Innovation for Dialogue: Creative Experiences to Encourage Participation

by DW Academie

Innovation is no simple task. This is especially true when it is intended to promote citizen participation in such a way as to foster constructive and respectful dialogues. For these dialogues to be successful, ongoing creative processes must be maintained. This is true for all institutions and organisations that seek to encourage civil society participation in political processes and decision-making in the hope of creating modern inclusive societies.

As if the challenge of involving civil society in public processes was not already significant, there is the additional and growing issue of digital exclusion which certain communities are encountering given that a growing number of political opportunities require the use of new technologies despite the fact that not all communities are equally digitalised.

Due to the complexity of this situation, DW Akademie has created ‘Innovation for Dialogue’ (I4D) as a key component of its training and participation strategy. This approach aims to ensure that civil society is able to participate fully in public debates using infrastructures that seek to serve public, rather than private, interests.

Building bridges between communities and experimental approaches

I4D develops processes of collaboration between new media forms, including open data initiatives, start-ups, hacker communities and innovation centres. It also experiments with new technologies to influence digital debates in constructive ways and develops capacities for innovation through agile human-centred designs and methodologies.

However, DW Akademie and its partner organisations in Latin America and the Caribbean are aware that in this region it would be a mistake to design strategies based exclusively on digital technologies. After all, the majority of projects are implemented in rural, Amazonian or peripheral urban neighbourhoods. Therefore, the Latin American strategy focuses on combining traditional communication methods—in particular community radio because of its reach—and newer digital information and communication technologies.

The publication, Innovation for Dialogue: Creative Experiences to Encourage Participation describes and systematises four examples of training and content production developed in collaboration with partner organisations in the region.

These experiences are exemplary due to their innovative designs, experimental approaches and the ways they collaborate with local and community radio and prioritise citizen participation and dialogue in the media:

1. Hackathon #ConectaCulturas

Hackatón #ConectaCulturas is an a joint initiative together with the Coordinadora de Medios Comunitarios Populares y Educativos del Ecuador (CORAPE, Coordinator of Popular and Educational Community Media of Ecuador).

This project is the first to use the hackathon methodology in a community media network in order to design a mobile application that can contribute to recovering the history and traditions of a country’s peoples and identities.

2. Reporterathon

This is an initiative implemented in collaboration with the Asociación de Radiodifusión Comunitaria Vokaribe in Barranquilla (Vokaribe Community Broadcasting Association in Barranquilla), Colombia. This project focuses on the collaborative creation of content, using community radio as a platform for citizen participation and dialogue.

3. Collaboratory

Colaboratorio is an initiative developed with the Centro de Producciones Radiofónicas (CEPRA, Radio Production Centre) of Cochabamba, Bolivia.

This is an open space where radio stations can make suggestions, encouraging citizen participation and dialogue in media.

4. Space Cabins

Cabinas Espaciales is a joint initiative that works with Radio Sónica, and belongs to the Asociación de Servicios Culturales y Educativos (ASEC, Cultural and Educational Services Association) in Guatemala. This project seeks to strengthen the voices of a large sector of society which has been historically excluded from media participation.

Collaboration as a tool for innovation

At a time when innovation in the information ecosystem is largely dominated by commercial players, these innovative participation strategies, which improve public dialogue, contribute viewpoints from marginalised or isolated regions. These spaces do not always have the best conditions and infrastructure, requiring creative solutions to be found. Collaboration and teamwork are therefore fundamental features of the experiences systematised here.

The projects mentioned above were developed by multidisciplinary teams, with the active participation of the community, schools, the general public and other social communication actors. In the implementation stage, DW Akademie implemented a participant-centred pedagogy in which training cycles start by planning methodologies and content alike according to the needs identified during the analysis. It is important to emphasize the role of participants as protagonists in the learning process. Likewise, priority is given to participatory methodologies such as teamwork, brainstorming and debates.

The end goal is to build civil society capacity. This not only means facilitating access to information but also enabling people to actively participate in public debates. In this sense, participatory methods make decision-making more inclusive and equitable. They also foster effective dialogue in the public digital sphere and place citizen participation at the centre.

The experiences described in the DW Akademie handbook Innovation for Dialogue: Creative Experiences for Encouraging Participation offer a model that can be easily reproduced in other contexts. They are also applicable to a variety of other processes including project evaluations.

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