Democratic Innovation
Our Democracies are facing complex challenges; engagement is plummeting, faith in institutions is at an all time low, and social cohesion is stretched to it's breaking point. But there are solutions to all of these; and they lie in our communities.
Future of Democracy
Engagement in the current system might be low - but the energy people have to improve and evolve this system is through the roof; we just need to create more opportunities to imagine and create the future we want to see.
Alongside Max Rashbrooke, Kassie Hartendorp, and Nīkau Wi Neera, I ran a panel + workshop designed to help attendees think about what's missing from the current system, and how we can create a more participatory future.
A new kind of Election Debate
For the 2023 General Election, we wanted to see some proper kōrero from our candidates.- and we didn't think the debates were doing a great job. For the most part, you heard the same talking points from the same people, learning nothing new - especially given how high-level all the policies were. We wanted to change that - so we tweaked the standard panel debate model a bit.
To ensure our candidates could go deep into an issue without fear of leaving the audience behind, we primed our attendees with critical stats and figure on four key topics before grilling our candidates on them - focusing our time on issues that hadn't received enough air-time, like refugee resettlement, food sustainability, and yes - democratic innovation. By the end, both the audience and candidates agreed this was one of the best debates they'd attended.
The start of this journey was made possible by
