The Digital Democracy project helps governments take the pulse of their constituents with digital tools. In 2020 and 2021, MBC piloted the project in Pasig, Manila, Legazpi and Iligan.

The process starts with identifying a relevant issue to the community and setting up the survey. Next, the government calls an opening citizen assembly to explain to participants why the issue is important. The government launches the survey during the opening citizen assembly. Then, participants vote on the issue, and the government analyzes the voting results. Next, the government calls for a closing citizen assembly to present the results to the participants to validate or disprove. Participants also provide recommendations to implement the results in the closing citizen assembly. In the final step, the government enacts policies and updates their constituents on what they plan to do. 

Through Digital Democracy, citizens provide input to government decision-making, even when mobility restrictions (such as during the COVID-19 pandemic) impede access to government offices. The government also benefits: it gets insights into what its constituents think and it is able to make better decisions informed by data. 

The Digital Democracy handbooks aim to provide government officials the tools to initiate a Digital Democracy project in their own cities or agencies, enabling them to make decisions informed by citizen input while at the same time, strengthening community and civic engagement.  This first handbook is made up of case studies of MBC’s Digital Democracy projects in Pasig, Legazpi, and Iligan cities as well as in Intramuros in 2020 and 2021. Succeeding handbooks will share tools, processes, and strategies for implementation. 

In five projects with different topics, different cities, and different contexts, LGU employees and constituents think Digital Democracy is a flexible, easy to learn, and useful tool for gathering citizen input.