{"id":4334,"date":"2025-03-09T22:25:21","date_gmt":"2025-03-09T21:25:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/verwaltungsgestaltung.de\/notizen\/?p=4334"},"modified":"2025-03-09T22:36:18","modified_gmt":"2025-03-09T21:36:18","slug":"week-149-at-the-digital-service-notes-for-3-7-march-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/verwaltungsgestaltung.de\/notizen\/2025\/03\/09\/week-149-at-the-digital-service-notes-for-3-7-march-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"Week #149 at the Digital Service: Notes for 3\u20137 March 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It was a rather cosy round on Thursday evening. We got together for the first time this year for our public-facing meetup<\/a>. Some 30 curious people joined us. Hosted at CityLAB Berlin again, we discussed \u2018Better voting, better democracy\u2019. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We heard from 2 organisations dedicated to supporting democracy and enhancing transparency within our government system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Discussing how to fortify democracy<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

How do we help citizens vote for the political parties and candidates that match their preferences? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

How can we ensure that elected officials act in our best interests and uphold their promises? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

How do we verify their integrity and scrutinise their activities?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We were delighted to have Pamela Brandt, project lead for the vote-matching tool \u2018Wahl-O-Mat\u2019<\/a>, kick things off. For over 20 years, she has been leading the probably most endured, well-known and successful citizen-facing tool the federal government has created. By rating 38 statements with agree, neutral or disagree, the user gets presented their matching rate with the political parties running in the election. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pamela reported that the Wahl-O-Mat has been used 26 million times in the 2.5 weeks during the election run-up. In a survey, 10 to 20% of the users stated they were not interested in politics. Even in an age of little attention, the average person spends 9:40 minutes with the tool, which is remarkable. Since its introduction in 2002, the tool has been used around 160 million times. 85% of the users stated they enjoyed using the tool, and 69% talked to others about the results they got.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These are some impressive numbers. Participants even wanted to hear more stats when they could ask.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The second speaker was Anne Hoppe, project manager at Abgeordnetenwatch, the German pendant of the UK parliamentary monitoring website TheyWorkForYou. They presented the NGO\u2019s offering, which also came with an MP match checker. It has been used some 1.2 million times in the past few weeks. Their page also allows constituents to write short questions for their MPs. Some answer very quickly, some don\u2019t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Both speaker took many questions. We even extended the question section by concluding with an added panel. \u201cHow can government and non-government institutions support democracy? Also, what can individuals do?\u201d, I asked. \u201cWrite MPs more often\u201d, Anne from Abgeordenwatch answered. The question of what should be focus areas in the coming years was mostly left unanswered. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As I mentioned earlier, when organising events like these, I am mostly driven by my own curiosity, and then I am happy that others want to explore these themes as much as I do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Powerful discussions on \u2018Better #voting, better #democracy\u2019 tonight at @tsbberlin.bsky.social\u2019s CityLAB at our 8th public sector meetup.\n\nWe welcomed Anne Hoppe from @abgeordnetenwatch.de and Pamela Brandt from @bpb.de to talk about their democracy-informing work, informing some 20+ million people.

[image or embed]<\/a><\/p>— Martin Jordan (@martinjordan.com<\/a>) March 6, 2025 at 11:25 PM<\/a><\/blockquote>