# Coproduction as an Approach to Technology-Mediated Citizen Participation in Emergency Management
## 3 Design Case Study: The Participative Roles of Citizens in EM
#### 3.1.3 Findings of the Empirical Studies  
These two studies made it possible to identify a number of issues that combined with other findings reported in the literature inspired the design of socio-technical systems supporting EM as a coproduction service. We can summarize such findings in three broad categoriesEMAs are aware of the necessity of integrating social networks in their daily practice. This is not a new finding; it is a need that has been consistently reported in by scholars and practitioners [23; 37]. However, the way to implement this integration taking into account the resources and protocols of EMAs is still an open question. Citizens are using social media to communicate and to create digital social capital, and professional EM workers have to be aware of all the networks and channels that have to be used to communicate important information [17]. According to [23], EMAs apply three strategies in social networks: push, if they are conceived as an additional communication channel; pull, when they are used to engage citizens in other activities like directing them to related web sites or asking them to send specific information; and networking, when they are conceived as an active bidirectional channel with different audiences, including other agencies and actors involved in the EM process. The type of strategy adopted depends on the experience emergency workers have in using social media [23], as well as on the available resources [34]. Indeed, in our first study two barriers that some participants raised were dealing with different social networks and being able to convey effective messages given the limitations of the types of messages that can be broadcasted in social networks like twitter. In any case, as discussed above and as posited by [PERSON] in her participation ladder [38] informing and consultation, which are the kind of participation supported using pull and push tactics, can be regarded as forms of tokenism, a way to give citizens the impression their opinions count but without authorities losing power and control on the situation. To have citizens working as partners in a coproduction service, higher rungs of the ladder need to be climbed, including partnership, power delegation, and citizen power. Technologies, per se, do not offer a panacea to climb the rungs, since there are many issues related with trust and reputation that need to be addressed first [1]. However, social computing is generating a digital social capital that might be integrated as a valuable asset in EM. A participatory design process involving EMAs in the exploration of scenarios and ways to exploit such assets might help to envision applications empowering both citizens and agencies. 2. **Trust and information processing are key issues to integrate citizen-generated content within EM practice**. Apart from the lack of preparation, one of the main challenges to integrate citizen-generated content to support decision-making processes in EMAs is how to process and respond to huge quantities of messages generated in a very short period of time by people who usually under the stress of experiencing a traumatic experience. As an example, [PERSON] et al. identified 6674 potential meaningful tweets out of a collection of 1,986,091 tweets for a period of six days during the Oklahoma grassfires of 2009 [6]. Another issue related with citizen-generated content is the quality of the information in order to support situational awareness and decision-making [9]. It is not only a question of trust and reputation on the information sources, it is also a question of the pertinence and technical quality of the information provided. Disasters are not events but processes that are experienced and, consequently, described in a different ways by different people [39]. Citizens are not experts in emergencies and, therefore, their judgments about the impact of an event or the need of resources might not be accurate for professionals who fear to lose efficiency, as well as control, if they depend on the information provided by citizens.