Civic Hackathons: Innovation, Procurement, orCivic Engagement?

Peter JohnsonDepartment of Geography and Environmental Management, University of Waterloo,Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Pamela RobinsonSchool of Urban and Regional Planning, Ryerson University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Abstract

At all levels, governments around the world are moving toward the provision of open data, that is, thedirect provision to citizens, the private sector, and other third parties, of raw government datasets,controlled by a relatively permissible license. In tandem with this distribution of open data is thepromotion of civic hackathons, or “app contests” by government. The civic hackathon is designed to offerprize money to developers as a way to spur innovative use of open data, more specifically the creationof commercial software applications that deliver services to citizens. Within this context, we propose thatthe civic hackathon has the potential to act in multiple ways, possibly as a backdoor to the traditionalgovernment procurement process, and as a form of civic engagement. We move beyond much of the hypeof civic hackathons, critically framing an approach to understanding civic hackathons through thesetwo lenses. Key questions for future research emphasize the emerging, and important, nature of thisresearch path.

KEY WORDS: civic hackathon, big data, geoweb, web2.0, civic engagement, procurement, apps,open data

Introduction: From Open Data to an Evaluation of Civic Hackathons

Across the globe, governments of all levels are seeking to engage their citizens andsoftware development communities using open government data promoted anddistributed through application programming contests. Known as “app contests” or“civic hackathons,” these largely government-sponsored events present open dataas an entrepreneurial carrot: by liberating data, governments create opportunitiesfor new mobile device app development, often driven by goals of improving servicesand citizen–government relationships (Nath, 2011). By hosting these events, gov-ernments hope to signal their commitment to more transparent and open ways ofgoverning while also encouraging new app development. Despite their popularity,the civic hackathon is a relatively new phenomenon that has yet to receive muchresearch attention. To date there is little coordinated research to assess and trackthe short-term benefits and long-term implications of the hackathon event, for bothsponsoring governments and hackathon participants.

Civic hackathons tap into the current zeitgeist of social innovation and entrepre-neurship by connecting civically minded hackers and coders to governments seekingto present a more open, transparent, and connected face to their citizenry. When welook beyond the buzz of the civic hackathon event itself, many questions arise. As theoutcome of a hackathon is a series of apps, we must consider if these events also servea form of procurement, one that takes place outside of traditional government

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purchasing procedures? Additionally, we question whether the apps produced haveany impact on government-provided services? Lastly, we question whether citizenengagement with government is either enhanced or restricted through directparticipation in a hackathon, and/or by using the apps that are produced by thehackathon.

To consider these questions, we present an evaluation of civic hackathonsthrough the twin lenses of procurement and civic engagement. Identifying thistension between procurement and engagement allows us to move beyond thecurrent enthusiasm for civic hackathons, placing a focus instead on ethical andgovernance outcomes, as well as identifying key trajectories for future research inthis rapidly expanding space.

Characterizing Open Data and Civic Hackathons

The ubiquity of the Internet in everyday lives has led to e-government initiativesand significant advances in digital service and information provision, for example,by moving government forms and payments online (Brown, 2007; Chang &Kannan, 2008) and making the transactions between governments and their citi-zens easier and faster (Yildiz, 2007). Unlike typical documents (e.g., reports,minutes, budgets) distributed via e-government portals, open data provides rawdigital data that are collected as part of governmental processes. These raw (orlightly edited) data are a deliberate choice to move away from distilled and pack-aged information provision to citizens, and instead is envisioned as open ended,allowing data to enable a variety of uses in the hands of citizens as well as the private,public, and non-profit sectors. “Open data” is a term applied to the sharing of onceclosed or only internally accessible government data with the public, subject tolimited restrictions on use and reuse (Janssen, Charalabidis, & Zuiderwijk, 2012).The Open Knowledge Foundation provides what is essentially a manifesto for opendata: it should be freely available for anyone to use, repurpose, and republish asthey wish, governed with an open license that explicitly permits these types ofactivities. Data should be collected close to the originating source and frequently, toallow for automated processing, and be free of proprietary formats (OpenKnowledge Foundation, 2014). If the raw data cannot be reused at will, it fails thedefinition of “open.” Open data typically adds a transparency motive to existinge-government initiatives that pioneered the simple provision of government infor-mation and services online (Bertot, Jaeger, & Grimes, 2010; Piotrowski & VanRyzin, 2007).

As more and more governments offer open data, communities of tech-savvydevelopers have responded by creating apps (software for personal mobile devices)that use government open data to generate content or provide services that ordi-nary citizens may find useful. More recently, with the explosion in use of mobileapps for every aspect of people’s interests and lives, has also come the increase inpopularity of the civic hackathon. The civic hackathon is a time-limited (typicallyhours or days) event, launched at a specific venue, where enthusiasts, governmentworkers, interested citizens, and the private sector meet in a collaborative environ-ment to access government open data. The goal of a civic hackathon is to leveragegovernment open data to develop software applications that address issues of

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shared civic importance. Civic hackathons are often coupled with prize money orother material rewards for participants, and typically involve the release or promo-tion of new or potentially highly valued government data. Civic hackathons oftenpresent a specific problem or theme (such as transit, or engagement), to which thesponsoring government aims to direct participant efforts toward the developmentof an app serving some sort of public and/or market need. The recent example ofthe federally sponsored Canadian Open Data Experience (CODE) hackathon(www.canadianopendataexperience.com), demonstrates the general approach ofthe hackathon. Held over 48 hours in March 2014, the $25,000 winner of CODEwas an app called newRoots, designed to help new immigrants and current resi-dents to find a new neighborhood that matches their employment interests withhousing availability and presence of specific ethnic communities. With the goal ofhelping people to make a community and household location choice that “offers thegreatest opportunity for them and maximizes their potential to be successful andproductive citizens” (CODE, 2014), newRoots aims to package and deliver govern-ment data to meet a perceived need currently unfilled by existing governmentservices. In developing this app, the development team drew on federal open dataon housing opportunities, labor market trends, rates of employment, income, crimerates, and the ethnocultural diversity of communities.

Civic hackathons follow a template set by the “Apps for Democracy” contestsponsored by the city of Washington, DC, in 2008. This contest was one of the firstlarge-scale civic hackathons, coinciding with the creation of a municipal open datacatalogue. According to the organizers, during the month-long contest, 47 smart-phone apps were created, representing a value of over $2,300,000 in software to thecity of Washington, for a government outlay of only $50,000 in prize money(Corbett, 2014). This stated value of software that was developed during the Appsfor Democracy contest represents the approximate price of private sector contractsto develop equivalent software. Despite the initial perceived success of this contest,and a follow-up contest in 2009 that focused on citizen requests, the long-termimplications, benefits, and sustainability of software developed through this contestremains unclear (Nagesh, 2010).

The civic hackathon phenomenon has grown worldwide. Early in 2014, Pesha-war, Pakistan held a civic hackathon, presented as an opportunity to “learn newskills, meet intelligent people and do good for the city” by “bringing technologyinnovation to civic services” (Code for Pakistan, 2013). Similarly, in Santiago, Chilethis year, a civic hackathon was held to tackle issues of health, education, housing,and democratic quality (UNESCO, 2014), with two of its goals being to: “1. Promotethe use of public data for the development of innovative digital applications onHealth, Housing, Education and Democratic Quality, which are useful to the public[and] 2. Fostering a culture of transparency, accountability and reuse of publicinformation for social purposes and public interest” (LabCivico, 2013). From Codefor America to Industry Canada’s 2014 CODE event, civic hackathons are simulta-neously using open data as the platform for new technology development while alsostriving to deliver civic engagement outcomes. We unpack these dual goals, in aneffort to move beyond the dominant hype surrounding civic hackathons, towardidentification of the underlying implications of this phenomenon for government–citizen–developer relationships.

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Civic Hackathons as Procurement

A major driver of government provision of open data is the assumption that data,once provided for citizen and private sector use, will not only reduce governmentcosts, but also unlock hidden entrepreneurial value, driving software-related eco-nomic development (Janssen et al., 2012). In many instances, the provision of opendata comes with incentive for developers to improve or expand on the serviceofferings of government (Nath, 2011). This rationale demonstrates the shifting roleof government from direct service provider to citizens, to the more libertarianimagining of government as a platform, limited to maintaining basic infrastructurewhile the private sector assumes the role of primary service provider to citizens(Longo, 2011; O’Reilly, 2011). The rise of the developers, often termed “civicentrepreneurs” (Alfred & Alfred, 2013), is symptomatic of this view of open data as aneconomic driver, with the civic hackathon serving as an incubator. Despite thecommonly held belief that open data provision drives software application-centricinnovation, an actual quantitative measure of the economic value of open dataresulting from its exploitation through civic hackathons, remains to be developed,with largely anecdotal claims of dollar values of applications (Zuiderwijk & Janssen,2014).

By providing open data, government makes a significant component of theunderlying basis for service provision and decision-making available to third parties(Robinson, Yu, Zeller, & Felten, 2009). This allows for the independent generation ofcivic-focused products and services, without direct government oversight or input,other than the provision of data (Brabham, 2009; Janssen et al., 2012). Whetherintentional or unintentional, this provision could be seen to facilitate the outsourcingof government technology/software procurement. Until relatively recently, whengovernments needed a service or a product, their principal mechanism for sourcingwas a procurement process. But now, with the rise of open data, an alternate optionexists. Compared with the use of a tightly prescribed and standard vendor-seekingprocess, could civic hackathons now serve as a replacement for RFPs (requests forproposals) with prize money to motivate participants to generate a software applica-tion or another product built on open data, intended to serve a government need?Here governments capture the momentum and innovative potential of the civichackathon and use it in a modified version of the standard procurement process.While civic hackathons are not a clear substitution for procurement, particularly inthat software applications developed in hackathons have not yet been proven to havethe same longevity or mission-critical nature of typical government IT systems thatwould be procured through traditional channels, they do have the potential togenerate usable products for the government hosts.

Considering these outcomes, we must ask if there is potential for the civichackathon to act as an informal path for government procurement? For example,if hackathons produce viable products, does this mean that they are a reliable meansof securing services for less money, with less oversight compared with the at-timesrestrictive traditional procurement process? Implicit in these questions are concernsover who receives the dominant share of value from work done during a civichackathon, and in particular if application designers (or more specifically, the“participants”) receive “fair” remuneration for their work?

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In the private sector, there are many new ventures whose business model isbased on crowdsourced contributions. With this approach, innovative contribu-tors are sharing ideas with the market instead of being contracted to do the workwith up-front compensation and/or the retention of intellectual property rights(Brabham, 2009). One example is Dandy (http://dandy.co) whose business modelinvolves recruiting entrepreneurs to pitch ideas that are then peer reviewedthrough crowdsourcing, and then taken to market with some profit sharing forthe original developer. The issue of reciprocity is demonstrated here, with arecent quote from the CEO of Dandy: “I think people are getting more collab-orative. . . . The way we set up Dandy was to encourage people to understandthat you shouldn’t be going into this to expect fair market value for what you’redoing” (Dingman, 2014). In the private sector, participants may knowingly acceptthe risk that their entrepreneurial efforts may not produce billable hours orprojects, but when a hackathon is sponsored by a government, with a focus oncivic issues, what are the obligations of government to the participants (and thepublic) as the convener of these hackathons? Are hackathon participants fairlycompensated for their software development efforts, and importantly, do theyexpect to be?

Ultimately, in the case of a civic hackathon, we argue that there is a need toconsider the nature of the relationship between the government host and the eventparticipants. Is it the convening government that benefits, the hackathon partici-pant, or both? And if there are benefits, what form do they take, are they evenlyshared, or is even this base expectation of benefit unrealistic in our new era ofsmaller governments and smaller budgets? This focus on reciprocity is critical, as werun the risk of civic hackathons becoming “virtual sweatshops” in which the con-vener unfairly derives disproportionate economic value from the sleeves-rolled-up-joiner, participatory vibe of the hackathon.

Hackathons as Civic Engagement

As an extension of their open data strategies, governments have positioned civichackathons as an effort to engage the public in two ways; first the hosting of aparticipatory event, and second, through the creation of new apps designed forcitizen use, based on government open data. This framing of civic hackathons aspublic participation or civic engagement activities is emphasized in recent efforts todefine civic hacking. In 2013, civic designer and organizer Jake Levitas wrote “Civichacking is the act of quickly improving the processes and systems of local govern-ment with new tools or approaches, conducted with cities, by citizens, as an act ofcitizenship” and then ultimately concluded that “Civic hacking is the new civicengagement—and it’s here to stay” (Levitas, 2013).

To begin to frame the capacity of civic hackathon to act as public engagementactivities, there are a number of criteria for good citizen–government interactionsthat we can evaluate against. The International Association of Public Participation isa respected international organization that seeks to improve public participationworldwide, and their work is respected by citizens and governments at all scales.Table 1 illustrates their “7 Core Values for the Practice of Public Participation”which we then apply to civic hackathons to query their engagement potential.

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Of the seven core values for the practice of public participation, the strongest fitbetween what civic hackathons offer to support citizen–government interactions isgoal #6: Public participation provides participants with the information they need to partici-pate in a meaningful way. Civic hackathons should only be framed as a good form ofcitizen engagement if participants are provided with a clearly positioned designchallenge and the necessary open data. When we consider whom the participantsare, what happens with the apps once developed, and what the longer-term out-comes of the civic hackathon process are, the need for further information andclarification arises. For example, if the participants are local, then civic hackathonshave the potential to engage citizen-participants in developing solutions to prob-lems that more directly affect them (see core values #1 and #4) and in designingtheir modes of participation via the app and its interactivity (core value #5). If theapps created are put into use, then the participants could have influence overfuture decisions by using the open data, the app, and its outputs (core value #2),and the participants could perhaps see how their participation in the hackathoninfluenced future decisions (core value #7). But until research is conducted, in thelonger term it is unclear whether a civic hackathon is substantially more than a“stunt” to create short-term buzz, or whether its outcomes will have long-termimpacts (core value #3). We ask if the consideration and assessment of these valuesis missing or excluded in the rush and general excitement to simply liberate opendata and unleash the crowd to create an app or product of variable quality orpurpose? This line of questioning should be formalized and critically explored toassess the impacts of civic hackathons on civic engagement.

The release of open data and the use of hackathons for improving publicengagement, ranging from simple rapport building to using open data and citizenapps to provide direct access to or feedback on government services, is neithersimple nor straightforward. This highly variable process produces many questionsand concerns about the place of civic hackathons as an effective and valued toolamong the current and future practice of civic engagement. Despite ongoingenthusiasm for the civic engagement possibilities of a hackathon, many questionsare raised concerning the extent to which a one-time limited event (the civichackathon) can truly enrich citizen–government relationships? At this point, gov-ernments continue to engage citizens through a variety of activities ranging fromtown hall meetings to using wikis to solicit input on the policy development process.If civic hackathons are going to be a civic engagement tool that is more frequentlyused, there is a real need to more carefully scrutinize their impacts. This area of

Table 1. Core Values for the Practice of Public Participation

1. Public participation is based on the belief that those who are affected by a decision have a right to be involved inthe decision-making process.

2. Public participation includes the promise that the public’s contribution will influence the decision.3. Public participation promotes sustainable decisions by recognizing and communicating the needs and interests of

all participants, including decision makers.4. Public participation seeks out and facilitates the involvement of those potentially affected by or interested in a

decision.5. Public participation seeks input from participants in designing how they participate.6. Public participation provides participants with the information they need to participate in a meaningful way.7. Public participation communicates to participants how their input affected the decision.

Source: IAPP (2014)

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research on civic hackathons, their participants, and their outcomes is critical to thedevelopment of an assessment process for civic hackathons. Such an assessmentprocess or protocol would facilitate the assessment of these events the same way weassess other civic engagement activities, such as participatory budgeting. By askingwho participated and why, we can begin to analyze the types of participants andtheir motivations. By identifying and assessing the impacts of the events, we maybegin to discern whether participants in these events really do feel more connectedto their government as a result of their experience. And by tracing these impactsover time, we can build a better understanding of durability of these impacts overtime.

Conclusions

No longer a novelty, civic hackathons at all governmental levels are now becomingcommonplace. The related discussion of their relative value (or lack thereof) istimely, as space is quickly being created for critical questions, reflections, andneeded evaluation. In the summer of 2013, the popular press was filled withquestions and statements such as “are civic hackathons stupid?” (Badger, 2013),with proponents countering that “civic hackathons matter” (Korte, 2013), forexample, through the production of applications that improve service delivery andinspire collaboration. Despite these contrasting perspectives, the absence of aca-demic research leaves us questioning the outcomes of the civic hackathon phenom-enon and its impacts on citizen–government relationships.

If the civic hackathon phenomenon persists and grows, there is a clear need forresearch to assess their impacts, outcomes, and the value of their deployment (andvalue as derived by whom). One simple way to measure value is through descriptivestatistics surrounding contest inputs and outputs. For instance, the “low hangingfruit” research on app contests would include inventorying and counting: thenumber and type of apps developed, the number and type of participants, and thecoverage of the event in traditional and social media. In light of the potential rolethat hackathons could play in securing government-needed apps, the procurementand compensation elements of hackathons warrant further attention. Comparedwith their loose potential to deliver civic engagement, it seems likely that the greaterpotential impact on citizen–government relationships may come from the actualapps produced and research attention should be focused here. In theory, theprovision of open data and the incentive the hackathon provides should result inthe development of new apps that address place-specific needs and wants thatshould ultimately benefit the citizens of that particular jurisdiction. The reality ofthis situation, however, is inconclusive, with the implementation and overall evalu-ation of civic hackathon software applications frequently ignored or forgotten,leading to limited adoption and claims of limited value from the hackathon processitself. The gap between design and implementation signals the importance oftracking the outcomes of civic hackathons over time. If hackathon-produced appshave little prospect of being widely adopted, and have no life or impact beyond theevent itself, host governments run the risk of the hackathon process being labeledas disingenuous engagement activities and also of exhausting participants’ appetitefor future involvement in new activities.

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Overall, the discussion presented here begins to identify questions and issues forassessment to evaluate the civic hackathon phenomenon. It signals the need fortargeted hackathon research that tracks these events as they occur, tracing bothimmediate and longer-term impacts. This research should also consider the extentto which governments are meeting their projected goals for citizen participationand engagement through these events. Answering these kinds of citizen- andgovernment-centered value questions and tracking change over time will allow us todifferentiate between hackathons as stunts, or as innovative citizen–governmentinteractions with reciprocal benefits that produce new technologies and ideas thatrespond to citizen challenges and needs. While civic hackathons may currently be infavor, further research is needed so that hosts and participants can differentiatebetween a side-show or a meaningful opportunity for innovation and engagement.

About the Authors

Peter Johnson is Assistant Professor, Department of Geography and Environmental Man-agement, University of Waterloo. He has published in such journals as ACME: An Interna-tional E-Journal for Critical Geographies and GeoJournal.

Pamela Robinson is Associate Professor, School of Urban and Regional Planning, RyersonUniversity. Her book, Urban Sustainability: Reconciling Space and Place, co-edited with Dale andDushenko, was published in 2012.

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