintain interest, updates must be frequent and varied. Although the level of comments
is low, this is to be expected with blogs where typically the ratio of readers to
commentators is very low and should not be an indicator of successful engagement.
Other indicators of successful engagement through the blog are evident. For example, a
free lecture series run in 2009 and promoted via the blog was oversubscribed by more
than 200 people. The library service had to stop inline promotion of the series as
demand was too great.
As a portal to the library's other social media activity, the blog is used minimally with
links through to Facebook. This is one facet that could be improved with additional links
to Twitter and Flickr.

TRAIL
Technologies for Rurality, Ageing and Independent Living Case Study
The main objective of the TRAIL project
38
, which started in January 2008, is to develop
participative methods that identify the unmet health-related needs of ageing citizens in
rural locations in the region of the North of Ireland. TRAIL creates service and product
37
http://manchesterlitlist.blogspot.com/
38
http://trail.ulster.ac.uk/
innovations that will enable rural and age-impaired citizens to live independently in the
heart of their communities. Project aim is to set up socially inclusive open innovation
models in business as well as in public sector. The current activity of the project
concerns healthcare and issues related to the aging population. This project could
improve their health and safety and stimulate the creation and evaluation of the new
products and services. Two programs were set up during the project MyHealth@Age
39

and Nestling Technology Initiative
40
. MyHealth@Age consists on development of new
products and services through participatory research in close cooperation with elderly
people, healthcare and welfare organizations, ICT-companies and Universities in
Northern Ireland, Norway, Sweden and Finland. Examples are mobile safety alarm with
wirelessly connected fall sensor with assistance support suitable both for alarm centers
and for friends and relatives, prescribed Healthcare that support own diagnose
measurements, medication support and secure messaging between patients and
healthcare staff including graphical diagnose measurement, enhanced social networks
that will improve isolated elderly peoples social life.
The customers' cell phones are equipped with GPS and an alarm so that the alarm
center can locate the person in need. The customers' phone is activated making it
possible to talk with the person in need even if that person can't reach the phone. Alarms
can only be made when the mobile phone is connected to the mobile network. If a fall
sensor is used, it has to be wirelessly attached to the mobile phone to transfer alarms to
the alarm centre.
Concerning the prescribed healthcare the data are visualized and shared between the
elderly person and the healthcare staff. The prescription or evaluations of the diagnose
measurement can be made on the elderly people mobile phone or at a web-browser.
The project has so far specified the requirements and developed a prototype in close co-
operation between elderly people, healthcare and welfare staff, ICT companies,
researchers, education and implementation of the trial products has been made
successful in Northern Ireland, Sweden and Norway nut no objective quantitative
measurements are available so far.

39
http://trail.ulster.ac.uk/activities/myhealthage/
40
http://trail.ulster.ac.uk/activities/nestling/
Other eDemocracy projects
TweetyHall
41
is a service that aims to connect the public with politicians, commentators
and others who help shape the local political landscape in the UK. There are over 400
local councilors representing over 230 authorities that currently use Twitter in an attempt
to better engage with the people who they have been mandated to serve. TweetyHall
enables easy location of local councilors and their recent Twitter activity statistics on
how active they are as well as a link to their Twitter page.. Visitors to the site can search
by location or political party. TweetyHall has been developed by FutureGov Consultancy,
a London based organisation that seeks to use web based technologies to actively
influence the development of policy, communication and engagement in the Government
sector.
The Pledgebank in Brixton
42
is a sort of archive containing information on successful
pledges, ranging from campaigning for vegetarian marshmallows to protecting civil
liberties. Pledges have been set up on local, national and international issues. The
pledge creator provided background information, to the people who sign-up to it.

Surrey County Council project
43
explored the use of video to engage local young
people in council processes and dialogue with local councillors through a series of
filming events under the banner "More than just a Voice. A mobile video kiosk was
purchased and young people were encouraged to make short (15min) films about
issues that affect them. The project also worked with a group of young people from the
traveller community to make a film and ran a number of studio-based events involving
interviews with young people and with decision makers.

Campaign Creator
44
, a pilot project funded under the Office of the Deputy Prime
Minister's e-Innovations grant fund and run by Bristol City Council, is an attempt to offer
citizens resources to organize themselves around issues of shared concern. The project
put together a suite of online and offline tools and information resources to enable
citizens, who don't have any experience of activism, to run a credible and serious
41
http://tweetyhall.co.uk/
42
http://pledgebank.com
43
http://www.surreycc.gov.uk/
44
http://.campaigncreator.org
community campaign. Within 10 months of launch over 500 users had registered on the
website to start a campaign.
The success of this project has brought considerable international interest in New
Zealand, Canada, Tanzania, USA, Tajikistan, Cameroon, Nigeria, South Africa, Belgium,
Ireland, Ghana, Australia and Switzerland.

Finland
Lahti Case Study
Lahti is located in the Southern Finland, 100 km from Helsinki, the capital of Finland.
Lahti's population has climbed from around 3000 in the 1900s to over 98 000 today,
making it the seventh largest city in Finland. Lahti has a diversified industrial structure.
The city is still the centre of Finnish furniture industry, when at the same time the service
sector and high technology companies are increasing their importance. Nowadays
design, quality and environmental technology are the main sectors developed and
invested in. In August 2009 Lappeenranta University of Technology, Lahti School of
Innovation and the City of Lahti have launched an eParticipation project to study different
methods of residents' involvement in the development of their living area by unofficial
ways. The target group was habitants of three suburban area called Tonttila, Riihel and
Metskangas. The main emphasis behind this project is to use the innovation potential
of ordinary people. Today there have been about 150 project members participating in 3
urban areas. The tool used in Lahti project is Facebook and social forums where citizens
can discuss and post their ideas. In one group, there have been 114 discussion
openings and several potential ideas, some of them are very detailed level (like design
of skate ramps). One idea concerning transportation information is brilliant according to
technology provider and Transportation Company. The most important type of
engagement in this project is idea generation however citizens can also receive some
information or consult the stage of projects evaluation. Concerning effective contribution
to the decision making process is still too early to define since the public servants,
present in the Fb group, do not respond to citizens directly. They do not want to create
expectations what so ever as the time scale between citizens' idea and potential
implementation of it, is long (could be even a year). As to project dissemination the
management team thinks that the best way to advertise the project is via social network
because it is a place where citizens are anyway, but also press and events.
Germany
Berlin Budget Online Dialog Case Study

The Berlin borough of Lichtenberg (population of 260.000) has conducted a participatory
budgeting project Online-Dialogue
45
in the second half of 2005. After the successful
activity local council has decided to implement participatory budgeting as a regular task.
This platform enabled citizens to get information on the issue, to direct questions to
officials, to propose and discuss ideas for the budget, and to cast votes in order to select
the most adhered to proposals. The borough's council members of all parties signed a
declaration, which describes in detail, how they were to use the results in their policy
decisions. The main objectives of the project are:
x Mutual agreement in policy decisions;
x Effective and fair budgeting;
x Transparency and comprehension for financial matters;
x Lively discussion and un-bureaucratic solutions
The specific SA tools and methodologies being used are paper survey, public meetings,
online-dialogue with detailed information section, moderated discussion forum, budget-
calculator, proposal-wikis, preference-polling, newsletter, editor's interviews with
politicians, etc.
The advocacy and media tools such as posters and leaflets, information stands at local
festivals, mass media coverage, online banners are being used to advertise the project
In total 4000 people have participated in the different formats of the pilot year. The paper
survey has reached a representative share of the local population. The online-dialogue
has reached mainly young and mid-aged citizens up to 50 years of both genders. The
level of education was higher than in the total population. As in all (online-) dialogues the
two main challenges were:
45
http://zebralog.de
-to reach disadvantaged target groups (in terms of education or income)
-to involve participants in the complexity of the problem (to get transparent, fair and
rational results)
The first challenge was worked on by the advocacy and media activities described
above and had decent results. The second challenge seems to be especially important
and difficult in budgeting matters.
The methodology and technology of www.buergerhaushalt-lichtenberg.de
has helped a great deal to work collaboratively on the budget. There were human
moderators, a shared editing function (wiki), and a budget calculator for the concrete
proposals. The specific challenge was to design these tools with a simple usability, but
also with a complex functionality.
4.2 eParticipation at National & Regional levels

The majority of the national eParticipation initiatives are covering the areas of
Participation of Deliberation, Information Provision and Consultation and that they are in
a major part founded by the national and private funds. The United Kingdom and
Germany are the two European countries leading in a number of identified national
eParticipation cases (26 for UK and 15 for Germany)
46
. As one can expect the
eParticipation initiatives are available in the languages of the country. There is
multilingualism in Belgium and Switzerland as both have several official languages. The
national scale initiatives are in general funded by national and private funds.
The regional scale eParticipation initiatives are mainly funded by the EU and the
concerned regions
47
.

United Kingdom
Within the United Kingdom Public Sector, at local, regional and national levels there has
been a significant increase in the use of social media tools and technologies with the
specific aims of improving public engagement and communication.

Tweetminister Case Study

Tweetminster
48
is a service that aims to connect the public with politicians,
commentators and others who help shape the national political landscape in the UK. It is
built using a combination of the Twitter Application Programming Interface (API) and
custom developed code and provides an aggregated view of the Twitter activity from
MP's and Political Parties.
In essence the site aims to digitally replicate the Houses of Parliament.
The added value that Tweetminster brings is in providing a single location for those who
are interested in the Twitter activities of MP's. nstead of having to trawl through the
main Twitter site or specifically configure their twitter client, visitors can easily find their
local MP on the site and follow their recent activity. They do not need to be a Twitter
member to do this, but to engage in the conversation then a Twitter account is required.
46
,
47
http://www.sora.at/fileadmin/images/content/Pages/euyoupart_ergebnisse_finalcomparativereport.pdf
48
http://tweetminster.co.uk/
The developers have also extended the basic aggregation of Twitter feeds to provide a
number of value added applications that can be installed on individual computers or
embedded in 3
rd
party websites.
Tweetminster is providing a valuable service by making it much easier for people to
identify and locate their local MP (if they have a twitter account of course) as well as
directly contact them to join in the active debates. By aggregating this across the political
spectrum and all MP's who use Twitter it a layer of simplicity that significantly enhances
this communication channels.
The service has gained recognition in both the mainstream and digital press channels
with coverage in the Financial Times, The Times newspaper, wired magazine and New
Media Age amongst others.
The Tweetminster twitter ID has over 10,000 followers and is used to provide updates on
newly joined MP's and other political activity.

Scottish Parliament Case study

One of the most successful and renowned national scale eParticipation project was
launched by the Scottish Parliament in 2004
49
(http://scottish.parliament.uk). This project
revolves around the idea of online petitioning which is one of the oldest forms of
eParticipation. The Scottish Parliament e-petitioner system is quite unique as it allows
any citizen to propose and sign an e-petition and to comment any online discussion. This
project also integrates the multichannel approach as citizens can choose to participate
via e-petition or via "real paper petitions.
The Scottish Parliament objective is to respect the principles of sharing power;
accountability; access and participation; as well as equal opportunities. These principles
perfectly fit with the situation in Scotland as the population is very dispersed. The
implementation of e-Petition is one of the best way to erase and to overcome the space
barriers to participate and to provide a better accountability by setting up processes
49
http://scottish.parliament.uk
which results are published online and transparent. It has also increased transparency
by clearly formalising the stages for handling petitions.
Moreover the transparency of the process is also guaranteed by the fact that visitors can
track the petitions progresses through the parliament or local authorities, for example via
a "progress in parliament button.
This initiative has a significant impact as it favoured the involvement of the Scottish
population in the Scottish Parliament's decision-making. The issues submitted to the
Public Petitions Committee via e-petitioning are key citizens issues. The subject of the e-
Petitions could vary from road crossing to telecom masts, Post Office closures, etc.
The Scottish parliament is carefully respecting data protection laws as the signatories'
names are displayed and personal data are stored privately.
The system automatically deletes duplicate signatures and it provides administrators
with graphical indicators on the validity of the signatures. These automated verifications
are based on the link between IP and e-mail addresses.
The follow-up of the petition is simple as the system automatically generates figures of
the numbers of signatures and their origin (regions of the signatures).

As the Scottish Parliament is recognized as one of the leaders in e-petitioning and its
projects has interested other Parliaments and institutions. The OECD acknowledged in
2004 that "few countries have used technology to enable electronic petitioning to the
extent of the Scottish Parliament
50
. Today the system has already been successfully
piloted and transferred to other local authorities in England.
The e-Petition system of the Scottish Parliament does not use expensive and new
technologies. It only needs Microsoft Active Server Pages (ASP) and a SQL Server
database to hold the petitions data. For the website, it uses the open standard XHTML
1.0 for web page mark-up, and (Open Database Connectivity standard to connect to the
database. The disk storage require for the application is less than 10MB
51
.
It is important to note that objectively the technical innovation level in this initiative is low;
indeed petitions sent by e-mail or put on websites are not new. However what is new is
50
http://itc.napier.ac.uk/itc/NewsItem.asp?ID=14
51
http://www.microsoft.com/casestudies/Microsoft-SQL-Server-2000/Scottish-Parliament/Electronic-Petitions-Enhance-
Public-Influence-and-Participation-in-Democratic-Process/49640;http://www.epractice.eu/en/cases/spes
the process
52
, once the e-petition has been submitted, the role of the petitioner does not
end. The e-petitioner
53
continues to have an active role: - he/ she can respond to
comments made on the discussion forum, the submitter can also exchange and debate
on issues rose by a petition with a wide range of citizens. The e-petitioner is able to
come and defend his petition before the Public Petitions Committee on issues and
question raised by the Committee's investigation.
This example illustrates that innovative technologies and ICT tools are not the
milestones for the success of an eParticipation initiatives. The important point is to set
up processes that encourage the stakeholders to make an interactive platform. It also
shows the importance of a multichannel approach allowing the citizens to use the
channels which fit the most with his/her skills and tastes. It also highlights the needs of
transparency for citizens.

Denmark

ROSTRA Case Study
Rostra
5455
(http://e-demokrati.borger.dk) is an online system for public debate and
expression of opinions through voting facilities based on the Danish Digital Signature,
started in June 2007. The tool is a part of the Danish citizens portal borger.dk developed
by the Danish National IT and Telecom Agency. t functions as a national "debate and
voting portal allowing citizens, businesses, politicians and journalists to participate in
debates and votes organized by levels of government, subject, etc. The tool can handle
debates and votes at the local, regional and national levels and it is possible to
authentify user identity through login with the Danish Digital Signature.
In its modernization programme, the government has committed to the use of ICT to
underpin "creation of a more open, user-oriented and democratic administration
56
where
52
ChallengesofExpandingInternet:eCommerceeBusinessandeGovernment,IFIPInternationalFederationforInformation
Processing,E-Petitioning:EnablingGround-UpParticipation;NicholasJ.Adams,AnnMacintoshandJimJohnston
http://www.springerlink.com/content/7x225285377139j2/
53
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Petitioner
54
http://e-demokrati.borger.dk
55
http://www.epractice.eu/cases/Rostra
56
http://www.eurospacegroup.com/file/pubblicazioni/20091005_convegno.pdf
both citizens and businesses have greater access to the workings of government and
are able to participate in strengthened dialogue with politicians. While this commitment
has not translated into any specific goals under the e-Government strategy, it has
nonetheless been acted on at the all of government level from the development of the
online system for public debate and expression of opinions through voting facilities
based on the Danish Digital Signature.
The impact of the ROSTRA tool was development of a new voting system for binding
election regarding the Danish parochial church councils. To secure the secrecy of the
ballot and to ensure unique identification of the voter, the voting process is developed
around the Danish Digital Signature. It was possible for all potential voters to cast their
vote digitally in a period for 10 days before the physical election took place, November
2008. To ensure that there will be no connectivity between the voters personal
information and the vote itself, it has been decided, that once you vote digitally, the
option to physically place your vote at the voting facility is suspended.
This e-election is a pilot project between The Ministry of Ecclesiastical Affairs and The
National IT and Telecom Agency.

Austria
WLANdSalzburgamultimediaon-linetouristGuide

The limited geographical area of Salzburg's Altstadt (old city-part of Salzburg) is an ideal
test-bed for rolling-out wireless-LAN with complete internet coverage everywhere and at
all times. The initial phase of WLANd Salzburg
57
is an information packed wireless
mobile city-guide that uses city maps in combination with GPS to show the actual
position of the tourist, plans and the surrounding attractions.
57
ePaiticipation foi Auolescent Citizens in Austiia NoellaEdelmann,CenterforE-Government,DanubeUniversityKrems,
Krems,Austria;JohannHoechtl,CenterforE-Government,DanubeUniversityKrems,Krems,Austria;PeterParycek;Austrian
FederalChancellery,Vienna,Austriahttp://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1616908
WLANd Salzburg is a virtual information layer that makes use of information from many
sources concerning tourist attractions. The information is distributed upon user request
from mobile computers and PDA's and is viewed by use of standard browsers.
As tourists are physically working the streets of Salzburg's Altstadt they can also be
accompanied by a virtual city-map with access to location-based information about
historical buildings, museums, fine arts, restaurants, and many other attractions, as they
emerge on their mobile devices.

Mitmachen and Jugend2help Case Study
In Austria, two recent eParticipation projects focused on adolescent citizens since 77%
of the young people (18-29) are everyday Internet users. The first project,
"mitmachen.at - move your future was to provide initial experiences with an
eParticipation tool. The second project, "Jugend2help
58

59
, applied the lessons learned
from the "mitmachen.at project to improve the Austrian public administration web portal
for adolescent citizens. In both projects, the results indicate that web portals and
eParticipation seems to suit the adolescents' information and communication needs.
Involving the users is central to the development of an eParticipation process or platform
so that the users' specific characteristics (age, skills), needs and interests are included
appropriately. Austrian youth eParticipators were asked to decide on the content and
features of their Help space. The Jugend2help project was very successful with around
900 contributions and 2000 votes.
The conclusions
60
concerning the project are important for the future projects setup and
they reveal that the most important for a success of the eParticipation projects are good
PR (in social media but also in Schools and Public institutions) and Web accessibility.
The target users' characteristics are also important for developing a marketing strategy
which is able to reach them. Other issues which must also be considered in
eParticipation are accessibility, inclusion and possibly gender.

58
http://www.jugend2help.gv.at
59
http://www.epractice.eu/en/cases/jugend2help
60
jugend2help.gv.atE-governmentforyoungpeople,DanubeUniversityKrems
http://www.epma.cz/Docs/EEEGD09/prezentace/J2H_7th_eGovDays_Prag_20090424.pdf
The phases of Jugen2help project:

Finland
Pijt-Hme Case Study
Lahti Living Lab
61
project purpose is to bring people into the center of innovation and to
help companies and organizations develop user centered products with consumers'
participation in the innovation process. Lahti Living Lab is a sort of consortium bringing
together public corporations, companies, academia and users with an aim to open new
solutions and business opportunities by promoting innovation in a challenging
environment. The special focus of the Lahti Living Lab is also to develop and study
innovativeness and productivity in the public sector. The methods of involving and
activating the users vary, there are methods based on ICT but also on face-to-face
communication.
Lahti Living Lab is situated in the Pijt-Hme region in southern Finland. The region
has app. 200 000 inhabitants, which makes the region large enough for piloting user-
centered applications for the public services. The region also has favorable conditions
and structures for the public sector innovativeness (that the first public utility of social
and health care in Finland was founded in the Pijt-Hme region). The variety of
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Phase 1
Discussion
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Phase 3
Rating

Online
Phase 2
Elaboration
Online
or Offline

Export
data
Import
data
Phase 4 Results Publication
projects related to the restructuring of public services and management of
innovativeness can be characterized as an ambition to improve the quality of life for a
whole citizens group and at the same time act as the start of a new and successful
business venture. The ongoing projects concentrate for example on involving ageing
people in generating ideas for a future welfare centre service concept. For example The
Patient Advice (Asiakasneuvo) programme developed under the guidance of LUT Lahti
School of Innovation began in autumn 2008. Programme has created a new way of
utilising patients' service experiences in developing services with many different sources
of information exploited. The user not only supplies information to the developers, but
also is a part of the development team generating ideas and prototypes.
Estonia
Estonia has been previously assessed by various E-readiness reports as one of the
most successful adaptors and up takers of new communication technologies in CEE
countries.
TOM Case Study
Started in June 2001 TOM
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63
(www.eesti.ee/tom) government initiative also enhanced
dialogue between citizens and public officials. The project was administrated by state
Chancellery and promoted in Estonia as Direct Democracy Portal. It has been
incorporated in the Osale.ee
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eParticipation site on June 4th, 2008. The main idea of
the project was to improve public participation in political decision making process by
providing the opportunity to propose and discuss new legislatives initiatives via internet.
The policy documents are presented for discussion by minister, on the eParticipation
portal and everybody can follow discussions but only registered users can submit the
proposal and participate in it. The way of considering the ideas was following:
x the idea is presented to the citizens on the portal
x citizens have 10 days to comment and discuss it
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www.eesti.ee/tom
63
http://tidplus.net/project/analysis-of-the-tom-tool/analysis-of-the-tom-tool-usage-statistics
64
http://www.osale.ee/
x this period is followed by 3 days period of editing and 3 days for secret voting
x only ideas getting more than half of votes in favour are considered further
x ministry has 1 month for analysis and answer
x the answer is posted on TOM
During the activity of the project
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1140 ideas were presented (64% voted in, 34% voted
out). 654 proposals were sent to the ministries (89% answered among those 6% with a
possible implementation, 48% negatives, 7% supportive). The TOM portal had 6910
registered users and about 100 to 150 visits per day (up to 300 when mentioned
elsewhere for example in blogs or forums). This is the most readily available and most
often used data concerning TOM performance from its launch in 2001 to the end of
2006.

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leosk-egovernance-academy-estonia

Source http://tidplus.net/project/analysis-of-the-tom-tool/analysis-of-the-tom-tool-usage-
statistics/

The positives sides of TOM were as follow:
x possibility to rise political issues
x obligation of state administration to respondents
x communication between users
x communication with state administration
x ability to follow proposals and discussions

The main problems of TOM were:
x many non constrictive proposals
x passive discussions-low level of the idea author's involvement, only 35%
participated in latter phase
x few votes
x small number of active users
x no publicity, buzz
x rejection of proposals by state administration on formal grounds
x little dialogue between citizens and political decision makers
x few ideas implemented
In 2005 Estonia became the first country in the world
66
to hold an election allowing
voters nationwide to cast ballots over the Internet. By Oct. 12, the final day of voting,
9,317 people had successfully cast their vote electronically.
The voting mechanism was fairly simple: Estonian citizens needed an ID card, a
computer and an ID Card-Reader. The ID card identifies the voters uniquely, and
they could then cast their vote on a secure site. They finally had to confirm their
choicebyenteringaPIN.About60%ofEstonianvotershavetheIDcards,whichhas
beeninusesince2002foronlineaccesstobankaccountsandtaxrecords.Butmany
IDcardusersstilllack thereading device,whichexplainsthelowturnoutofonline
voting.
One percent of registered voters participated online in the elections for mayors and city
councils across the country and officials hailed the experiment conducted on October 10
to October 12 as a success. Election officials in the country of 1.4 million said they had
received no reports of flaws in the online voting system or hacking attempts. The IT
solution for casting votes cost about 250,000 euro. In the future, the same software was
used for conducting national polls. In 2007 some 30,000 out of 940,000 eligible voters
chose this option.

Romania
Beautiful Romania Case Study
The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Romania re-launched in 2008
the online presence of the Beautiful Romania project
67

68
(http://www.beautifulromania.ro)
66
http://www.tomw.net.au/technology/it/webethics.shtml
67
http://www.beautifulromania.ro/en
68
http://www.epractice.eu/en/news/306907
The platform aims to promote the initiatives and activities related to urban regeneration
and cultural heritage protection among central and local stakeholders, as well as
individuals interested in these issues in Romania.
This initiative is expected to boost urban employment in these regenerated sites while
initiating the process of revitalisation of currently neglected and degraded historical
buildings in the centres of several Romanian cities. The project provides training and
employment opportunities for young people from vulnerable groups, supports the
Romanian Government and municipalities in the rehabilitation of the country's urban
heritage. In this way, the project supports the Government's efforts towards increased
social and economic development. For these purposes, the Beautiful Romania project
team has developed an interactive online resource centre that will gather and promote
best practices around the world, potential project ideas to be developed in Romania,
resource organisations and information on legal framework and volunteering/internship
opportunities. The platform integrates several web 2.0 technologies which aim to
facilitate the communication and interaction with a wider audience.

Regional scale eParticipation initiatives have many similar characteristics of the national
scale one. Indeed the participation areas addressed are Information Provision,
Deliberation and Consultation
In Europe the United-Kingdom and Germany are as well leaders in term of regional
scale eParticipation projects. However Spain is also active in those fields with 6 cases
identified. These can be explained by the fact that in these 3 countries, regions have a
lot of power and that the regional identity of the citizens is very strong.

Generally regional scale eParticipation Initiative are available in the languages of the
countries, except for Spain which uses two languages: Catalan and Basque.
France
Ile de France Region-ADEME Case Study
ADEME
69
, the French Agency for Environment and Energy Management has recently
launched a new web site on territorial climate and energy information. The new website,
www.pcet-ademe.fr, has been launched in the frame of "The Environment Round Table
(Grenelle Environnement), which invites all communities with more than 50 000
inhabitants to establish a Territorial Climate-Energy Plan (PCET). This site aims at
facilitating the implementation of the Territorial Climate Energy Plan and acts as unique
database identifying information and useful tools for the concerned communities. The
site is divided into 4 main sections: the "methods section, which presents an overview
on the PCETs and on the necessary steps for their implementation and financing; the
"actions section illustrates the main fields where action against climate change should
be taken; "tools gives information on management and communication tools and
introduces reference documents, while the section "observatory monitors the actions so
far taken and constitutes a discussion reference point for the communities through
forums and newsletter.

4.3 European Cooperation Projects

More than half of the eParticipation projects
70
on the European scale are initiated and
funded by the European Commission and the European Parliament. Some others are
initiated by other European institutions, political parties and non-profit organisations.

European eParticipation projects are often available in several languages due to the fact
that the European Union has 23 official languages.
Naturally the language most frequently used in more than half of the projects, is English
followed by German and French. Still one third of the initiatives at the European scale
are only available in English.

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EuropeaneParticipationStudyandsupplyofservicesonthedevelopmentofeParticipationintheEU,eParticipationgood
practicecasesanddiffusion
DeliverableD4.2cFinalversionAuthors:EleniPanopoulou,EfthimiosTambouris,KonstantinosTarabanis
http://islab.uom.gr/eP/index2.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_view&gid=97&Itemid=82
Most of the European eParticipation initiatives cover the area of information provision,
dissemination, deliberation and consultation, followed by the area of community building,
polling, campaigning, voting and electioneering.

EC has launched its first eParticipation initiative called the Interactive Policy Making
Tool in 2001. The goal of this initiative was to allow both Member State Administrations
and EU Institutions to have a better understanding of the needs of citizens and
companies.
To increase the participation of the EU citizens, the European Commission has also set
up in 2001 a dedicated platform called "Your Voice in Europe, available in 11
languages, allowing citizens to consult information, discuss and exchange via a Forum.
The main objective of this platform is to improve European governance and to introduce
better regulation. The very broad scope of discussions include environmental issues, the
Euro, Europe's borders, the European social model, the EU's strategy for growth and
jobs...

PSD Party portal Case Study
"The Alliance & Progressive Socialist Democrats in the European Parliament has
launched an interesting and successful initiative at the European scale which is an
interactive section on the website where citizens can interact. The members of the group
and "simple citizens can discuss on themes which interest the PES and they can both
add their ideas and comments. The website also provides information in order to enrich
and to arouse the debates. The information are viewable in 4 languages: English,
French, German and Spanish. The website's audience has doubled in one year, thanks
to Twitter" said Tony Robinson, head of the Internet Unit for this Parliamentary Group in
Strasbourg during the 2009 European e-Democracy Award presentation. A distinction
was also awarded by the Politech Institute and IP label for the variety of web 2.0 tools
used and of the content of a website whose aim is to increase citizen participation in the
European debate.
Ucount4eu Case Study

"Ucount4eu
71
(www.ucount4eu.eu) is an initiative which has been launched by
GOV2U a NGO which aims to increase the awareness of the European citizens of the
impact of the EU and its institutions in their daily activities. "Ucount4eu allow citizens to
discuss in a forum, and to initiate online petitions (e-Petition) which can be potentially
passed to the Parliament for discussion once it gathers one million signatures.
"Uncount4eu covers the following areas of participation: information provision,
deliberation, and polling.

CitizenScape Case Study

CitizenScape
72
is a 2 years project initiated in 2009 which objective is to empower
citizens, to debate and to contribute to the legislative and decision-making processes on
the national and EU levels. CitizenScape involves actors from the civil society as well as
from the public institutions.
CitizenScape is an online democratic space adapting "the best of breed technological
solution with many advanced functions. It also applies the public-i webcast methodology
to create a structure to engage citizens to the project and to moderate their inputs. It
integrates two types of tools informal social networking and Web 2.0 technologies
(Facebook) and more formal ones (such as petitioning). The CitizenScape project works
on 4 pilot sites, in Bristol (UK), Donegal (Ireland), Genova(Italy), Zilina (Slovakia), each
acting as an independent platform.
The main critical successes of the project:
x ncrease of the citizens' participation in their local democratic institutions.
x Development of a methodology which encourage citizens engagement
x Acceptance and use of the CitizenScape services by local authorities
x Reliable access and delivery of the services to all users.
One of the early challenges of the CitizenScape approach is to ensure that a new Civic
Space is co-created and this involved coaching for both the citizens and council
participants.
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www.ucount4eu.eu
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http://citizenscape.org/
The issue of identity management is also critical in order to move seamlessly from Social
Web Spaces to the Civic Space. This is an important topic to explore in future projects.
While the CitizenScape pilot trials are the alpha run of the Web 2.0 eParticipation
service, "Public-i" is now running the services as a Virtual Town Hall beta run by
deploying a fully commercial service to Local Authorities across the UK and Europe.
The CitizenScape project has defined a set of Evaluation Criteria and a Pilot Trials
Monitoring Plan, providing evaluation of the CitizenScape Pilot service in 4 varied
Legislative Authority contexts, countries and languages. It was supposed to be reported
at the end of the 12 month Pilot Trials in December 2009.

HuWY Case Study

HuWY project
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74
(Hub Websites for Youth Participation), launched on January 2009. It
aims to get young people involved in decision making processes by talking about
policies and laws which affect the Internet, like cyber bullying, child abuse, ID theft,
privacy and phishing, file-sharing. All those discussions are transferred to European
governments and parliaments. Youth groups discuss on these questions using their own
online spaces: youth group forums, social networking spaces, multimedia gatherings etc.
and they post the results on Hub websites (Hubs) provided by the HuWY project. The
online Hubs hold supporting information space for the results of young people's
discussions and feedback from Policy Makers.
Suggestions, tags and feedback from the national Hubs are collated into an EU Hub
addressed to international policy-makers.

73
http://huwy.eu/
74
http://www.epractice.eu/en/cases/huwy
The main objectives
75
are:
Encourage young European citizens to be active within the EU democracy
Involve young people in policy development related to the Internet and its
governance
Support positive Internet use and to foster initiatives to agree on Internet policies
Advance eParticipation as a tool of future citizens' involvement.

The technologies used on the project are electronic mail, file sharing, filtering
technology, folksonomy engineering and groupware. The following software tools are
deployed for the implementation of the Platform: WordPress MU-blog and Content
Management System (Chat rooms, Web blogs, Web Portals) and Media wiki. However
participant groups may use any tools they like to support their discussions.
The authors of the project think that the alternative solution regarding the
tools/technologies they have deployed in this platform could be Drupal (another open
source tool).

LEX-IS Case Study

LEX-IS
76
project was launched in January 2007 and was tested at the Austrian, the
Lithuanian, the Hellenic and the Model European Parliament. The principal tool used for
these projects was DOC ASSET which automates the workflow of document capturing
and creation, protocol labeling, use, review, approval, coordination, following, archiving
and retrieval and in generally the whole life cycle control of the documents and
Organization receives or sends. LEX-IS objective is to increase citizens-especially young
people- involvement and participation in the public debate and decision making
procedures. It aims to demonstrate that what citizens need in order to participate in the
EU political activities is not a special knowledge but only well structured, evident and
clear information
LEX-S project's objectives
77
is to enhance cooperation between citizens, businesses,
non-governmental organizations and Parliamentarians in the stage of preparation and
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http://www.ep-momentum.eu/eParticipationProjects/HuWY/tabid/99/Default.aspx
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http://www.eu-participation.eu/lex-is/
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http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/apps/projects/factsheet/index.cfm?project_ref=EP-06-01-018
debates with the use of the state-of-the-art information technology tools and
methodologies. That is for example to provide citizens better information on the EU
activities and on the different stages of legislation proposal (those stages typically
include scanning of the overall environment the proposed law is going to act upon, early
identification of social problems and needs, as well as establishing the need for a policy.
Realization of this project requires to settle a LEX-IS consortium (Parliament, University,
ICT companies) in order to create a network with key players from the local and national
representative entities.
LEX-IS has the ambition to be explored to the wider audience in a pan-European level
by sharing experiences through the LEX-IS forum and by creating liaisons with existing
related initiatives and projects. The project has already a significant success which is the
interest of the Model European Parliament (MEP), an organization that drives the
"European Parliament of the Youth" in 25 European Countries with the active
participation of more than 1,000 students every year who follow the processes and real
issues of the European Parliament..
LEX-IS should create a web platform which is supposed to be a base of content for
citizens and businesses who want to deepen their abilities:
x to query and view the legal structures and elements (draft laws, legal
components, legal documents, supportive information) in multiple levels of
abstraction and decomposition, using content management engines and legal
metadata schemas already available within the consortium.
x to view the argumentation structure of a law that is under formation, using
semantic annotation and argument visualization techniques.
x to express opinions around legal components, arguments that are presented by
the participating organizations, or opinions of other parties, in a structured way
that promotes participative decision-making.
To increase citizen's interest in this project and to attract them to participate in the LEX-
IS network, some events and communication channels should be organized.
.
Openparlamento Case Study
Openparlamento.it
78
is another initiative which allows the citizens to follow politics
activity. This complex web application offers to the citizens the possibility to gather
information on the follow-up of files presented by national elected representative, from
their submission to their approval by the Chamber of representatives and the Senate.
The website also enables to follow the process of an act and votes, give information on
the signatories and present the Public officers' speech on the acts. The website renders
available the texts which can be modified by the users and comments thanks to an
online communication tool. Thus the users can describe using their own vocabulary the
parliamentary acts.
Moreover a dedicated webpage and a personalized digital newsletter solely composed
of news related to the acts, the politics or the debate followed by the users, is directly
send to him by email. This allows the users to follow nearly in real time what is going on.
The idea to materialise on a web site, in live, the principles of transparency of the activity
of the elected representatives, has guided the conception of this project. The authors of
the projects declare: We wanted to build a place on the Web where the citizens can
informed themselves and et control the activities of the elected representatives at the
National Parliament ,
All those digital initiatives allow the citizens to better understand the cogs of the
Parliament, to follow the activity of their representatives and to comment their acts. In a
way, it contributes to bring together the citizens and the MPs which representing them.

5.eParticipationinotherpartsoftheWorld
Countries worldwide are exploring different ways of developing interactive mechanisms

to encourage e-Engagement and e-Participation. Coherent government policies and
strategies are needed to ensure that digital technologies and services reach far and wide
across all a country's regions and socioeconomic groups. Long-term vision and
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consistent, even-handed policy implementation are called for. The recession, however,
has forced governments more recently to think also about the short-term and long-term
economic impact of investment in ICT programs and infrastructure. Several rich and
digitally well-endowed countries are using ICT infrastructure spending as a form of
economic stimulus. These include Taiwan
79
(16
th
), which has launched a project to
blanket every major city with wireless broadband infrastructure, and the US, where
Congress has earmarked US$ 7bn of a larger stimulus program to fund broadband
rollout projects.
Many governments are also striving to expand the scope of "e-participationthe use of
ICT by citizens to engage in the political process. In recognition of the growing use of
digital technology in political life, the Economist Intelligence Unit has incorporated the
UN's e-participation index scores in the rankings model this year. This indicator
assesses the quality and usefulness of information and services provided by
governments for the purpose of engaging citizens in the public policymaking process.

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E-readinessrankings2009Theusageimperative;TheEconomistWritteninco-operationwithTheIBMInstitutefor
BusinessValuehttp://graphics.eiu.com/pdf/E-readiness%20rankings.pdf
source E-rediness report 2008:www.unpan1.un.org

We have chosen some relevant worldwide applications of eParticipation good practices
at the National and Local levels and their challenges as follow:

The United States of America

This wind of change provoked by Obama pulled an outfit of construction sites in the
American administration, the construction sites which aimed, among others, at satisfying
the ambitions of the new president. The White House gains, as for her the Golden Palm
of the presence of the American administration on Facebook with its 327 592 followers.
Even the NASA or the State Secretariat (U.S. Department of State) as well as the
government of several States are now precursors and models to be followed in the
innovative adoption of the collaborative applications.

National level-Baracobama Case Study

One successful and interesting Case is www.barackobama.com
80
which is an American
illustration of national scale eParticipation initiative.

YouTube-sponsored the Democratic Presidential Debate in the United States highlighted
the blurring of the lines between politics and citizens. The use of YouTube for
Presidential Debates gave citizens "a platform to question candidates on issues that
mattered to them. Political campaign Web sites that contain candidate profiles and blogs
have become major aspects of election campaigns

The www.barackobama.com website was launched as the presidential campaign
website. This website was actually the host of the project 'Organize for America' which
reveals the main objective of the website. During the campaign, the website played an
important role in engaging individuals and groups by using Web 2.0 tools. When we look
at the contents of www.barakobama.com , we see that it has a variety of links and tools
for visitors to use. These links are grouped under three major headings, issues,
volunteers and blog, which each lead to different pages with rich contents.

After the election the website has become a platform for promoting the projects of
Obama Administration and sharing political information.
Looking at these, we can argue that on the website, interaction with users is emphasized
to a great extent. Only the issues page is dedicated to a one- way communication by
sharing information with the visitors. Even from this page, however, visitors can access
Web 2.0 tools. On every page of the website, the links to major tools are provided:
Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, Flickr, Digg, Twitter, Eventful, Linkedin, Blackplanet,
Faithbase, Eons, Glee, MiGente, MyBatanga, AsianAve and DNC Partybuilder. The
tools include applications ranging from social networking to video sharing thereby
enabling people to choose the type of communication/tool they like. The main tool for
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Web2.0intheProcessofe-participation:TheCaseofOrganizingforAmericaandtheObamaAdministration;auteurAysu
KES-ERKU,VisitingScholar;DepartmentofSociologyUniversityofMassachusettsAmhers&R.ErdemERKU,Doctoral
ResearchFellow,NationalCenterforDigitalGovernment,UniversityofMassachusettsAmhert
interaction between users is the blog page. Visitors can join this blog page and post their
comments by creating a user account, which is a very common, user-friendly application.

The popularity of Barack Obama pages on Web 2.0 sites such as Facebook, YouTube
and MySpace shows that the use of existing tools, which are already popular, is a major
factor in the success of e-participation.
As the UK moves towards a General Election in 2010, MP's and political parties have
looked to learn from the Obama campaign for ways to increase their engagement with
their communities.

Regional level-Virtual Alabama Case Study

Virtual Alabama
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82
, inspired by hurricane Katrina, is an implementation of Google Earth
system which improves disaster response through better data sharing and allows city,
country and state agencies to collaborate in innovative ways. Having seen more than
450 tornadoes strike the state during his time in office, Gov. Bob Riley wanted to create
a data base which will help to assess the damage and apply for federal aid, by giving
them the information on how the region looked like before. The solution was to build
Virtual Alabama using locally owned imagery on a secure, permission-based Google
Enterprise platform in order to visualise all GIS information in 3D model (3D buildings,
3D models, shapes). 3D models are proven to be easier to understand and encourage
users to explore. All common OS, platforms and browsers are supported and data can
be presented as an overlay on a map. The solution is integrated into existing legacy
systems and data registers with images, 360 photos, documents cross-referenced to the
map. Getting started was relatively inexpensive as the state spent less than $150,000 for
the software licenses and hardware. t's also very interesting to keep all data stored in
on the platform as the cost of computing systems is constantly dropping. The system
contains location data for sewer, water and power lines; radio towers; police cruisers; fire
hydrants; building schematics; sex offenders' addresses; approved landing zones for
medical helicopters; inventories of hospitals and cached medical supplies, such as
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http://www.govtech.com/featured/Virtual-Alabama-Facilitates-Data-Sharing-Among.html
82
http://www.dhs.alabama.gov/virtual_alabama/pdf_files/VirAL_Fact_Sheet.pdf
respirators; evacuation routes; shelters; land-ownership records; and assessed property
values. Virtual Alabama's platform is accessible only to government employees with the
proper permissions but in a case of danger then access can widen. The connection is
established in real time and data is streamed to everyone who needs to have this kind of
information.
Local level-CapStat Case Study

CapStat
83
project is a resource for a District of Columbia resident to track how District
Government is working for them. They can use these pages to track the performance of
individual agencies, find neighbourhood statistics and learn how their government is
responding to the city's most pressing challenges. CapStat provides dynamic information
about the operations and performance of DC government. Thanks to the CapStat the
administration is committed to transparency and accountability, as citizens are able to
look closely into every aspect of the government's performance. Citizens are also invited
to use TrackDC
84
to tell what do they think about the government activity and how they
imagine it to do those things better, so that the government can truly be 'of the people,
by the people, and for the people. The CapStat is using several applications like
mapping application. This application was designed to allow citizens access to
Government data and provide a tool for quick mapping by location and time.
Nongovernmental initiatives-SeeClickFix Case Study

SeeClickFix
85

86
is an American non-governmental initiative with an international
application in local areas all over the world. It works by exploiting three basic principles:
x Empowerment, SeeClickFix allows anyone to report and track non-emergency
issues anywhere in the world via the internet. This empowers citizens,
community groups, media organizations and governments to take care of and
improve their neighbourhoods.
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http://capstat.oca.dc.gov/
84
http://track.dc.gov/
85
http://seeclickfix.com/how_seeclickfix_works
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http://www.thealter.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=section&layout=blog&id=10&Itemid=61
x Efficiency, two heads are better than one and 300 heads are better than two. In
computer terminology, distributed sensing is particularly powerful at recognizing
patterns, such as those that gradually take shape on a street.
x Engagement, citizens who take the time to report even minor issues and see
them fixed are likely to get more engaged in their local communities. It's called
self-reinforcing loop. This also makes people happy and everyone benefits from that.
Citizens vote on neighbourhood issues, or promote more efficient community
governance by instantly forwarding them to a person who might be able to help.
Neighbourhood groups, elected officials and advocates monitor key issues, and publicly
propose solutions on how to resolve them. Governments and other entities responsible
for the public space (such as utilities and property owners) become more accountable to
the public by acknowledging problems and providing effective communication about
solutions.
It uses widgets, smartphone applications open data resources as GeoRSS, KML JSON,
maps, Facebook, Twitter as well as forums and blogs integration. It is available in many
languages.

Canada

In Canada, e-participation services are organized by category which makes it user-
friendly, and responsive to citizens' demands
87
.
In order to gauge the efficacy of their services, the government uses a unique Canadian
outcomes analysis approach called 'Citizens First' in the case of individuals and
families, and 'Taking Care of Business' in the case of companies, which used further
surveys against the Common Measurement Tool that the government officials
responsible for GOL have developed. With this tool the government has been able to
measure clients ' expectations, priorities and the actual percentage of satisfaction with
government services at all levels of government, and track how that is changing.
In a recent survey, GOL Canada was assessed to have not only service maturity (i.e. the
level to which a government has developed an on-line presence in terms of service
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AnOverviewofeParticipationModelspreparedbyNahleenAhmed,DivisionforPublicAdministrationandDevelopment
Management(DPADM);DepartmentofEconomicandSocialAffairs(UNDESA)
breadth and service depth), but also customer service maturity, which measured the
extent to which government agencies manage interactions with their customers and
deliver service in an integrated way across all channels.
The political will to engage its citizens in policy discussions and to improve public
services is amply manifested by the development of a measurement tool to gauge the
usefulness of the information and services provided on its website. This is an
encouraging first step for the future of e-services and e-participation in Canada, which
aims to design its services based on public demand and user needs.
Croatia
PollitikaCaseStudy
"Independent but not neutral"
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is the self-definition of Pollitika (www.Pollitika.com)
Launched in 2006 by Marko Rakar, known for his political notes on his blog about the
political situation of this south European country of 4.5 million inhabitants, Pollitika.com
has become an inevitable website about politics. Three thousand bloggers are enrolled
and contribute to the website. About 2.000 new articles are published every year for
150.000 visitors per month. Mark Rakar is a passionate man. During the visit of the
French National Assembly, proposed to the participants of the last World e-Democracy
Forum, he enjoyed every moment and every picture. Curious by nature, quoting the
American strategist Joe Trippi and convinced that an electoral campaign is "too serious
matter to be left to political parties", it was not a surprise that he is one of Top 10 Who
Are Changing the World of Internet and Politics. During the e-Democracy Awards
workshop, last October, he explained how Pollitika.com strengthened democracy in
Croatia.

Singapore

88
http://www.edemocracy-forum.com/2009/12/croatia-pollitika.html
Singapore e-government readiness reflects a strong commitment from the government
to promote access and use of ICTs. It maintains excellent, informative, and up-to-date
site www.ecitizen.gov.sg with easily accessible information. More significantly, it also
includes a Government Consultation Portal http://app.feedback.gov.sg/asp/index.asp
which encourages feedback from citizens regarding policy, as well as a forum
www.cutwaste.gov.sg for suggesting ways to cut government waste.

The most notable aspect of Singapore's
89
overall online presence is the integration
process, which makes it one of the 'best practices' for integrated portals and one-stop-
shop sites, and therefore an effective way forward in eGovernment.Anoteworthyfactor
in Singapoies online piesence is the way seivice delivery has been integrated to facilitate
access to citizens Insteau of ueveloping silos ofinformationbyseparatinginformationby
departments, they are grouped under categories, which makes the site extremely user
friendly.
The government portal also actively encourages feedbacks from the public in order to
improve its services. The portal also allows citizens to take advantage of m-technology
by providing its citizens the option of receiving SMSs from the government on diverse
matters including passport renewal, road tax renewal, an e-government newsletter and
even notifications of overdue library books. The Government of Singapore implemented
SingPass in March 2003 to support Singapore's e-Government Vision and to transform
public service into a Networked Government. SingPass is the common password for the
public to access the government's e-services. Citizens and foreigners working in
Singapore only need to remember one unique ID and password assigned to them.
Today, about 40 government agencies authenticate users with SingPass for access to
about 370 e-services requiring secure user identification.

The Republic of Korea

89
The Republic of Korea's national portal http://www.korea.go.kr/ has a strong
eParticipation presence. The portal provides citizens with online consultation and
encourages its people to engage in issues affecting them. It allows citizens to create
online submissions and payments and lets them track the progress of their submissions.
All this is done on a secure network that ensures electronic signatures.

In the city of Chuncheon, in Korea (www.chuncheon.go.kr) citizens have direct access
to the Mayor through the Chuncheon City website. Through this website citizens can
suggest ideas and proposals and forward comments on the services provided to the
Mayor's Office. The suggestions are then reviewed by the Mayor's Office and feedbacks
are provided to the citizens. In addition, citizen groups and local residents participate in
the compilation of the city's budget to ensure a transparent process.

The United Arab Emirates (UAE)
One of the countries that have made tremendous strides in advancing its eParticipation
activity are the UAE
90
. The gain is largely attributed to a revamped national site that
integrates information and services into a single gateway where its services can be
easily located. The UAE national site was not only completely re-done but also re-
branded. Furthermore, the government took steps to provide participatory features on
one of its ministry websites, i.e., the Ministry of Education, which is one of the few
government sites in the Middle East to offer an open discussion forum.

An interesting feature on the UAE gateway is the organization of the site by topics that
are geared towards addressing the needs of the end-users, integrating information,
services, and transactions under separate sections for residents, business, visitors, and
government, thereby enhancing its interactive presence.

The government has articulated a vision for its e-government strategy with the intention
of "enabling integrated policy formulation by facilitating a knowledge-based world class
90
government." t purports to do so by soliciting "ideas and feedback from external
stakeholders. On its website, the government also explicitly outlines the need to
develop performance indicators, both quantitative and qualitative, in an effort to be
transparent and accountable. It goes on to state that specific performance targets and
tangible benefits to the government also need to be outlined in order to measure
performance and success. Although the e-government strategy does not explicitly refer
to e-consultation and eParticipation processes, the experience with the Ministry of
Education is nevertheless a salutary example of the government's openness to engage
citizens in a participatory process in the future.
South Africa
Country provides some facility for public comments on its government portal. Although
the range of public services offered on the website is not very extensive, it nevertheless
offers citizens the opportunity to comment on a number of public documents on issues
that are under consideration by policy-makers.
A particularly notable feature is the launching of a national accessibility portal in 2004 to
make ICT available for four million people with disabilities, as part of their social
inclusion strategy. Termed as the South African National Accessibility Portal
91
(NAP), the
site is a one-stop information, services and communications channel that support
persons with disabilities, caregivers, the medical profession, and those offering services
in this domain.
This is an example of an e-government portal that is beginning to evolve from solely e-
Information to e-Consultation. There is clearly an attempt to organize the information
according to the perceived needs of the public, and in several different languages.
Furthermore, the number of documents available for public comments is quite
impressive, which indicates the government's desire to solicit feedback from the citizens
before finalizing the documents for legislative actions. It is not clear, however, how the
government intends to publish the results of its consultative process and assess the
performance of its portal.
91
Brazil
Brazil egov portal

92
is one-stop-shop eParticipation site. It is perhaps the most effective
in Latin America, with the most pertinent information and services on the main page
organized in easily defined categories. They range from tax payment and health services
to legislation information and utilities. The image logos make the site particularly user
friendly. As for engaging citizens in discussing key policy issues, the portal offers limited
choice of topics for online discussion. The e-procurement website for government
contracts for goods and services provides information on relevant legislation and current
news on economic development issues. It includes an online bidding site for government
contracts, as well as links to services for new and emerging businesses in Brazil. To use
the online services, the website installs specific software for the user's computer and
allows for online registration of potential government contractors.
92
6. eParticipationattheInternationalScale

International eParticipation projects are often initialised by NGO or Civil Organizations
(CSO) which launches websites in English language that in majority cover the area of
information provision, deliberation and promotion. They all aim to inform the worldwide
citizens and to reinforce their involvement and issues that International organization,
NGOs and CSOs judge as global and thus concerning every citizens.

0ne of the best known inteinational ePaiticipation initiatives is Amnesty
International petitioning
93
Amnesty Inteinational is a worldwide movement of
people who campaign for internationally recognized human rights for all. On
Amnesty Inteinationalwebsite the citizens can sign petitions in favoui of Buman
Rights oi piotest against non iespect foi Buman in geneial
The main areas of participation in this case are Information providing in four
variouslanguages(Arabic,English,FrenchandSpanish)andcampaigning.

"Greenpeace International is an independent global campaigning organisation that
acts to change attitudes and behaviour, to protect and conserve the environment and to
promote peace by:. Its website offers audiovisual information to the citizens all over the
world and promotes the exchanges via forums and blogs. The "Greenpeace
nternational's website covers the deliberation and information provision 'area of
participation.

We can also find some eParticipation projects
94
where NGO are not involved such as
eParticipation initiative at trans-national scale are scarce. Although many expect from
trans-national scale eParticipation initiative to facilitate and reinforce the dialogue
between citizens on issues that interest both sides. We can expect from trans-national
93
http://www.amnesty.org/
94
EuropeaneParticipationStudyandsupplyofservicesonthedevelopmentofeParticipationintheEU/eParticipationgood
practicecasesanddiffusionAuthors:EleniPanopoulou,EfthimiosTambouris,KonstantinosTarabanis
http://islab.uom.gr/eP/index2.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_view&gid=97&Itemid=82
eParticipation initiative to strengthen the cooperation and the understanding both leading
to peace and economics welfare.

DigiActive (www.digiactive.org) is an all-volunteer organization dedicated to helping
grassroots activists around the world use the Internet and mobile phones to increase
their impact. Our goal is a world of activists made more powerful and more effective
through the use of digital technology. The purpose of DigiActive is to promote and
explain the digital tools of social change so activists can use them effectively. The
activities of DigActive include, but are not limited to:
x Explaining how to use various digital tools for activism
x Reviewing digital activism guides and resources created by other organizations
x Sharing stories of successful digital activism campaigns around the world
x Hosting virtual events where activists can learn from expert digital activism
practitioners
x Alerting activists to digital actions taking place around the world.
x Fostering community among digital activists from around the world

Western Balkans
The project's primary aim
95
is to establish a communication and information
management network hosted by the National News Agencies of the Western Balkan
countries. The network will take the online form of:
x a thematic portal (the communication environment) to enable sharing of public
information (supporting a range of multimedia formats);
x a community forum which will support interactive e-democracy processes based
on a discussion forum, questionnaires and polling mechanisms.
95
http://cordis.europa.eu/fetch?CALLER=PROJ_IST&ACTION=D&DOC=19&CAT=PROJ&QUERY=1207128137887&RCN=80549
The environment will be unified across the 3 Western Balkans countries involved,
governed by a shared set of specified procedures and a common code of ethics. The
project aims to involve policy makers and stakeholders from Western Balkans - including
relevant Governmental Organisations (Ministries), Public News Agencies and citizens
in the use and outcomes of the network.
The project brings together 8 partners representing three Western Balkan Countries
(Albania, Serbia and Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia) as well as two Member
States (Greece and United Kingdom). The project is funded under the European
Commission's Sixth Framework Programme: FP6-045003-Web-Dep.

7.Conclusion
eParticipation should be used to support, complement or enhance the activities and

understanding of representative government, and should not undermine the value of
representative democracy. The adoption of ICT tools in decision-making is a process of
innovation and learning and requires sustained political support to be successful.

One of the major challenges of e-participation is social and political complexity, which
implies the necessity to reflect the various needs and demands of different groups in the
society. Wherever possible, tools should incorporate an expectation of such divergence
and provide opportunities for negotiation, mediation and consensus building.
The second challenge is the integration and the responsiveness which requires that the
mechanism exists to manage the process, analyse inputs, to respond to them and feed
them into the policy process.

It is important to create every eParticipation project in a committee setting so everyone
can have the possibility to express his opinion on the subject and website design
(website colours and images). Successful eParticipation project must be centred,
designed, adapted and thought around the targeted stakeholders and issues addressed
to them. The objectives of the project (policy-modelling, legislation, campaigning...), the
target and the reason must be clearly indicated in order to get valuable and focussed
citizen participation. A clear and concise definition of these elements is the first step to
efficient participation.

From previous experiences we know that the success of an eParticipation project
depends first and foremost on the level and scope of the project. The most successful
eParticipation initiatives are those realized at the local level. Initiatives at the European
level are definitely much more complex (e.g. in terms of multilingualism, specific social
and political heterogeneities and diverging national interest) and thus more difficult to
realize.
Furthermore for the moment the feeling of belonging to the European Union is still not
strong enough to be comparable with a national or local identification so European
eParticipation project have more difficulties to attract large audience.

To have a successful eParticipation project, eInformation presented needs to be
accurate, complete and reliable, in order to reach an effective participation and
transparency. The information must be useful and easily reachable and in an
understandable language. The type of information must of course be adapted to the
targeted audience both in languages and means to obtain the information. eInformation
empower citizens and render governments more accessible and transparent.

Despite the numerous ICT tools available for eParticipation projects (blogs, online
forum, online consultations and polls), they are often not effectively used which is
rather unfortunate as these ICT tools could contribute to increase transparency. To
engender use of ICT it is vital that offline events are implemented to identify and
encourage the motivating factors that will improve uptake.

It is primordial to acknowledge the participation effort of the citizens, the government
needs to show that the feedback is important and that the policy makers are interested
and attentive to the inputs given by the citizens. The citizens must have the impression
that his or her participation is meaningful and has an influence on the government policy.
All those elements participate in the trust and transparency required for encourage the
participation of citizens.

A cross-media approach is essential for democratic processes. Successful eParticipation
initiatives cannot be purely virtual, since one third of the EU population is not online and
exclusive "e channel could deepen the digital divide and create a gap in the sense of
"politically included and "politically excluded citizens. Media in our context gather all
tools allowing communities to talk to each other, to spread news, and to give everyone a
voice and a platform from which to use that voice.
The same content should be presented on several different platforms (for example 3D
Interactive Environment which allow citizens explore and shape augmented-reality public
spaces or RFID tags which bring digital media contents to the real world and support the
interaction between virtual and real communities) in different forms (for example online
survey versus paper survey, digital video-conferences, TV sessions versus face-to-face
meetings) to reach as wide range of audience as possible.

Final remarks
The present deliverable is a first step of the State of the Art and will find its continuation
in the second deliverable of Work package 5, "D5.2 Methodology for eParticipation
nnovation which will contribute to the definition of the project's "Experimental Design,
Scenario and Protocol (D5.3).
The purpose of the second step of this deliverable is to make a review of the existing
methodologies in order to define the best methodology that will ensure the successful
implementation of the European eParticipation projects in the Living Labs context.

The main criteria to be studied in the methodology will be:

- Finance - we will try to define a funding base which will ensure the sustainability of the
project

-Domain / Areas in this part we will define according to the examples used in the
present deliverable what are the best methods used to generate an environment
(subjects, area) that facilitates the participation and what basic conditions need to be
accomplished.

- Ways- we will try to define the best way of eParticipation to keep user motivated and
involved and what should be done to keep users informed about contribution evolvement

-Tools - we will define the usability of the eParticipation applications, tools, channels and
devices taking into account what is the social acceptability and what is the level of
compliance with ICT- to conclude if a trainee program is necessary or not

- Enhancement we will try to find the way to increase engagement and motivation on
both sides.

-Support- we will indicate ways the input should be used to reach final destination

-Dissemination activities- we will make an overview of means to advertise project in
order to choose the one which will attract the largest audience.

-Monitoring/Evaluation we will indicate what kind of monitoring methods can be used
to improve the effectiveness of the project

However we need to underline that for the moment it is not possible to indicate any
particular successful methodology to be applied since no quantitative or qualitative
measurement and data had been published so far. Moreover previous studies of
eParticipation have focused on the technical and institutional perspectives but there was
no evaluation offered by a social-cognitive approach.
All the findings we were able to collect allowed us to establish an evaluation of existing
approaches what could be a first attempt to define an effective methodology for
providing information, support and tools for the pan-European Living Labs eParticipation
project.


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QUERY=1207128137887&RCN=80549

Apollon - SOTAs For Eparticipation Through Emedia

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Table 2: eParticipation Index 2008: Top 10 Countries

Ranking Country 2008 Index

Manchester Libraries maintain a profile on Flickr

The Manchester Libraries page on Facebook

The Lit List blog

Berlin Budget Online Dialog Case Study

4.2 eParticipation at National & Regional levels

Countries worldwide are exploring different ways of developing interactive mechanisms

Nongovernmental initiatives-SeeClickFix Case Study

Brazil egov portal

eParticipation should be used to support, complement or enhance the activities and

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