Papers by Cyril Velikanov
Public administration and information technology, 2017
In this Part II of the present Chapter, we describe the stages (or phases), mechanisms and proced... more In this Part II of the present Chapter, we describe the stages (or phases), mechanisms and procedures of a MOD process, in accordance with the requirements set forth in Section “ MOD Paradigm Versus Deliberative Polling” of Part I. Our task is to provide an MOD blueprint for an ICT-based MOD platform that almost immediately lends itself to system implementation. As in Part I, we use the neologism deliberandum to refer to a given instance of mass online deliberation, that is, to a process of deliberating online within a given community, on a given issue, and within a given period of time.
Public administration and information technology, 2017
In this Part II of the present Chapter, we describe the stages (or phases), mechanisms and proced... more In this Part II of the present Chapter, we describe the stages (or phases), mechanisms and procedures of a MOD process, in accordance with the requirements set forth in Section “ MOD Paradigm Versus Deliberative Polling” of Part I. Our task is to provide an MOD blueprint for an ICT-based MOD platform that almost immediately lends itself to system implementation. As in Part I, we use the neologism deliberandum to refer to a given instance of mass online deliberation, that is, to a process of deliberating online within a given community, on a given issue, and within a given period of time.
International Conference on Digital Government Research, May 17, 2010
... Cyril Velikanov Moscow MEMORIAL Society Malyi Karetnyi Pereulok 12, Moscow 127051 Russia +7 9... more ... Cyril Velikanov Moscow MEMORIAL Society Malyi Karetnyi Pereulok 12, Moscow 127051 Russia +7 916 682 30 82 [email protected] ... In their analytical paper [1] prepared after several years of operating the project on a country-scale (the Estonian TOM project), they ...
Can we ever build a practically implementable model of governance that combines normative qualiti... more Can we ever build a practically implementable model of governance that combines normative qualities of universal suffrage in the classical representative and direct democracy models with epistemic qualities of presumably elitist open deliberation? Can we make more inclusive the deliberative model itself? If we arrive at building such a model, this would be an important step towards a better democratic governance. I propose a model, which I call "Direct Deliberative Democracy" (abbr. "D3"), and which is expected to bring a positive answer to the above question. D3 is based on three main concepts: (A) Mass Online Deliberation (MOD) with its procedural framework, already presented in a number of my conference papers and in two co-authored book chapters; (B) "argumentative facilitation", which consists in assisting the least prepared citizens in formulating better arguments within a deliberation on an issue of their concern; and (C) "implicit voting", which consists in algorithmically aggregating the non-participants' values, interests and preferences into the decision-making process, in a way deemed epistemically better than the classical "explicit" voting. To put these basic concepts into practice, we need a set of procedures governing participants' actions and interactions, and an interactive IT system to implement and enforce those procedures. For MOD (Part A above), both the concept and the procedural framework are already well elaborated. The concept of argumentative facilitation (Part B) has been presented in one of my 2017 papers, and the work on the appropriate procedural framework is under way. The concept of implicit voting (Part C) is introduced in this paper for the first time; I am not expecting its large immediate acceptance, because it puts into question the understanding of universal suffrage in today's democracies as an explicit and discretionary expression of everyone's will.
Central and Eastern European eDem and eGov days, Mar 1, 2018
eParticipation projects often comprise deliberation among participants, where proposals are colle... more eParticipation projects often comprise deliberation among participants, where proposals are collected, discussed and rated to be processed in further stages of the eParticipation. In the case of large-scale audiences, this initial stage involves mass-online deliberation (MOD), which has to cope with a potentially very large number of proposals advanced by the participants. To enable clustering, MOD rely on human-(i.e. participant)-based appraisals of proposals given in the course of the participation project. Based on these appraisals, this contribution then proposes a clustering algorithm that makes use of the whole set of the above individual ratings. (Dis-)approval ratings are first weighted by the indication of clarity, that is, the higher the clarity rating assigned by a person, the higher the weight with which the (dis)approval rating will enter the clustering.
In a series of our earlier papers [1-4] we have developed a concept and a model of large-scale on... more In a series of our earlier papers [1-4] we have developed a concept and a model of large-scale online deliberation, which could accommodate any number of participants who deliberate on a given issue altogether as one undivided body, in one common "virtual room", rather than divided into several small groups. This approach indeed requires a rather specific procedural framework, and an ICT-system to support and enforce those procedures. It provides for a meaningful participation of any size, open to any citizen in a given constituency, therefore preserving their equal political rights. Rights, however, do not imply capabilities; a person may be authorized to do something, but not being able of doing that thing. Both the representative model and the referendum-based direct model of democratic governance provide every citizen with a very basic right---that of casting their vote. This basic right is indeed inclusive, for, the act of voting can be performed even by the least prepared and least capable person; yet, one can ask how meaningful is the act of such an unprepared vote. The deliberative model, in contrast, is rather demanding; it requires from those who decide to participate in a deliberation a high level of factual preparedness and of argumentative and rhetoric capabilities. It is somehow elitist, in comparison with e.g. the representative model. A question therefore remains---can we make our deliberative model inclusive, and what this inclusiveness should mean with regard to different levels of personal capabilities? In this paper, we are trying to answer these two questions. We discuss and compare various causes of non-participation, and also various levels of involvement in a deliberative participation. We argue that, regarding such a demanding activity as is political deliberation, trying to achieve equal and uniform inclusion makes no sense. Instead, inclusiveness should be understood as providing every individual with as much possibilities and help, as he/she is capable and willing to make use of. Providing help to those who are willing to deliberate (on a given issue) but are not capable enough is indeed a much more difficult task than simply providing everybody with equal procedural possibilities. To this end, we introduce a mechanism of argumentative facilitation, through a voluntary aid, brought by more (rhetorically and argumentatively)capable participants to their less capable peers. We expect that our method will provide not only for increased inclusiveness of participation in online deliberation, but also for complementing online deliberation by expanding it offline at the "last mile", with small face-to-face groups connected to the main online community through one or more group facilitators, or coaches.
Communications in computer and information science, 2018
In this paper, I introduce and discuss a new model of governance, in which epistemic qualities of... more In this paper, I introduce and discuss a new model of governance, in which epistemic qualities of intrinsically elitist open deliberation are combined with normative qualities of aggregative democracy based on universal suffrage. In our model, these two approaches, typically considered as opposite to each other, are combined in a quite natural way. Namely, the process of deliberative policy-making in a community is open to every its member who is willing to participate (the “active” ones); while all others (the “lazy” ones) are provided with the possibility of either to cast their informed vote, or, at the end, to delegate their voting right to the whole community, through an IT system enforcing appropriate procedures and performing appropriate algorithms. Practical implementation of our model will be made possible through a combined use of (1) a procedural framework for Mass common Online Deliberation (MOD), which had been described in detail in our past papers; (2) an appropriately designed Computer-Assisted Argumentation (CAA) system; and (3) a system for collecting and taking into account individual preferences of every “lazy” citizen, in a way similar to the so-called Voting Advice Application (VAA) systems.
Public Administration and Information Technology, 2017
In this Part II of the present Chapter, we describe the stages (or phases), mechanisms and proced... more In this Part II of the present Chapter, we describe the stages (or phases), mechanisms and procedures of a MOD process, in accordance with the requirements set forth in Section “ MOD Paradigm Versus Deliberative Polling” of Part I. Our task is to provide an MOD blueprint for an ICT-based MOD platform that almost immediately lends itself to system implementation. As in Part I, we use the neologism deliberandum to refer to a given instance of mass online deliberation, that is, to a process of deliberating online within a given community, on a given issue, and within a given period of time.
(Inter)National Conference on Digital Government Research (DG.O), 2010
... Cyril Velikanov Moscow MEMORIAL Society Malyi Karetnyi Pereulok 12, Moscow 127051 Russia +7 9... more ... Cyril Velikanov Moscow MEMORIAL Society Malyi Karetnyi Pereulok 12, Moscow 127051 Russia +7 916 682 30 82 [email protected] ... In their analytical paper [1] prepared after several years of operating the project on a country-scale (the Estonian TOM project), they ...
Abstract: In this paper I introduce a model of self-regulated mass online deliberation, and apply... more Abstract: In this paper I introduce a model of self-regulated mass online deliberation, and apply it to a context of cross-border deliberation involving translation of contributions between participating languages, and then to a context of cross-community online deliberation for dispute resolution, e.g. between opposing ethnic or religious communities. In such a cross-border or cross-community context, online deliberation should preferably progress as a sequence of segmented phases each followed by a combining phase. In a segmented phase, each community deliberates separately, and selects their best contributions for being presented to all other communities. Selection is made by using the proposed mechanism of mutual moderation and appraisal of contributions by participants themselves. In the subsequent combining phase, the selected contributions are translated (by volunteering or randomly selected participants among those who have specified appropriate language skills) and presente...
In this Part II of the present Chapter, we describe the stages (or phases), mechanisms and proced... more In this Part II of the present Chapter, we describe the stages (or phases), mechanisms and procedures of a MOD process, in accordance with the requirements set forth in Section “ MOD Paradigm Versus Deliberative Polling” of Part I. Our task is to provide an MOD blueprint for an ICT-based MOD platform that almost immediately lends itself to system implementation. As in Part I, we use the neologism deliberandum to refer to a given instance of mass online deliberation, that is, to a process of deliberating online within a given community, on a given issue, and within a given period of time.
Proceedings of the 19th Annual International Conference on Digital Government Research: Governance in the Data Age
Can we ever build a practically implementable model of governance that combines normative qualiti... more Can we ever build a practically implementable model of governance that combines normative qualities of universal suffrage in the classical representative and direct democracy models with epistemic qualities of presumably elitist open deliberation? Can we make more inclusive the deliberative model itself? If we arrive at building such a model, this would be an important step towards a better democratic governance. I propose a model, which I call "Direct Deliberative Democracy" (abbr. "D3"), and which is expected to bring a positive answer to the above question. D3 is based on three main concepts: (A) Mass Online Deliberation (MOD) with its procedural framework, already presented in a number of my conference papers and in two co-authored book chapters; (B) "argumentative facilitation", which consists in assisting the least prepared citizens in formulating better arguments within a deliberation on an issue of their concern; and (C) "implicit voting", which consists in algorithmically aggregating the non-participants' values, interests and preferences into the decision-making process, in a way deemed epistemically better than the classical "explicit" voting. To put these basic concepts into practice, we need a set of procedures governing participants' actions and interactions, and an interactive IT system to implement and enforce those procedures. For MOD (Part A above), both the concept and the procedural framework are already well elaborated. The concept of argumentative facilitation (Part B) has been presented in one of my 2017 papers, and the work on the appropriate procedural framework is under way. The concept of implicit voting (Part C) is introduced in this paper for the first time; I am not expecting its large immediate acceptance, because it puts into question the understanding of universal suffrage in today's democracies as an explicit and discretionary expression of everyone's will.
Proceedings of the 18th Annual International Conference on Digital Government Research, 2017
In a series of our earlier papers [1-4] we have developed a concept and a model of large-scale on... more In a series of our earlier papers [1-4] we have developed a concept and a model of large-scale online deliberation, which could accommodate any number of participants who deliberate on a given issue altogether as one undivided body, in one common "virtual room", rather than divided into several small groups. This approach indeed requires a rather specific procedural framework, and an ICT-system to support and enforce those procedures. It provides for a meaningful participation of any size, open to any citizen in a given constituency, therefore preserving their equal political rights. Rights, however, do not imply capabilities; a person may be authorized to do something, but not being able of doing that thing. Both the representative model and the referendum-based direct model of democratic governance provide every citizen with a very basic right---that of casting their vote. This basic right is indeed inclusive, for, the act of voting can be performed even by the least pre...
We present an online deliberation system using mutual evaluation in order to collaboratively deve... more We present an online deliberation system using mutual evaluation in order to collaboratively develop solutions. Participants submit their proposals and evaluate each other's proposals; some of them may then be invited by the system to rewrite 'problematic' proposals. Two cases are discussed: a proposal supported by many, but not by a given person, who is then invited to rewrite it for making yet more acceptable; and a poorly presented but presumably interesting proposal. The first of these cases has been successfully implemented. Proposals are evaluated along two axes-understandability (or clarity, or, more generally, quality), and agreement. The latter is used by the system to cluster proposals according to their ideas, while the former is used both to present the best proposals on top of their clusters, and to find poorly written proposals candidates for rewriting. These functionalities may be considered as important components of a large scale online deliberation system.
JeDEM - eJournal of eDemocracy and Open Government
In this paper we introduce our model of self-regulated mass online deliberation, and apply it to ... more In this paper we introduce our model of self-regulated mass online deliberation, and apply it to a context of cross-border deliberation involving translation of contributions between participating languages, and then to a context of cross-community online deliberation for dispute resolution, e.g. between opposing ethnic or religious communities. In such a cross-border or cross-community context, online deliberation should preferably progress as a sequence of segmented phases each followed by a combining phase. In a segmented phase, each community deliberates separately, and selects their best contributions for being presented to all other communities. Selection is made by using our proposed mechanism of mutual moderation and appraisal of contributions by participants themselves. In the subsequent combining phase, the selected contributions are translated (by volunteering or randomly selected participants among those who have specified appropriate language skills) and presented to ta...
eParticipation projects often comprise deliberation among participants, where proposals are colle... more eParticipation projects often comprise deliberation among participants, where proposals are collected, discussed and rated to be processed in further stages of the eParticipation. In the case of large-scale audiences, this initial stage involves mass-online deliberation (MOD), which has to cope with a potentially very large number of proposals advanced by the participants. To enable clustering, MOD rely on human(i.e. participant)-based appraisals of proposals given in the course of the participation project. Based on these appraisals, this contribution then proposes a clustering algorithm that makes use of the whole set of the above individual ratings. (Dis-)approval ratings are first weighted by the indication of clarity, that is, the higher the clarity rating assigned by a person, the higher the weight with which the (dis)approval rating will enter the clustering.
In this paper we address various aspects of eParticipation from citizens' perspective. A numb... more In this paper we address various aspects of eParticipation from citizens' perspective. A number of requirements are formulated that should be satisfied in order for an eParticipation campaign or activity to be both representative and productive. Appropriate procedures and methods are described, to be incorporated into an eParticipation platform in order to satisfy each of those requirements. Special emphasis is put on the "crowd buzz" problem that may appear once an eParticipation campaign has attracted really many participants who all want to express their opinions on a given subject matter. Our design provides for maintaining orderly and productive deliberation even within such an "overcrowded" online forum. The main features of our system are: mutual moderation and appraisal of participants' contributions, by assessing both their overall quality and the level of agreement with the author's propositions; selection of "potentially most interesti...
In this paper, I introduce and discuss a new model of governance, in which epistemic qualities of... more In this paper, I introduce and discuss a new model of governance, in which epistemic qualities of intrinsically elitist open deliberation are combined with normative qualities of aggregative democracy based on universal suffrage. In our model, these two approaches, typically considered as opposite to each other, are combined in a quite natural way. Namely, the process of deliberative policy-making in a community is open to every its member who is willing to participate (the “active” ones); while all others (the “lazy” ones) are provided with the possibility of either to cast their informed vote, or, at the end, to delegate their voting right to the whole community, through an IT system enforcing appropriate procedures and performing appropriate algorithms. Practical implementation of our model will be made possible through a combined use of (1) a procedural framework for Mass common Online Deliberation (MOD), which had been described in detail in our past papers; (2) an appropriatel...
We present an online deliberation system using mutual evaluation in order to collaboratively deve... more We present an online deliberation system using mutual evaluation in order to collaboratively develop solutions. Participants submit their proposals and evaluate each other's proposals; some of them may then be invited by the system to rewrite 'problematic' proposals. Two cases are discussed: a proposal supported by many, but not by a given person, who is then invited to rewrite it for making yet more acceptable; and a poorly presented but presumably interesting proposal. The first of these cases has been successfully implemented. Proposals are evaluated along two axes-understandability (or clarity, or, more generally, quality), and agreement. The latter is used by the system to cluster proposals according to their ideas, while the former is used both to present the best proposals on top of their clusters, and to find poorly written proposals candidates for rewriting. These functionalities may be considered as important components of a large scale online deliberation system.
This two-part chapter proposes a model and some design choices to build a mass online deliberatio... more This two-part chapter proposes a model and some design choices to build a mass online deliberation (MOD) system, aimed at supporting orderly, fair, inclusive and purposeful participation of a large number of people. According to this model, a deliberation on a given issue, in a given community and at a given time (a " deliberandum ") progresses through a number of phases, roughly corresponding to ideation (moving and discussing proposals, with a proposals' clustering algorithm operating in the background), consolidation (i.e. editing of one proposal per cluster), and reconciliation (of some among the consolidated proposals from different clusters). Depending on a given context of use, a final selection of one among the remaining irreconcilable proposals may be done by vote either among the deliberants only, or within the whole community (a referendum), or else, within a randomly selected panel of community members. Specific mechanisms defined in our model are: mutual m...
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Papers by Cyril Velikanov