Democracy, as an important principle of the modern world, requires the active involvement of citizens in governance and strategic decision-making. This will ensure that a wider range of views are taken into account, taking into account the needs of all segments of society, which in turn will contribute to a balanced and informed approach to making important decisions.
on 21 March 2024, the expert event “Strengthening Democratic Processes at the Local Level in Time of War” was held , with more than 150 participants from all over Ukraine.
“War, of course, is a threat to democracy, as many rights and freedoms can be restricted. However, our task is to develop democracy by all means in order to win this war,” said Kateryna Ivanchenko , Head of the Centre for Innovations Development.
The expert event included a presentation of the results of a study on the state of participatory democracy in a full-scale war, according to which 56.4% of the surveyed citizens said they felt that interaction and cooperation between residents and local governments to address community issues during the war had increased.
“The war gives us the opportunity to use old and modernise existing participation tools,” said Anna Yemelianova, project coordinator and e-democracy expert at the Centre for Innovation Development.
One of the parts of the presentation was the presentation of an analytical dashboard that presented the main results of the study.
“Thus, more than 60% of residents said that they are familiar with draft decisions of the local council, information is published on websites, social networks, etc. At the same time, more than 60% of the local authorities surveyed also said that the opportunity to get acquainted with draft decisions was fully provided,” said Olesia Malyavina, researcher at the Centre for Innovation Development.
The event also featured a discussion of the topic “Democracy in Time of War”, namely tools for strengthening democratic processes in the territorial communities of Ukraine, in particular for effective and transparent local recovery and sustainable community development.
The panelists were: Serhiy Loboyko, Chairman of the Expert Council of the Innovation Development Centre, Mykhailo Leichenko, STO of the Innovation Development Centre, project manager of the eDem module, Maksym Nefyodov, project manager of the Big Recovery Portal, co-founder of the NGO “Technologies of Progress”, as well as experts on strategic development of the Innovation Development Centre: Oleksandra Humenna, Volodymyr Kondziolka, and Oksana Bulkot.
All thepanelists stressed the importance of ensuring transparency and community participation in the processes of making both strategic decisions and decisions on the restoration and development of their territories. Thus, the necessary conditions for participation are the involvement of citizens in governance, the preservation of the principles of transparency and openness, as well as the constant desire to strengthen democratic institutions and processes at all levels of government.
“Democracy is not only a number, but first and foremost, there must be a desire for cooperation and mutual trust, because the most important asset of a community is people and business,” said Serhiy Loboyko, chairman of the expert council of the Centre for Innovation Development.
“There should be a single platform for public participation in the reconstruction process that will combine various tools in a single process. TheeDemmodule in the ecosystem of accountable reconstruction – DREAM, which we are currently working on together with the Ministry of Recovery and the DREAM team, should become such a tool,“ said Mykhailo Leichenko, STO of the Centre for Innovations Development, project manager of the eDem module development project.
“An important part of the expert event was group work with representatives of Pidhorodnenska, Pereshchepynska, Novoodeska and Kazankivska communities. We will work together to adapt/improve local strategies, programmes, plans, and recovery/development projects based on democratic principles. The working groups included representatives of local authorities, the public, IDPs, and businesses.
Based on the results of the work in the groups, a plan of further steps to develop strategic documents for each of the communities was developed and presented.
“Thank you for organising such an event. Our project office was delighted. We already have additional ideas for using digital democracy tools,” said one of the participants.
In the future, the communities will go through a period of collecting and in-depth analysis of community data, their territorial features, strengths and weaknesses. An important part of the analysis will be the collection of proposals for inclusion in strategic documents from community residents to ensure participatory development of strategic documents.
View the speakers’ presentations and video of the event
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For reference: This event was made possible by the generous support of the American people through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The Innovation Development Centre is implementing the project “Strengthening Democratic Processes in Territorial Communities” with the support of the USAID Democratic Governance in Eastern Ukraine Project.