THE ICELANDIC EXPERIMENTS IN DIGITAL DEMOCRACY & CIVIC TECH: 5 LESSONS FOR KENYA TOMORROW (PART I)
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Disclaimer: This article was written in 2016. Its content then does not represent the reality now. Please keep the 2016 context in mind as you read this 2 part series. In addition, the views or opinions of the author on a number of issues in 2016 may not hold true in 2021.
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Decades of concern over a rise in political apathy and citizen disengagement from politics and public affairs has led to many initiatives in nations in both the Global North and South, (such as Iceland and Kenya respectively) to foster higher levels of civic engagement and political participation. During this time, the promise from advances in information and communication technologies (ICTs) has generated optimistic expectations of more politically engaged publics[1]. Herald digital democracy and civic tech.
We recognize the fact that civic engagement involves the processes, spaces and capacities/capabilities for citizens and other stakeholders to exercise their right and duty to engage in governance and decision making processes.
Part 1 looks at how Iceland conducted one of the foremost innovative civic engagement and digital democracy experiments yet — an attempted crowd-sourced constitution. It ends with an introduction to the Kenyan context by juxtaposing the precipitating factors that led to the two nations embracing a ‘digital democracy’ paradigm.
Part 2 gives a history of Kenya’s own journey into the digital democracy arena, explores areas to improve upon to facilitate tech-driven democratic participation, and makes recommendations for reform. The combined lessons learned from Kenya and Iceland should serve as examples on how others can design and implement e-democracy and civic tech projects that, first, enrich the overall consultation and participation process; second, expand existing and create additional spaces for participation; and lastly, enhance capabilities of various stakeholders to effectively participate in and influence the affairs of their government and communities.
A History: From Athens to the Þingvellir:
It is now so well known that the Greek root of the word democracy is literally “power of the people[2]”, that we oft take it for granted. Some 2,500 years ago the ancient Athenian state rose to unprecedented political and economic power by giving its citizens a direct voice and an active role in civic governance. The city’s uniquely participatory system of democracy (for its time), helped unleash the creativity and essence of the Athenian people and channel it in ways that produced the greatest good for the society as a whole. Importantly, the system grew organically from Athenians’ own needs, beliefs and actions: it was as much a spirit of governance as a set of rules and laws.
Democratic participation is a concept as old as humanity itself. Whether formally enshrined in documents such as the Magna Carta or the Napoleonic Code, or manifested informally at local levels, the concept of citizen participation is thoroughly global. Kin-based societies from East Africa to the Amazonian rainforest have traditionally made decisions by consensus and persuasion rather than by top-down diktat.
Iceland has been recognized for being a forerunner in democratic representation. Þingvellir was established in 930 AD and was the site at which Alþingi (or Althing derived from ‘a thing’) sessions were held right up to 1798. A thing was “a form of governing assembly found in Germanic societies, and a tradition that endures to this day in one form or another across Northern Europe”[3].
The rise of Digital Democracy, E-government and Civic Tech:
Fast forward to the 21st Century. Here we see the swift propagation of ICTs, and their utility in providing solutions to a range of governance and development challenges. The transformation is characterized by a commitment by many governments towards openness, transparency and inclusivity; and a corresponding clamour by citizens to play an active role by wielding their sovereign ‘citizen power’ as co-partners in the governance process, thereby maximizing their role in the management of public affairs.
The following section looks at an innovative form of leader-citizen | citizen-leader engagement. Information dissemination and service delivery often dominate government ICT use (falling within the ambit of e-government, rather than e-democracy) as these practices offer governments the greatest chance for leapfrogging traditional approaches to bring about economic gains through financial savings, and enhanced efficiency; rather than employing their use to aid the effectiveness of democratic processes.
According to the Council of Europe[4], e-democracy, as the support and enhancement of democracy, democratic institutions and democratic processes by means of technology, has as its main objective the electronic support of democracy. The 2009 recommendation[5] adds that digital democracy, aka e-democracy “is closely linked to good governance, which is the efficient, effective, participatory, transparent and accountable democratic exercise of power in electronic form.” Simply put, e-democracy leverages information technologies to bring about increased meaningful government-citizen engagement with transparency, accountability and participation at its core. While e-government — driven and enabled by the same technology — seeks to make a government’s operations more effective and efficient through digitization or digitalization.
There is nowadays increasing recognition of the potential value-add of soliciting voluntary public input, or crowd-sourcing, into political decision-making to enable collaborative democracy according to Brabham, 2008, 2009; Hilgers & Ihl, 2010; and Koch, Füller & Brunswicker, 2011), such as those which provide contexts for engagement and drawing upon civic insight can enable more informed government decision-making[6].
A chronicle of events:
A prime example of decussation of the request for, and provision of input resulting in a novel two-way process is Iceland’s crowd-sourced constitution.
In September 2008, Lehman Brothers filed for Chapter 11, and the ensuing economic crisis was the shot heard ‘round the world. The worst since the Great Depression. Iceland was the country hit hardest by its devastating effects: its three commercial banks collapsed, owing in equal part to politicians and bankers. Politicians gave the banking sector too much free rein when it privatized the sector, and the bankers went to town — resulting in crushing debt. On hearing the news, citizens rushed to their banks to withdraw their savings, only to find the coffers empty. Adding insult to injury, rumours swirled that that the supermarkets would run out of food. The unemployment rate rose, the Króna dropped, stocks plummeted. Discontent rapidly became outrage which in turn led to the ‘Pots and Pans Revolution’ — crowds of 2,000 from a population of 320,000 held extensive and rather noisy civil protests to the doors of Alþingi (its Parliament), other public buildings, and of course, the banks. Citizens disgruntled by the alleged corruption demanded a fresh governance model, constitutional reform — an Iceland 2.0.
It was widely felt by Icelanders that this would usher in a new era, and a clean break from the past. Elections took place a few months later. The nation’s citizens demanded accountability. Geir Haarde, the premier at the time, was found to be guilty of failure/refusal and/or neglect to hold special cabinet meetings to address a crisis that was clearly looming. Prosecutions of bankers followed. Two national referenda (Icesave) on deposit guarantees were held to decide on the fate of foreign debtors’ owed monies.
Yet there lingered a deficit of trust. In the face of this, what better way for a new government to garner buy-in and credibility than to have its people — the ultimate sovereign — have a say in what goes into their constitution? It was slated to be one of the two: either “a shining example for the democracies of the world, or a sham pseudo-revolution designed by amateurs to upset a rickety apple-cart only now righting itself”[7]. The answer will present itself after a description of the process.
The Icelandic Crowd-sourced Constitution(al Bill):
Shunning convention and custom, Iceland’s government turned to the public and invited an impressive cross-section of close to 1,000 members of society to participate, and gave them free rein to brainstorm and articulate what they felt ought to be prioritized in the constitutional process. For the purpose of context, one pundit penned his thoughts on this thus: the constitutions of existing states, including democratic ones, have usually been written by small, rather unrepresentative subsets of individuals. Solon is supposed to have single-handedly laid out the foundations of democratic Athens. The U.S. Constitution was penned by a few dozen white men. More recent examples of constitutional processes involve the usual elites: professional politicians and state bureaucrats[8].
This was the first phase, known as the National Forum. Thereafter in 2010, a Constitutional Council of drafters, once again regular citizens from diverse walks of life, were elected by the public to draft a constitutional Bill which would later be presented to the larger public in a referendum, and finally to Alþingi for final approval. At this point, if the novelty of non-professional, non-expert drafters had worn off, the Council solicited, through social media and crowdsourcing techniques, key concepts they wanted reflected in the new constitution.
Every week for approximately four months, the Council posted a draft clause on its website which allowed the Icelandic population to comment, join discussions on the Council’s Facebook page and Twitter profile, or submit their views via written letter. Members of the Constitutional Council posted videos on YouTube and used Flickr to show photos of the Council at work. Council meetings were open to the public and streamed live via the website and Facebook page. The traditional letter method was nonetheless still the most commonly used form of public participation during the process, numbering 3,600 responses in contrast to the 370 comments posted on the Council’s website (Stjórnlagaráð, 2011)[9]. Thereafter, a non-binding referendum was conducted.
In the autumn of 2012, six questions on a range of issues were posed to the people of Iceland, and of the 49% of the electorate who participated in the plebiscite, 66% answered in the affirmative on whether they wanted a new constitution. This signaled a recall of citizen power from the hands of politicians and elites who had caused the country’s mortgage crisis and the ensuing austerity measures, and it was hoped that this would be a demand that the latter could not refuse. On the contrary. Like most constitutions, the entrenchment provisions therein were strict, if not more so. Iceland’s supreme law required that a constitutional amendment bill be passed by two separate parliaments, sandwiching a presidential election: an unapologetically hard-nosed check and balance on an executive and legislature if there ever was one. Procedural sine qua non aside, the faction with the most sway, the Independent Party, did not support the process. The people’s constitution was not enacted by Alþingi, and since the 2013 election took place, it looks unlikely to be revived.
Despite the rather anticlimactic turn that the crowd-sourced constitution (bill) took, this was in no way the end to the story that is Iceland’s experiment in digital democracy and civic tech. Nor was it the beginning. In fact, the economic crisis weathered by the Nordic Island nation birthed a host of successful and sustainable digital democracy initiatives. Part 2 will look at a sample of these projects, draw out lessons and best practices, and give recommendations for Kenya — the Silicon Savannah — tomorrow.
But first, a comparative history.
A Tale of Two Countries — Iceland and Kenya:
To thaw the tense relations between the rulers and the ruled in Iceland, the government attempted to restore legitimacy and credibility, garner the people’s buy-in and build trust and faith in their leadership. They sought to do so by re-establishing the centrality of the people as the true sovereign by inviting and incorporating their input in constitution-making. This would reflect the change in the nation’s zeitgeist, and the new grundnorm would document the transformation by re-writing the social contract, and more crucially, limit governmental powers.
There are a few similarities between the situations in Kenya and Iceland during the late 2000s and early 2010s. Parallels can be drawn between citizens of both countries who equally demonstrated a lack of trust and dissatisfaction with the way politicians prioritized others’ (moreso their own) needs above the taxpayers’. Low government approval ratings, creative protests by a disgruntled citizenry, widespread corruption, poorly managed exploitation of natural resources, opaqueness of public finance administration and a banking sector on the brink. Other causes for social unrest and nonviolent resistance were caused by the revelation of governments actual role in encouraging (and/or failing to stamp out) state capture and corruption.
Said distrust at times resulted in protests. One example can be found just after Kenyan members of parliament sought to increase their pay. Citizens mobilized by civil society activists hauled pigs (to signify greed as they were already among the highest paid in the world) with some complicit MPs names painted on their torsos to the gates of its parliament in Nairobi in a protest known as ‘Occupy Parliament’. The pigs lapped blood to signify that they were “bleeding the country dry”.
But more significantly, Kenya embarked on and completed a constitutional review process which was promulgated in August, 2010 after a referendum. Even with this in place, Kenya too could benefit from implementing the people-centred governance model envisaged by the constitution’s foremost clause. Article 1 of the constitution provides that “all sovereign power belongs to the people of Kenya” and that “the people may exercise power either directly or through their democratically elected representatives” at both national and county level.
N.B. The content above provides a solid introduction and background information and insights. Part II will identify some gaps and weak points that Kenya should work on, highlight the best practices from digital democracy and civic tech in Iceland, and enumerate what lessons Kenyan stakeholders can apply so as to create an environment conducive for effective tech-driven civic engagement.
[1] http://pa.oxfordjournals.org/content/59/2/299.extract
[2] from dēmos ‘the people’ + -kratia ‘power, rule.’
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%9Eingvellir
[4] https://www.coe.int/t/dgap/democracy/Activities/GGIS/CAHDE/2009/RecCM2009_1_and_Accomp_Docs/6647-0-ID8289-Recommendation%20on%20electronic%20democracy.pdf
[5] Recommendation CM/Rec(2009)1 and explanatory memorandum
[6] Aurigi, 2005; Couldry, Livingstone & Markham, 2007 as quoted in Julie Freeman and Sharna Quirke. 2013. Understanding E-Democracy. JeDEM 5(2).
[7] http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/10/23/constitutional-changes-in-iceland/
[8]http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2014/07/five_lessons_from_iceland_s_failed_crowdsourced_constitution_experiment.html
[9] Julie Freeman and Sharna Quirke. 2013. Understanding E-Democracy. JeDEM 5(2).
