In this blog post, Carl Whistlecraft, our Working in a Modern Democracy programme lead, introduces our Democracy Conversations series. These new activities will be getting under way soon, to help us learn from our partners in the wider democracy sector.
Introducing Democracy Conversations
In recent weeks, we have been putting the final touches to an initiative we are calling Democracy Conversations. Our first Working in a Modern Democracy report was invaluable in helping us understand how our ADSO members feel that local democracy is changing, and the impact that our participants feel those changes will have on Democratic Services.
With this in mind, we committed to widen our conversations so that we can gain different perspectives from across the democracy sector. This meets a direct request from our members, to hear from people in other organisations. It also meets a strategic priority for the ADSO Board, for us to extend ADSO’s profile and build on our existing partnership working.
What we’re discussing
In essence, we are going to get some wonderful and experienced democracy folk in a virtual Zoom room and not allow them to leave until they have given us their unique take on their particular specialisms and areas of expertise. Most importantly, we’ll be finding out what this means for the future of local democracy.
We hope to ensure that the sessions are informal and conversational, but most importantly insightful, for you and for our wider democracy family. To share our learning, we will be capturing these discussions and sharing them on our website and via our social media channels. We are aiming to limit the sessions to no more than 45 mins and to bring you the highlights in bite-sized ways, in blog posts and video clips.
Our conversations will be framed in a way that is very forward looking. We will explore a variety of themes including digital tools, AI, changing citizen expectations, participatory methods and culture. All this will be set within the context of what this means for governance, decision making and the roles of officers, councillors, partners and citizens.
Who is taking part
We have already booked in eight local democracy celebrities from organisations including the New Citizen Project, the Local Government Information Unit, Test Valley Borough Council, CfGS and the Open Government Partnership. More are in the pipeline and it goes without saying that if you think that someone would be good for us to chat to, please let us know.
Contact us
If you’d like to suggest a participant for our Democracy Conversations, please email us at: info@adso.co.uk
Thank you