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👀 - If you want to see where we are in the project or are looking for guidance on how to contribute, visit the project's Readme 🌺 . If you're looking for external resources such as similar projects around the world or information about Pol.is, visit the project's Information Resources page.
ℹ️ - This project page will include in-depth background info and an overview of the project's mission, values, people, and plan! As progress is made and work phases are finalized, phases and developed resources will be documented in its own page in this Wiki.
The vHawaii Project is a grassroots experiment to reimagine the way democratic political engagement and policy generation is approached in Hawaii through the embrace of technology and online engagement.
Our state is at a crossroads, requiring our leaders to make critical decisions on behalf of Hawaii's public. However, traditional attempts at engaging with the community in meaningful dialogues to inform these decisions have been failing us. From TMT to affordable housing development, there has been a disconnect between the decision making process relied on by local elected officials and the wishes of various community groups. This makes traditional decision making tools both unreliable for state leaders, and unrepresentative for local communities, paralyzing decision making and limiting progress in our state.
Drawing inspiration from the vTaiwan Project, undertaken by engaged citizens and government officials, implemented by the national government in Taiwan, the vHawaii project is experimenting with the vTaiwan process to improve, simplify, and adjust the framework to fit Hawaii's unique cultural and political circumstances by Fall 2022. vHawaii is aiming to develop an efficient, nuanced, and transparent policy generation process embedded within state government that policymakers and community members alike can rely on for the state’s biggest decisions, grounded firmly in the principles of consensus-based decision making. The vHawaii project is currently being worked on by individuals from around the state, with generous technical support and resource development being provided by Code for Hawaii volunteers.
To reimagine a stronger, more efficient, and more connected democratic problem solving process for Hawaii through the embrace of technology, out-of-the-box thinking, and a consensus-based approach to policy-making.
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Cameron Deptula (Co-Founder + Head Investigator)
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Ben Trevino (Code for Hawaii Sponsor)
Q: How did the vHawaii Project begin? The vHawaii Project began out of the experience that two college students (Cameron and Rina) had with the 2021 State of Hawaii Legislative Session, and contract work for the State of Hawaii’s Department of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism. Both experiences made clear two things: state leaders are often hesitant to act boldly, despite high demand for action, and the general public was not being engaged through testimony writing and public consultations. Instead, traditional public engagement processes were dominated by lobbyists and special interest groups. It was clear that there was both a need for our leaders to receive better feedback from members of the public, and a need to find easier ways for average Hawaii residents to have their voices heard on critical issues. Out of this need, the students convened a diverse group of local government professionals, business leaders, technologists, students, and members of the general public to explore an alternate path for decision-making, policy development, and public problem solving in the state--reimagining the way democracy might be conducted in Hawaii.
Q: How is community engagement conducted currently in the State? Community engagement throughout Hawaii typically relies on interactions between state leaders and the public through a mix of official, legally-mandated public input sessions via public hearings, informal interactions with the public through meeting requests or correspondence, and political opinion polling. Unfortunately, the first two methods of interactions too often result in either limited public engagement or leave leaders with little infrastructure to organize individual input into actionable feedback. Further, it's often the case that those who participate in these efforts are lobbyists, not the general public. Political opinion polling on the other hand allows leaders to view the opinion of individuals and groups around the state, however this process relies heavily on the quality of polling methodologies and leaves little room for consensus-based decision making or creative problem solving with the public. The vHawaii Project believes that a better way forward is possible, which can both provide the public more accessibility, ease-of-participation, and opportunities to improve government policies, and which can provide government officials broad input, easy-to-manage processes, and clear recommendations to inform their decisions.
Q: What has the vTaiwan Process been used for in Taiwan’s Government? The vTaiwan process was developed in 2015 by a group of Taiwanese government officials and civic activists as a way to source feedback from the public and overcome deadlocks as the country worked to resolve novel challenges. The process has been integrated as a tool into the Taiwanese government’s policy development process and has since been used to help draft solutions to over 26 regulatory issues dealing with controversial or new subjects, such as online alcohol sales, Uber regulations, and FinTech regulations. The project inspired similar engagement work within Taiwan through the government-developed platform, Join.gov.tw, which is currently being leveraged by local government administrations to solicit public feedback and make key decisions across the country.
Q: What is Pol.is and how does it relate to the vHawaii Project? Pol.is is an open-source, free online conversation and opinion software that serves as a platform for public consultations, leveraging AI techniques to help identify areas of consensus between participants. The vHawaii project is experimenting with this platform as a tool to better engage the public. Through Pol.is, participants register for a unique account and are able to participate in a “conversation.” After joining a conversation, participants are presented with a randomized series of comments, and are able to vote on each comment: up, down, or pass. These comments are either seeded by conversation hosts or are submitted by participants. If a participant has a novel idea or comment, they can submit their own to be voted on as well. These comments are lightly and transparently moderated by the conversation hosts to prevent spam or remove duplicative submissions. Much like traditional polling, the votes on these comments provide opinion data that can be analyzed to search for public opinion. Unlike traditional opinion polling, however, the ability for participants to provide ideas of their own through comment submissions, or attempt to improve the ideas of others allows for active problem solving, improving potential solutions, and finding consensus. Pol.is enables collective problem solving and provides an opportunity for the intelligence and experiences of the community as a whole to work in order to find solutions for the public's biggest challenges. Pol.is has been leveraged successfully by local governments throughout the US, East Asia, and Europe.
Q: What is Pol.is Like? The participation mechanism behind Pol.is modeled off of a more productive version of the internet comment section found on news sites and social media. However, Pol.is has successfully avoided the pitfalls endemic to many online comment sections such as trolling, spam, and bias by randomizing the order of submissions (no "top" comments) and disabling direct replies between participants. Social media engagement and internet commenting has become cemented in the daily life of Hawaii residents of all ages, and each day Hawaii residents take to the internet to comment and like posts-- often related to government. The vHawaii project believes in embracing existing trends and energy in the public and adapting them for the betterment of society, which Pol.is has does.
Phase Goals:
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Develop Full Digital Infrastructure Required for vTaiwan Process (Code for Hawaii devs will help)
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Develop Collective Knowledge (via GitHub) and Share with Group on How to Set Up/Manage Programs
Step 1 (Proposal Stage):
**Hackpad** - Issue, Qualify Issue, Stakeholder Discovery
Step 2 (Opinion Stage):
**Typeform** - Invite Stakeholders Through Rolling Questionnaires, Identify Affected/Knowledgeable People;
**Slideshare** - Produce Informational Content Digestible by Stakeholders;
**Facebook Ads** - Reach Out to General Public;
**GitBook** - Interpret and Explain Terminologies;
**Pol.is** - Online Deliberation;
**Discourse** - Participants Ask Questions, Competent Agencies Respond.
Step 4 (Reflection Stage):
**YouTube Live/LiveHouse.in** Face-to-Face Dialogue;
**???** - Transcript of Dialogue.
Step 5 (Legislation Stage): Formalize Consensus into Policy/Action
Phase Goals:
1) Learn more about each program through implementation
2) Solicit feedback from participants
3) Use experience to identify improvements (if any) that vHawaii can improve the vTaiwan process within each category of the project values.
Scale:
Small (20-50 people) Pol.is with Code for Hawaii Membership Base + Friends/Invites
Requirements:
1) Discussion topic -- relevant to audience
2) Prepare platforms with infrastructure and data to accompany discussion topic
Phase Goals:
1) Improve the vTaiwan Process based on feedback from participants and also better align the program to fit the five guiding values, experiment with changes internally.
Ideas:
-Simplify Software to More Accessible/Familiar Software for Average HI Residents (idea submitted 10'18'2021)
-Develop a Process Navigator--Website to centralize processes into one hub (embedded forms/webpages?) and connect participants with individuals who can help aid participation (idea submitted 10'18'2021)
Specifics To Be Developed After Completing Phase II
PHASE IV: Implement vHawaii Process with Non-Profit/Community Group as a vHawaii Community Case Study
Goal:
1) Test out vHawaii Process with real stakeholders (50+) and issues
2) Demonstrate functionality of program
3) Develop best practices for vHawaii
4) Main Goal: Develop an actionable solution after fully running through project
Scale:
Medium (~50+ people) Real Stakeholders, Experts, Community Members
Ideas:
-AinaViz (potential non-profit partner to consider)
-Chinatown Community Groups, Neighborhood Board, Chamber of Commerce, etc. (potential community to engage-- over an issue like dealing with Graffiti)
Specifics To Be Developed After Completing Phase II
Specifics To Be Developed After Completing Phase II