Technology for Citizen Engagement
Democracy is a form of government that is of the people, by the people and for the people. This essentially ensures that the leadership is appointed by the people, and that it is responsible and accountable to them. Actively engaging with the public while making decisions that specifically influence them is one way to ensure responsibility and openness. Seamless citizen engagement is the need for the hour as the pandemic has disrupted everyday lives and people are worried about the future. With technology authorities and politicians can reach out to the public and connect with them on a personal level.
Revamping Citizen Communication with Beacon Technology
Since its launch by Apple in 2013, beacon technology has advanced dramatically, and it is anticipated to remain so. The demand for beacon technology is expected to exceed $25 billion by 2024. It's fair to conclude that the platform has a lot of success and will play an important role in marketing in the coming years. Beacons link and relay information to mobile devices allowing location-based discovery and engagement simpler and more reliable. So, if a citizen were to walk into an developing facility, they would receive an alert on when the facility would be completed and what features it holds.
Improved Offline Attribution with Google Ads
Through linking your beacon's signals to your Google Ads account, you can get a lot of valuable information about your searchers' offline behaviour and even monitoring in-store visits.
Out-of-Store Marketing
Every relevant information that you want your prospective clients to know can be sent directly to any responsive system within the scope of your beacon. Campaigners themselves will also use the in-store beacons to drive individual product promotions.
Advanced Data Gathering
You can also help with your Google My Company listing by adding a beacon in your business. The beacon itself will track your company's common visit times by enhancing the accuracy displayed in the GMB page.
Customer Benefits
Beacons aim to enhance the customer experience by providing an extra element of personalised engagement during the buying experience. Targeted advertisements and promotions from their favourite brands create loyalty, comfort, and familiarity.
Ensuring Positive Citizen Engagement with Social Scoring Systems
Almost a year ago, it was determined that, after several heated debates focusing on the social implications of Twitter and Facebook, it was time to take a step back and consider how technology is affecting citizen engagement with policymakers now and in the future.
After all, it's simple to be influenced by the resources and perspectives that we're familiar with, which a vast amount of politically engaged people are subjected to on a regular basis on social networking sites. Institutional changes and individual innovation have expanded the number and diversity of contact points that citizens can use to affect policy results. The extension of citizens' expertise and resources often encourages more individuals to join in these more demanding ways of engagement. There has been increased direct communication with government figures. More citizens join public interest organisations, political associations and other modes of action.
Political Consumerism
People also developed modern techniques of political action, such as political consumerism, new modes of divisive behaviour and artistic advocacy. The Internet facilitates new methods of peer-to-peer interaction among people who hold political values and want to be involved. The false news arms race will escalate in the future; social scoring systems, such as those used in China, will become the rule in many places; and we expect that social media legislation will alter the face of democratic discourse as we have experienced it in the twenty-first century.
4 Emerging Trends in Citizen Engagement Technology
1. Multichannel Approach
Using the internet to engage citizens draws far more people than any other tool. Many local councils, for example, find it impossible to reach out to young people due to their insufficient time to engage with their administration. Lawmakers and CIOs should aim for a cohesive interconnected communication paradigm that integrates new tools (such as citizen engagement networks and social media channels) with far more conventional methodologies to theoretically strengthen the scope and breadth of citizen engagement (such as focus groups and town hall meetings).
2. Personalized Interface
Providing people with an interface – such as a smartphone app or a web portal – that allows them to select which issues they want to be kept updated about increases the importance to them. In this era with small attention spans, significance by personalization is the holy grail. Giving preference to all subjects that are nearest to their homes is another way to have more importance.
3. Citizen Engagement Trends
More policymakers are introducing community participation dashboards, which enable them to obtain insights into their citizens' views from publicly accessible data sources. Using data mining, one can quickly segment the voices of various citizen groups instead of speaking about "the voice of the citizen." This is important for bringing value to the city's decision-making processes and it allows you to better appreciate how to implement a more equitable public agenda that considers all interests.
4. Open Data
Open data is used to improve political participation. Indeed, open data empowers people to take action on their own and encourages them to work with their city to enhance public services. People may, for example, use accessibility data to develop cycling programmes or crime data to develop effective collective safety initiatives.
Need for Technology in Citizen Engagement
There is already a stronger consensus that public participation and citizen engagement are the foundations for good governance and e-government is a core element of successful governance. Moreover, as the government discusses the passage of the Electronic Delivery of Services Law, the prospect of e-Government initiatives being ubiquitous in all fields of public services is gradually becoming a reality. It is a fundamental change in the implementation of public and critical services from person to technology-based frameworks. The use of a web application for the provision of services presents many challenges, including those associated with the management of transition from a human interface to a technology interface. The use of a technology interface for service delivery poses a variety of concerns, including transition management from a human interface to a technology interface, technology acceptance, unequal access to those services, and so on.
Challenges of Technology in Citizen Engagement
- Limited Trust in the Government: In general, public confidence in government activities is poor for a variety of reasons, including failure to keep promises made publicly, perceptions of high corruption and nepotism, and failure to consider citizen input on growth priorities, among others. There is also doubt about the purpose for promoting engagement.
- Political Reluctance: Public engagement is fundamentally a democratic mechanism that is often not formalised or organised. As a result, many people are hesitant to join.
- Lack of Commitment: Engagement in policy and legislation systems is a time-consuming mechanism that often necessitates people making long-term sacrifices in time and other commitments. These are normally limited, restricting the form and length of participation.
- Exclusion: Consultative mechanisms can also be used as a means of justifying the perception of the power elite. Additionally, the nature of participation like time, place, process of inclusion, language, etc. This can also result in the omission of the most vulnerable and marginalized populations.