Brussels, Belgium November 16, 2010 by Konrad Dwojak Junior Project Coordinator POLITECH INSTITUTE ePractice Workshop: Public Services 2.0 WAVE & eMPOWER: eParticipation Case Studies for Public Services 2.0 POLITECH INSTITUTE European Center of Political Technologies

What is WAVE?  WAVE - Welcoming Argument Visualization to Europe  Targets cross-border discussions on drafted and implemented EU environmental legislation on climate change  feedbacks its results to MEPs and MPs affiliated with the Project to ultimately join up with and inform the national governments of the three trial sites - UK, France and Lithuania Bottom-up approach  6576 users  Public Services Brussels, Belgium - November 16,

WAVE’s Features  WAVE has implemented DebateGraph's mapping tool to visualize and facilitate opinions on complex legislation Rate ideas/comments Influence the impact/importance of others’ comments Discussion features within a map (Stream)  Groups Create and share a group on a particular topic Develop a map on a specific topic Interact with group members  Events  Polls  Map Public Services Brussels, Belgium - November 16,

What is eMPOWER?  Aims to motivate and strengthen the involvement of NGOs and citizens in the decision-making process on environmental issues at a National and European levels  Portugal  Italy  Greece  ePetitioning platform in 4 languages  Gathers evidence in order to provide input to decision-makers and make them view policy from the public perspective  Bottom-up approach  Acts as a stimulus for citizens’ involvement and empowerment  Public Services Brussels, Belgium - November 16,

eMPOWER’s Features  ePetitioning System Different levels of registration/signatures tested Feedback from the users  Sharing Views by the users Blogs Forum  Groups Public Services Brussels, Belgium - November 16,

Conclusions  Service Supply vs. Service Demand Important & ‘hot’ topics/issues are not always in public ‘demand’  The importance of well-developed tools  Easy to use  Minimum # of errors in the final version  Simple registration process  Make it clear to the citizens that a tool plays a direct impact on decisions of policy-makers and policies  Involve key politicians/policy-makers  Interactivity/Web 2.0 features  Marketing, dissemination, PR  Treat like a commercial product Public Services Brussels, Belgium - November 16,

7 THANK YOU! Konrad DWOJAK POLITECH INSTITUTE European Center of Political Technologies Address: Saint Bernard, 67 – Brussels B-1060 – Belgium – website: Public Services Brussels, Belgium - November 16, 2010