If you’re hanging around Westminster between 7 and 17 July, pop into Westminster Hall to check out what sounds like a fun exhibition. The Royal Institution of British Architects have run a competition for schools to design a new Houses of Parliament. The nine shortlisted entries will be on display in the oldest part of [...]
Posts under ‘Democratic renewal’
Political Innovation Camp at Reboot Britain
I thought I’d offer you a bit of an outline of the PICamp (Political Innovation Camp) strands that are making up part of NESTA’s Reboot Britain event next week. You’ll see that the sessions that are planned reflect a lot of the issues that come up on this blog regularly. We’re offering these because we [...]
A few signposts off
We can learn things from the way they elect Popes – and the way they used to. Chris Dillow reprises his ‘extremist not a fanatic’ theme – that it is rational not to care too much about politics – and that politics benefits from our indifference. And finally ‘Reboot Britain’ will be worth keeping an [...]
Maybe now is the time
Here’s New Start‘s Clare Goff on the demise of the community empowerment bill (via Julian Dobson): ‘Maybe now is the time for fresh ideas to revive the collective voice and rebuild politics from the grassroots up.’ Absolutely right. Quick thoughts on the democratic turmoil, starting with three angles on those expenses: Some people (including one [...]
Reductio ad absurdum
Continuing Brendan O’Neill’s theme about the reduction of politics to the question of how efficiently politicians can tick the ‘democracy’ box, Simon Jenkins picks up on the calls for fewer MPs and councillors: “The difference is that most democracies have many tiers of representation on which voters can vent their rage. The Germans run almost [...]
Steady state on citizenship stats
The England Citizenship Survey for April – December 2008 was published the other day by CLG (pdf, Excel data). Overall, despite the onset of the financial crisis, attitudes to and participation in politics don’t seem to have changed much. A few headlines: Only one fifth of people (22%) feel that they can influence decisions taken [...]
Reinventing democracy
At the start of May, there’s a forum on the future of democracy taking place in Grenoble. Sounds like a fascinating event, although on the academic rather than practical end of the conference spectrum. Pierre Rosanvallon, Professor at the College de France, has written an explanatory article for (of course) Le Monde, which is well [...]
Innovating on the cheap for better democracy
When it comes to technology start-ups there’s a nine out of ten chance that the idea will fail. Far from being considered a problem it’s recognised that doing something different is a risky strategy. But it is also one that can lead to enormous rewards if you get it right. True failure only happens when [...]
EU citizens trust local government
The European Union’s Committee of the Regions has published a new Eurobarometer survey looking at the impact of local and regional government in the EU. The survey shows that local government is the most trusted tier of government in the EU (50% trust), with the EU itself second (47%) and national governments some way behind [...]
How local government and the public sector disincentivise social innovation
The reason that there is such a wide-ranging debate about what democracy is, and how it is likely to change in the coming years, is in no small part, down to the fact that technology is making new things possible. The technical infrastructure available to us is changing, and creative minds are being applied to [...]
