Thirsty trees, democratic containers and human-controlled AI cockpits: Join INVI's study tour to Berlin
You can't solve wicked problems if you never step off the hamster wheel. That's why INVI has made the study trip a ritual: Out of Denmark, into new environments - and back home with concrete tools for everyday life.
Last year we we traveled to Helsinki. This year it was Berlin. Here we met people creating solutions to everything from thirsty trees to the role of citizens in the tax debate. And while optimism about the state of democracy was strikingly low among everyone we spoke to, innovation was high. Democracy and innovation were sprouting up across the city - and there's a lot to learn from our neighboring country.
All underlined are links so you can read more.
CityLAB Berlin - When eGovernment moves to the city
CityLAB is Berlin's open innovation lab where government officials, tech developers and citizens come together to create technology that can be used in everyday life. They create solutions that make the city greener, transparent and usable, and what they all have in common is that they are close to the reality of Berliners.
CityLAB Berlin works in short, intense processes - three months at a time - and each process always ends with a concrete product. They build digital solutions to Berliners' daily challenges, and it's Berliners' experiences that set the direction for development. That's why they are involved from day one.
The goal is to create solutions that the administration and citizens can actually use in everyday life, see three cool projects here:
Water your neighborhood
Climate change - especially the dry and hot summers - is putting pressure on Berlin's ecosystem. The city's trees are drying out, suffering permanent damage and are increasingly being cut down as their lifespan shortens. Berliners value the trees and actually help turn them around, but in a disorganized way - some trees were flooded, while other trees received no water. The Gieß den Kiez project was created to change that: to join forces and turn citizens' efforts into a coordinated movement to save the city's green lungs.The result is a digital map of the city's 700,000 trees with information on species, age and water needs. Citizens can "adopt" a tree and record when they have watered it. Suddenly, the climate crisis is reduced to something tangible on the way home from work. The platform is open source, so other cities can adopt it directly.
The democratic container
Container is a rolling laboratory that can set up camp in the heart of the city. Inside is a workshop, exhibition and dialog space all in one - a place where officials, politicians and citizens can meet to test ideas and build prototypes. The container does what PowerPoints never can: It brings politics, technology and people to the streets and puts innovation into play where everyday life is lived.Google for the engine room of power
Normally, thousands of written requests to the Senate in Berlin are stored in PDF files that only the most patient officials can read. Parla turns things upside down: with the help of AI, over 11,000 documents are now made searchable and accessible to citizens, journalists and officials alike. The result? The paper piles of bureaucracy become a transparent database where you can see exactly what politicians have answered - and follow policy as it's being made. This is digitization that doesn't remove people, but gives them an overview and access to the engine room of power.
nexus Institute - citizens in the engine room
At nexus Institut, they work to make politics a process where ordinary people can have real influence on an ongoing basis. They are experts in designing citizen assemblies where a representative sample of citizens are given time, access to experts and a mandate to formulate recommendations and run many exciting projects that are about letting Berliners set the course of politics.
What they do - two projects to be inspired by
Human in Command - human cockpit for artificial intelligence
With the AI Cockpit project, nexus is working to make artificial intelligence more transparent so that it can be controlled according to ethical standards. The idea is simple but crucial: AI systems must always be controllable by humans - not only during development or acquisition, but also in daily operation. That's why nexus is currently developing a "digital cockpit" where AI systems can be monitored, tested and adjusted according to both technical and ethical criteria. The project is being developed together with companies and users in areas such as HR management, transportation and health - and the goal is an open source solution that makes it possible to maintain a true human in command when implementing artificial intelligence in society's critical functions.Municipal Climate Assemblies
With the Municipal Climate Assemblies project, nexus shows how local citizens can play a central role in the green transition of municipalities. Together with Mehr Demokratie e.V., they are developing citizen assemblies where participants are selected by lottery to ensure a broad and representative cross-section of the population. In four workshops, citizens work with experts on concrete climate solutions - and their recommendations are compiled in a citizen report that is handed over to the city council and presented publicly. In this way, climate action becomes both more democratic and better anchored locally. Once the first processes have been completed, the experiences will be translated into guidelines so that other municipalities can copy the model and establish their own climate citizen councils.Citizens at the helm of the tax debate
With the Citizens' Assembly on Fair Taxation, nexus invites Germans into a debate normally reserved for experts and officials: the tax system. A representative cross-section of the population, selected by lottery, works through the question of how taxes can be distributed more fairly. The recommendations are not just presented in a report, but unfold in a televised debate where citizens themselves take the stage and give new voices to one of the most heated discussions in German politics.
ZOE Institute for Future-Fit Economies Waving goodbye to GDP
ZOE Institute is a relatively new but significant player in European politics. They call themselves a think & do tank and their mission is clear: they want to change the economic compass. Away from GDP as the only benchmark, and towards well-being, justice and planetary boundaries. They have Kate Raworth, best known as the economist behind Doughnut Economics, on their advisory board. They translate research into concrete tools, and have developed a policy database with over 200 concrete suggestions for policy instruments that officials and politicians can use directly in their work on green transition and social justice.
Read about three of the Institute's levers here
New pathways to a good life within planetary boundaries
Models, Assessment and Policies for Sustainability (MAPS) is a project that will rethink how we design policies to reconcile human well-being with planetary limits. With a co-creative approach, new post-growth scenarios are developed, shifting the focus from economic growth to quality of life. The project builds an advanced simulation tool that can test policy packages across environmental, social and economic indicators - showing what resources are actually required to ensure a good life for all within the planet's carrying capacity.
Today, we're flying around with 117 different indicators for wellbeing, sustainability and inclusion - but with no common direction and constant battles over what to count. The MERGE project brings together a heavyweight team of European universities, think tanks and organizations - from University College London to the Wellbeing Economy Alliance - to create a common language and a usable toolkit. MERGE will deliver the indicators and frameworks that make wellbeing and sustainability measurable where it counts: in the spreadsheets, reports and planning tools that govern our society.
While MAPS develops scenarios and simulation tools to test concrete policy packages, WISE Horizons goes one step up in the helicopter: the project will unite the entire beyond growth movement in a common theoretical and practical framework that can replace GDP as a governance measure. WISE Horizons brings together some of the world's leading research communities on one mission: to create a new economic paradigm where well-being, inclusion and sustainability are at the core. The project will develop a database of indicators, new models and a common theoretical language to replace GDP with measures that actually say something about how people and the planet are doing. The ambition is to bring together the fragmented beyond growth movement and deliver the tools to make the next economic paradigm both measurable and manageable.
What else did we do?
