Impact
Benefits & Social Impact
The benefit to the implementing partners of the project is the development of a unique methodology and a real platform which has been put to the test. Essentially this can be summed up as a net gain in "know-how" with respect to e-democracy and e-participation models and best practices worldwide.
The benefit for the City and the Region of Thessaly, the owners of the project, is increased legitimacy and an improved public image. Also, the establishment of a new mentality, since they accepted the need for increased engagement of citizens in the policy making process.
The benefit to the users, the citizens, is first and foremost the creation of a "culture of participation", especially in a country in which the dominant perception is one of "distant" politicians who do not listen or are interested enough for their constituents once they are elected. Also, society as a whole stands to benefit greatly form this project since the issue of deliberation has gained the attention of mainstream media and key opinion leaders who have embraced it as truly new and innovative. In this respect, it acts as an example, a "role model" for other projects to be developed especially in local authorities.
Finally, as a side benefit, the "Special Secretariat for Information Society" (Greece's govenment body in charge of coordinating the information society funds) stands to gain from the promotion of this example to other potential parties who are interested now to deploy similar projects, enriching thus the country's experience from e-democracy projects. In fact, experience gained from this project has already created plans for further uptake and expansion.
Quantitative: The level of participation:
The project is now entering its final phase and the overall results will have to be assessed when the project will be concluded. At the same time, it must be considered that a similar project has never been implemented in Greece before, thus there is no availability of historical or comparative data for the development of benchmarks to asses progress.
However, there are already some early indicators on which we can judge performance. These are:
-Number of citizens who have registered at the platform: 310.
-Number of citizens who participated in the first agenda setting e-poll: 195.
-Number of citizens who posted to the e-forum: 21 with 26 posts.
-Number of e-surveys submitted: 31 (ongoing currently).
-The monthly average site statistics are: 350 visits, 250 unique visitors, 1.900 page views.
These figures –although relatively small - exceeded expectations so far, considering that in the City of Trikala (with a population of 51.802 people), there are between 8.000 and 13.000 internet users out of which only between 950 and 1.550 have broadband access (figures calculated and based on official data from the “Observatory for the Information Society†eEurope/i2010 July 08 report and the “Census 2001†population data of the “Greek National Statistics Officeâ€). Assuming that broadband users are the ones most likely to use such a sophisticated platform, then we can -very roughly - estimate that 25% of them became registered users and 15% participated in one way or another.
These numbers justify our claim that the project is already an unqualified success, especially after taking into consideration the fact that it is not yet concluded and that it is a novel project for the City of Trikala and Greece as a whole, with all the constraints and problems that this entails.
Track record of sharing
Exchange and transfer:
The project was designed from its very inception with a view for scalability and replicability by other organizations and partners. All critical parts of the platform are designed to be adaptable for almost any organization wishing to deliberate widely with citizens or specific stakeholders. The methodology’s principles are largely independent of the initiating body.
In this respect, there have been discussions with other stakeholders who have expressed a strong interest in adopting the project for their own use. Naturally, the fist organizations who have expressed interest are of a similar nature, namely other cities and municipalities especially in the region. The novelty and success of the project has attracted strong local interest and there is a specific plan under way to replicate and transfer the project firstly to neighbouring cities and subsequently to other local authorities integrating all the necessary modifications and improvements which have been identified through this first application at the City of Trikala. We should note here, that the mere fact that the City of Trikala is looked upon as a role model for other cities ensures the high interest of other authorities in adopting the platform.
The medium term objective - as soon as the project concludes its present phase - is to adapt the platform for uses and a report of findings will be published which will help towards this goal. Other actors who could benefit from adapting this platform are Ministries or Parliaments for legislative related deliberation. Also, non-profit organizations of any nature or umbrella organizations of non-profits and international institutions can benefit from its adoption.
Dissemination:
e-dialogos has attracted wide interest by mass media and IT-related journals, mainly because it is the only project of its kind in the country. This was a result of spontaneous interest (which is significant factor) and also of the dissemination efforts of the team. We have opted to share our experience and lessons learnt with specific audiences abroad and the reception was always positive and warm.
Here is a list of some of the dissemination efforts on the international scene, specifically addressed to fellow e-participation theorists and practitioners.
• Presentation at the international conference “Broadband Cities 2008â€, Trikala, Greece
• Presentation at the international ICT conference “Global Forum 2008â€, Zappeion, Athens, 2008
• Presentation at the international conference “9th World e-democracy Forumâ€, Issy-les-Moulineaux, Paris, France
• CC-eGov, Case Study Interview, 2007
• Project case cited at E-Participation.net
• Project case cited at epractice, the EU supported portal on e-government and e-democracy
• Project case cited at Digital Communities Portal
• Article «An Innovative Methodological Approach to Local E-Democracy in Greece » by Christoforos Korakas, in Βοοk: «Beyond e-Government & e-Democracy : A Global Perspective» by Alan R. Shark, D.P.A. & Sylviane Toporkoff, Ph.D. executive editors
• Best practice case cited in all the official presentations by trainers of KEDKE/ITA (the official local authorities association of Greece) during the educational programme “Digital City†which trained the elected officials of local authorities all over Greece during 2008
Lessons learnt
The First lesson is the utmost need for “Legitimacyâ€, meaning the need for "pioneers" - in this case was the Mayor and the CEO of the coordinating body (e-trikala) - who will embrace the project, inspire public servants and citizens and will provide assurance that citizens’ voices will be heard.
Second lesson is that there are no ready-made transferable solutions or one-size fits all platform or methodology. There are tailor-made solutions which must take into account the local needs and restrictions (cultural, political and technical) and need the input of a wide range of experts to collaborate as one team: Software developers, social scientists, opinion poll experts, communication experts, content managers, graphic designers etc.
Third lesson is the paramount need to combine offline with online methods especially with respect to communication and marketing of the project, a task that must "educate" the owners, the users, the management team and the stakeholders of the project, considering the novelty of the project.
Award finalist 2009 
Project or service
Strategic initiative
