CONTEXT
Participatory, liquid, digital, or deliberative: democratic innovations have gained popularity over the past 10 years. Researchers, practitioners, CSOs (civil society organizations), and public authorities have since been involved in over 300 transnational projects to design, test, improve, research, and iterate new ways of making collective decisions with citizens. Research and innovation programs have been pioneers in the field of democratic innovations, with the mainstreaming of citizen science, citizen engagement, pilots, and experiments in Horizon 2020 and Horizon Europe projects. SCALEDEM aims to leverage the results of these initiatives and unlock the potential of democratic innovations outside the “laboratory” of experimental projects.
To achieve this, the project is based on three pillars: (1) formulating a theory of scaling based on the results of past projects and research, (2) translating this theory into practices through concrete activities to be implemented on the ground, (3) extending the impact of both the theory and consolidated practices through capacity-building, networking, and dissemination actions.
Mission: Moving Beyond Experimentation, Creating a Compass
SCALEDEM seeks to reconcile scaling “high” (integration into political institutions) and scaling “deep” (embedding in political culture), while avoiding sacrificing quality for quantity. To achieve this, the project proposes an infrastructure that includes several tools:
- A knowledge map to centralize information on democratic innovations (Nets4Dem).
- A “translation hub” to transform research into concrete and political actions. The Translation Hub nurtures a global community of over 500 end-users of democratic innovations (researchers, civil society, policymakers, practitioners, science communicators, and cultural institutions) and is open to all.
- Two scaling grounds to test the replicability of innovations in new contexts. In 2026, we will financially support and accompany the implementation and follow-up of more than 13 democratic innovations, involving over 39 third parties through open calls.
- Three strategic partnerships with the European Capital of Democracy City Network (ECoD), the Network for innovative solutions for the future of democracy (Nets4Dem), and the DemoReset Network.
If you are interested in joining us in tackling the challenge of scaling democratic innovations, feel free to contact Camille (camille.dobler@missionspubliques.com).
Consortium Partners
| Missions Publiques (MP) | France |
| European University Institute (EUI) | Italy |
| Dublin City University (DCU) | Ireland |
| Research Institute for Sustainability – Helmholtz-Zentrum Potsdam (RIFS-GFZ) | Germany |
| ifok GmbH (IFOK) | Germany |
| European Capital of Democracy (ECoD) | Austria |
| Democracy X (//Danish Board of Technology Foundation) | Denmark |
| Nexus Institut (NEXUS) | Germany |
| Fondazione ICONS (ICONS) | Italy |
| GLOBSEC (GLOBSEC) | Slovakia |
| Université Catholique de Louvain (UCLouvain) | Belgium |
| Democracy Reporting International (DRI) | Germany |
| Extituto de Política Abierta (EX) | Colombia |