Idea Zaragoza - Observatory of Public Sector Innovation

Zaragoza City Council has launched a new electronic citizen participation platform with the aim of involving its citizens in public policy decisions and in the design of its services. It provides an interactive space for residents to actively contribute, strengthening the collaboration between the administration and the community, thus fostering a more inclusive and transparent management.

Innovation Summary

Innovation Overview

In recent decades, citizen participation has gained importance in the public sphere and governments have had to make room for citizen participation policies. Despite this progress, participatory processes face various challenges that require attention, such as the low number of participants, the lack of knowledge of participatory processes or the high personal cost of participating. In this scenario, Zaragoza City Council implemented Idea Zaragoza.

Idea Zaragoza is an online citizen participation platform that aims to serve as a space for communication between the public administration and the citizens of Zaragoza for the design of new public policies and services. This initiative seeks to overcome obstacles, promoting a more effective interaction between the administration and residents, thus consolidating a more inclusive and responsive approach to the needs of the community.

Idea Zaragoza is a project of the Technical Office of Transparency and Open Government of Zaragoza City Council that has been developed in collaboration with the Chair of Citizen Services Design of the University of Zaragoza. Idea Zaragoza is a project developed under the holistic and people-centred Service Design Thinking methodological approach.

The objectives of this project are:
- To create a public space for communication between citizens and the administration.
- To make political decisions and design public services in a co-creative way with citizens.
- To increase and improve citizen participation in the city.

Idea Zaragoza was launched in September 2021 with the launch of the first challenge called "Reto Salamero". Idea Zaragoza stands out for offering a variety of citizen participation processes, designed in a collaborative way with a multidisciplinary team (designers, developers, citizens, experts...). With numerous participatory processes launched, it ranges from consultations and surveys to the collection of ideas and co-creation sessions, among others.

The design of the platform seeks to enable agile, simple, convenient and intuitive participation for all citizens. To this end, it should be noted that the design complies with standards and criteria of accessibility, transparency and usability for its correct use.

As part of the commitment to continuous improvement of the platform, a study was carried out to evaluate citizen satisfaction, detect areas for improvement and search for solutions. The results of the study were very favourable, considering that more than 94.5% of the participants studied would participate again in some Idea Zaragoza process.

Innovation Description

What Makes Your Project Innovative?

Idea Zaragoza is an innovation in citizen participation processes because:

1) It is designed using the "Service Design Thinking" methodology, a holistic and people-centred approach that considers all parts of the process and all stakeholders involved in participatory processes.
2) It is a platform with a versatile, comprehensive and durable design.
3) It allows the different agents involved and users to be considered in all stages of citizen participation, from the design of the participatory processes to the co-creation of the final result.
4) It includes gamification elements to call citizens to action to participate in their participatory processes.

What is the current status of your innovation?

As of this date of submission in 2023, this project is at the stage of formative evaluation. This evaluation uses a mixed methods approach, collecting data through quantitative surveys and testing sessions and interviews with users and stakeholders.

This research has allowed us to collect information on user satisfaction with the platform, as well as to detect problems and new user demands. We are now developing new functionalities, new forms of online participation and increasing efforts for its dissemination.

Innovation Development

Collaborations & Partnerships

The "Im-pulsando Zgz frente a la Covid-19" working group, comprising politicians, citizen participation experts, civil servants, and representatives, collaborated in observing, creating, and testing the project. Zaragoza City Council departments initiated the platform, facilitated participatory processes, and promoted its awareness. Local media contributed to platform launch dissemination. Groups of citizen volunteers participated in all phases of the project's development.

Users, Stakeholders & Beneficiaries

Citizens and organisations benefit from participating in the decision-making and design of public services. They report being more satisfied by making participation more accessible and feeling included in public decision-making.
Platform managers benefit from having help with the design of the participatory processes that are launched and having more possibilities to consult citizens. They report greater speed and convenience in launching processes.

Innovation Reflections

Results, Outcomes & Impacts

We conducted a quantitative survey. 94.5% of the participants said that they would participate again in an Idea Zaragoza process. Furthermore, participants indicated that Idea Zaragoza significantly improved the problems detected in the initial study.
In general, politicians, civil servants and experts in citizen participation are satisfied with the functioning of the platform.
The number of participatory processes launched by Zaragoza City Council has increased notably during the time the platform has been in existence.

Challenges and Failures

We found some resistance to participation in Idea Zaragoza because of the distrust of participatory processes previously generated among citizens.
Some areas for improvement were identified through the interviews: the need of increasing and improving the dissemination of the platform and improving the dissemination of the results.
We are currently working on improving the platform and increasing the dissemination channels. New digital screens have been set up to present the platform. In addition, we are trying to give training and presentation talks about the platform to make citizens aware of its possibilities.

Conditions for Success

We need a government team that is involved and committed to citizen participation.
It is necessary to create multidisciplinary working groups that participate in the design and development of the proposals. The group should contain UX/UI designers, politicians, public servants and citizens.
A digital environment is needed to enable the development of the platform.

Replication

Idea Zaragoza has not currently been reproduced.
Idea Zaragoza has the potential to be replicated as it allows challenges to be designed and launched according to the needs of each context.

Lessons Learned

The launch of different participatory processes on the platform has allowed us to learn and understand the preferences of citizens, how they interact with the different functionalities and to discover which forms of participation are most successful.
It was observed that citizens preferred participatory processes that were not too long in time, with few phases and interactions.
It was observed that citizens engaged with processes depending on their area of influence and affect; and that processes with "more complicated" issues resulted in fewer participants.

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