By George Bolton, University of Southampton Participedia provides a unique hub, a community of individuals and organizations working for the benefit of democracies across the world. The persistent and complex problems that the Participedia community is seeking to address require collaborations that draw on multiple perspectives and skills. This is…

Are you wondering what we will be exploring at our Radical Democracy Summer School? This Q&A with Research Assistant Etienne Cardin-Trudeau is an inside look at some of the big ideas and questions that we will be reading and talking about. Etienne has been working with the Participedia/SFU planning team…

Registration is now open for our Radical Democracy Summer School, co-hosted with Simon Fraser University, Community Engaged Research Initiative (CERi) in beautiful Vancouver, Canada! Join us for an action packed week of workshops, guest lectures, field trips, shared meals and creative, collaborative group work. Register today for the entire course…

What’s new with Participedia’s six research clusters? Download the full report to find out! Phase 2 of the Participedia project has brought some exciting developments, and collaborative projects are starting to take shape among our six research clusters. …

Introducing #JustParticipation, a student-led podcast about democratic participation and innovation around the world. — Produced by a team of student research assistants at McMaster University, the #JustParticipation podcast explores the stories of diverse research and practitioner experiences from within the Participedia community and beyond. Our first season places a thematic spotlight on the use of social media to advance democracy in the digital age…

A wave of innovation has been unfolding over the last 18 months, but many governments are not taking advantage. The problem: The pandemic has intensified the challenges that democracies around the world were already facing: how to meet the rapidly changing expectations of citizens. Why it matters: Trust between institutions…

Three major trends, each involving both an escalating crisis and a corresponding set of responses, are inspiring new innovations in democracy. The problem: People today have different expectations and capacities than their predecessors of a generation ago, yet in many places, the options for engaging with government have not evolved…

Around the world, democratic innovations help societies address the historical legacy of racial injustice. The problem: Many societies have a deeply painful legacy of race-based injustice, which negatively affects its capacity to address the impact of that legacy and so undermines the present and future of that society. Why it…

The field of deliberative and participatory democracy has developed strong ideals of inclusion and equality. Yet these ideals have mostly been developed from a Western-centric angle. What does democracy beyond the West look like? What can be learned from democratic practices around the world? …