CivicLab methodology Toolkit
Creators: name: Коваленко, Олексій
name: Коваленко, Олексій
Publisher: name: Division of Elections and Participatory Democracy Council of Europe Expert
Year: 2022
Subjects: management, strategy, strategic management, digital transformation, strategic planning, digital democracy, decision-making, data-driven decisions, public participation, non-profit organization, public organization, project management, digitalization, outcome forecasting

description: Participatory decision-making processes are increasingly relevant in the local context. They strengthen the trust of citizens in politics and elected representatives, and increase their acceptance of decisions, as these are decided jointly.The specific format of the participatory process determines the outcome. Are the participants representatives of the problem at hand? Do all affected persons, including those from disadvantaged groups, have the opportunity to participate? Is the process understandable and clear? Can the effects of possible decision options be considered in the process?This tool is offers an innovative methodology for representative selection of participants, as well as a digital component for developing, analysing and predicting the impact of decision options. The CivicLab methodology can be used in both on-site and online formats and can be adapted to the needs of specific audiences and to the issue at hand. It incorporates the Council of Europe’s standards for citizen participation in decision making and demonstrates their implementation through successful examples in the development of national strategies, proposals for action plans, regulations, local programmes, draft laws, and so forth.The document contains many references to the Ukrainian context, as well as best practice examples from Ukraine, as it was initially developed in the context of the Council  of Europe co-operation project, "Promoting civil participation in democratic decision making in Ukraine". But the tool can also be applied and adjusted to every local and  national context and used in all Council of Europe member states.

Content and logic of this document

Chapter 1 explains the issues of participation in the development and adoption of quality and effective decisions and helps directly combine the tool and methodology with the useful, relevant, sustainable, owned (URSO) paradigm (see Chapter 1). This chapter is useful for authorities and non-governmental organisations in understanding how measures to improve the quality of developing decision options are correlated with strategic directions, goals and objectives in their daily work.

Chapter 2 presents a description of the CivicLab methodology, its purpose and objectives, explains the innovativeness of the methodology, demonstrates the structure of the digital component as part of the methodology and explains the conditions for its application

Chapter 3 outlines the principles of digitisation of activities using the digital component of analysis and forecasting. It explains in an accessible way how the methodology, the digital component and the matrix actually work, and demonstrates options for the use of the methodology by public authorities and the public at various levels of development and decision making, including the terms of regulations and tools for civil participation.

Chapter 4 describes the standards for using the CivicLab methodology, which regulate the sequence of steps and rules of its use in order to organise the process of developing proposals for effective decisions at the appropriate level. It also describes the evaluation indicators that have been developed to ensure compliancewith the methodology standard.

Chapter 5 provides useful and practical information, describing the results of the developed proposals, listing possible digital matrices and describing the application of the digital component. The chapters are followed by good practices examples using the CivicLab methodology in different contexts, a bibliography and a glossary of useful terms.