Christian Rost (source: Goethe-Institut Estland)

Christian Rost (Dipl. Geograph) Stadt- und Regionalentwicklung Könneritzstraße 20 04229 Leipzig

Tel.: 0341 46336832 Mobil: 01636200066 Mail: christianrost.le@googlemail.com

About the speaker:Christian Rost studied human and physical geography with references to urban and regional development / urban ecology. He works as a moderator in a district of Leipzig and in neighborhood management there as well; he also volunteers for a socio-cultural center in his home city. Mr. Rost is an expert in urban gover-nance and participation processes in urban develop-ment.Prior to his actual working on his PhD in the field of urban and regional development he worked as CEO of the „Federal Competence Center for Cultural and Creative Industries“ in Germany.

Background : Rebellious cities and normative claimThe need for the inclusion of broad social classes in urban development processes and urban projects can be derived in general from two levels.A first dimension of the issue finds its origin in the scientific proclaimed by Henry Lefebvre ´s „Right to the City“ (Levebre 2009). It describes the difference between the usual recovery mechanisms in the real estate sector, building upon practices of urban deve-lopment and the intrinsic interests of the different stakeholders in the urban context.Where such conflicts of interest lead, is repea-tedly demonstrated by the wide variety of ur-ban protest movements. Whether in Seattle in 1999 or in Istanbul in 2013, the realities of ur-ban planning often miss the wishes and needs of the different population groups (Harvey 2013).

Protests at Gezi-Park, Istanbul 2013 (source: AFP)

Misguided planning processes go hand in hand with the lack of citizen involvement and participation. De-spite legal basis, cities’ governments cannot / or do not want to involve all relevant population groups in appropriate processes. Often they are too expensive or take too much time.And yet by using the right set of instruments, much higher follow-up costs could be avoided while do-ing justice to the citizens’ interests . In addition, this approach would offer the opportunity to generate other, perhaps better approaches to and solutions for urban development scenarios.Beyond the practical level as presented in this paper, there also exists a normative claim in the EU context.This second dimension of the topic originates from the 1980s (Hauff 1987). Based on the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, an action program called „Agen-da 21“ was enacted (Heineberg , 2001). For the first time, the demand for the inclusion of all segments of society in the search for solutions was part of the im-plementation on the local level. (Lötscher & Kühmi-chel 1998).

Crowdforce Event – 2013-10-07 – Tropicana RotterdamKeynote: „Crowd sourcing as a tool for integrated urban development“ – a summary by Christian Rost

Greatings from Rio (source: move-your-card.com)

A fundamental change in the understanding of urban development planning can be seen in this context. In terms of a cooperative state, control is understood as a process of interaction, during which the control-ling object and subject are no longer clearly separa-ted from each other (Mayntz 2004 : Hamedinger et al 2008). To this effect, urban development planning is de-fined as a strategy- oriented planning, „relying on the inclusion and participation of different actors in administration, politics, economiy and civil society“ (Dangschat 2008). Besided the physical component, tt alsoencompasses the social factor of urban deve-lopment.On the European level, the demands for new parti-cipation formats can be found in the „Leipzig Char-ter on Sustainable European City“ (European Union 2007), in which the member states made a commit-ment to advance an integrated urban development and to support governance structures for their im-plementation.

Gruß aus Leipzig (source: geo.de)

Thus, citizens should be systematically integrated into development processes. Attempts to implement this process included, among others, the application of activating and participatory planning processes. Comparable approaches, especially in the field of ci-

vic participation, are also found in EU programs such as ERRE and ESF.The above presented two dimensions of the impe-rative of including broad population strata in urban development processes and urban projects descri-be a paradigm shift at long sight or respectively a three-step-process from planning to management to governance. According to Mayntz this development can be summed up as follows. Based on the statist - hierarchical shaping of social fields through politics (hiding behind the term „planning“,) in the 1960s and early 1970s Mayntz describes the change in the 1970s, up to a „management“: „ The type of planning that had been practiced until then obviously didn’t work, because the particular object to be shaped wasn’t a merely passive item readily letting the government form him, but rather active and dyna-mically processing control impulses“ (Mayntz 1996; 1998 Benz 2007). However, the model of „manage-ment“ got into trouble, certain social phenomena could not bedetected (Benz 2007 1998 Mayntz 1996). Hence Mayntz continues to assume that a „[ ... ] so-cial subsystem’s resistance to political interventions [ ... ]“ exists . These and similar insights subsequently led urban planners and researchers to compare pre-vious models of society controlling to a plurality of governance mechanisms, which take new into view political networks, professional communities, civil society, the market and negotiatingconstellations or associations (Mayntz 1996; 1998: Benz 2007).

The problem of operationalisation.The need for greater involvement of civil society ac-tors in urban development processes, at least in the European context, is understood by most of the par-ticipating stakeholders. As shown, costs can be re-duced by shared knowledge and better deployment of resources at the development of urban projects, using appropriate methods. Subsequent costs are reduced because all affected groups are involved in the run-up. Protests are reduced because the driving force for urban development processes and individu-al projects comes from the center of the society.It is the implementation that is more difficult than expected. A democratic process of involving the po-pulation usually costs a lot of money and often takes more time than expected. Furthermore, despite the democratic process in the sense of citizens to be in-cluded cannot always be activated easily. Damon and Ben Miller Orobona, looking for a proper solution, therefore ask rightly: „How can we reach large num-bers of people and allow them to effectively engage in meaningful citizen participation without slowing

down the process?“ (see millermillercanby.com) . The good thing about their issue is that they simul-taneously provide a solution. In their opinion, crowd-sourcing can be a key to solve these problems.

Crowdsourcing as a keyBut what is meant by crowdsourcing and where does the concept take effect in the sence of a participa-tory urban development? Crowdsourcing is defined as „the act of taking a job traditionally performed by a designated agent (usually the employee) and out-sourcing it to an undefined , generally large group of people (crowsourcees ) in the form of an open call“ ( Howe 2006 ) . Another definition could be the fol-lowing: „ Crowdsourcing as an interactive form of de-livering a service which is organized collaboratively or competitively and which includes a large number of extrinsically or intrinsically motivated actors with different levels of knowledge on the basis of modern information and communication technologies using Web 2.0 „(Martin; Lessmann; Voß 2008).

Crowdsourcing (source: super-hub.eu)

The concept is applied in various fields, for example in open innovation processes of companies.“Open innovation is a paradigm that assumes that firms can and should use external ideas as well as in-ternal ideas, and internal and external market acces-ses, as the firms look to advance their technology” (Chesbrough 2003).One particularly successful example is the ‚Yellow Chocolate‘ campaign in New Zealand. Planned as a promotion for the Yellow Pages, by the participati-on of nearly 100,000 people a chocolate was crea-ted that tastes like the color „Yellow“ The population was requested to share their vision of such a taste of chocolate. As a result, they produced a yellow bar of chocolate with the flavor of pineapple-pudding.

When introduced to the market, the product was sold out within a few days (see theinspirationroom.com).

Yellow Chocolate (source: theinspirationroom.com)

Another example of the application of crowdsourcing is crowdfunding.Crowdfunding is a form of crowdsourcing, in which money is collected through the crowd, mainly for artistic projects, companies, NGOs and political pur-poses. . At the same time, donors are involved in dif-ferent ways: as multipliers for the finished projects , as an inspiration in the development process, as in-vestors or as a pre-seller. A successful crowdfunding project is about more than just the money „ ( Eisfeld-Reschke, J.; Pelzer, C.; Wenzlaff, K. 2012).As one such example, the most successful platform „Kickstarter „ could be mentioned.Also interesting are special niche providers. In Ger-many a platform called „LeihDeinerStadtGeld“ . Instead of expensive bank loans for the pre-financing of urban construction projects, the platform allows cities to borrow money from their own citizens. In turn, the citizens can decide what happens with the city money (www.leihdeinerstadtgeld.de ).

Leih Deiner Stadt Geld (source: leideinerstadtgeld.de)

Other forms of crowdsourcing are “Co-Creation” and “Micro Working” ( Eisfeld-Reschke, J.; Pelzer, C.; Wenzlaff, K. 2012) .As these first examples show, crowdsourcing allows getting in touch with a large number of customers and interested people (the crowd). At a very high scope, knowledge can be sampled from many peo-ple. This gives a valuable range of opinions, avoiding high costs. Thus solutions to problems can be deve-loped collaboratively.Against this background, crowdsourcing solves all the requirements of an integrated urban development. It is a non-hierarchical tool for reaching a consensus. Due to the far reach and open access to all popula-tion groups, it has also a grassroot democratic basis. Due to its simple application, it supports joint acti-vities and promotes a more targeted use of existing resources.This, for example, works very well in the field of city marketing as the German crowdsourcing project „Hannover Love“ shows. While the city of Hanno-ver does not yet have its own Facebook page, some residents have come together and show their favo-rite places in the city on the project’s website (see hannoverliebe.de). Through various links to Vimeo, Facebook & co it is an effective tool for defining a population’s identity.

DYI-City-Marketing (source: hannoverliebe.de)

Another example is „Like Offenbach“. With that pro-ject the city supports the private makers of that Fa-cebook page with money. The contents are created and maintained by students of the local university, without the city government intervening (see face-book.de /likeoffenbach).In the field of classical planning techniques crowd-sourcing is also applied. The company “PlanKoope-rativ” from Heidelberg provides a web tool, which al-lows cities and villages to plan urban spaces through the participation of the mass (see plankooperativ.de)

City-Planing (source: plankooperativ.de)

Areas such as urban planning or marketing are tailored very specifically on a particular target group. In a larger context crowdsourcing can also be used as a tool for direct democracy. On the platform e-democracy.org citizens can discuss and voteupon municipal projects and urban planning projects . „e-democracy.org „ was launched in 1994 in Minnesota, and is now available in the U.S., UK and New Zealand in over 50 municipalities (See e-democracy.org ).How means are being applied purposefully in order to optimally benefit from the knowledge of the mass in urban projects shows „Apps for Democracy „ from the city of Washington. Originally developed as a competition for the best technical application to ac-cess the urban database, apps will now be promoted that offer solutions for more direct democracy. The best developer team is awarded with a cash prize of $ 10,000 and a support of up to $ 14,000 over a peri-od of 9 months (see appsfordemocracy.org).

App´s for Washington DC (source: appsfordemocracy.org)

The listed examples show that crowdsourcing can be an effective tool in the field of urban development. But what are the critical success factors?For a successful application of crowdsourcing as a tool of integrated urban development, the same con-ditions as in other application areas are needed. For instance, the content and the benefits of a participa-tion should be evident. Consequently, it is better to

limit oneself to a core topic and not wanting to solve all problems at once. Also theissue should be of high common interest. It is also important that everyone involved can really contribute and that this involvement isn’t just feig-ned. This can be achieved by giving feedback toand showing every contributor which results are imple-mented at the end. Only then a long term trust bet-ween the different actors can be established.A good example of the successful implementation of such an instrument is „Maerker Brandenburg”. Here the knowledge of the crowd is used for identifying road damage, illegal landfills and other problems. The targeted users have a vested interest in the reso-lution of these nuisances and can personally take part in that process. The objective of the offer is clearly formulated and the benefits are apparent. When a problem is solved, it can be seen in real terms and also on the website via a traffic light. Thus everyo-ne can follow-up on their concern. If these things are being paid attention, a crowdsourcing offer can be a success (see mearker.brandenburg.de).

Maerker Brandenburg (source: maerker.brandenburg.de)

Sources:

Chesbrough, H. W. (2003). Open Innovation: The new imperative for creating and profiting from technology. Boston

Coase R. (197): The Nature of the Firm. In: Williamson, O. E. & Winter, S. G. [Hrsg] (1991): The Nature of the Firm. Origins, Evolution, and Development. New York u. a. S. 18–33. Zitiert nach: Benz, A. [Hrsg] (2007): Handbuch Governance. Theoretische Grundlagen und empirische Anwendungsfel-der. Wiesbaden.

Eisfeld-Reschke, J.; Pelzer, C. und Wenzlaff, K. (2012): Crowdsourcing Report 2012 - Neue Digitale Arbeitswelten, Berlin

Europische Union (2007): Leipzig Charta zur nachhaltigen europäischen Stadt. Leipzig.

Harvey, D. (2013): Rebel Cities: From the Right to the City to the Urban Revolution. London, New York

Hauff, V. (Hrsg.)(1987): Unsere gemeinsame Zukunft – Der Brundtland-Bericht der Weltkommission für Um-welt und Energie, Greven

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Lefebvre H. (2009): Le droit à la ville. Paris

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Martin, N.; Lessmann, S. und Voß, S. (2008): Crowdsourcing: Systematisierung praktischer Ausprägungen und verwandter Konzepte. Hamburg.

Mayntz, R. (1996): Politische Steuerung. Aufstieg, Niedergang und Transformation einer Theorie. In: Beyme, K. von & Offe, C. [Hrsg]: Politische Theorien in der Ära der Transformation. Oppladen. S. 148-168. Zitiert nach: Benz, A. [Hrsg] (2007): Handbuch Governance. Theoretische Grundlagen und empirische Anwen-dungsfelder. Wiesbaden.

Mayntz, R. (1998): New Challanges to Governance Theory. Jean Monet Chair Paper 50. Robert Schumann Centre of the European University. Florenz. Zitiert nach: Benz, A. [Hrsg] (2007): Hand-buch Governance. Theoretische Grundlagen und empirische Anwendungsfelder. Wiesbaden.

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Web-Sources:

http://www.millermillercanby.com/blog/www.theinspirationroom.comwww.leihdeinerstadtgeld.dewww.hannoverliebe.dewww.facebook.de/likeoffenbachwww.plankooperativ.dewww.e-democracy.orgwww.appsfordemocracy.orgwww.maerker.brandenburg.de