Innovation-in-Europes-Cities_Bloomberg-Mayors-Challenge1

WinnersAthens664,046Population (2012)-1.58%Population growth per annum(2002-2012)€18,770GDP per capita (2013)-0.92%Annual GDP growth (2003-2013)Winning proposalGreekOfficial languageDirectlyelected mayor(five-year term)Metropolitan governancesynAthina: changing governmentfrom the bottom up by encouraginga volunteer culturesynAthina is an initiative aimed at the entirecity. Austerity measures hit Greece harderthan any other European nation, significantlyreducing the operational capacity of Athens.SynAthina is supported by a central municipalplatform and a new department that will promotesocial innovation. The initiative supports andencourages community and business-sponsoredprojects, while aiming to reduce the distancebetween citizens and government throughcitizen participation in problem-solving. Opendata is expected to facilitate transparency andprovide tangible measurements of the project’ssuccess, increasing residents’ levels of trust. As isthe case with many applicant cities, discussionsare already being developed to export thetechnology to other European cities, highlightinga desire to not only participate in city innovation,but profit from it too.Six years of GDP contraction has seen Greece’seconomy shrink by almost a quarter, but a recordtourist season in 2014 helped push the countryback into the black. During this time, Greecehas undertaken the biggest government debtrestructuring in history, with bailouts far largerthan annual GDP. With a high debt-to-GDP ratioand unemployment rate, especially amongst theyouth who represent significant lost potential,Greece is unable to fund many projects at anational or local level. Health care budgets, forexample, have been reduced by 40% as part ofausterity measures. In this environment, regularprotests have shown a growing mistrust betweencitizens and government; Greeks are the most likelyin Europe to believe their government is corrupt.VisionIn this environment, synAthina is an attempt torebuild Europe’s oldest capital city from the bottomup by employing citizen engagement as a lever forpromoting government transparency and reform.The project is supported by a website, whichallows citizens to list (on a map) projects aimedat improving the quality of city life in categoriesranging from urban improvements to education,culture and children. A matchmaking service linksvolunteers and funders, which can be made up ofcitizens, NGOs or private businesses. However,this masks the big steps Athens has had to takepolitically. Many of the informal activities, likegardening abandoned plots or street exchangebazaars, are technically illegal, and Athens is usingthe suggestions as feedback to rewrite a “complexsystem of administrative obstacles that repeatedlyinhibits citizens”. By providing official recognitionto community efforts, no matter how small, themunicipality wants to build a relationship of trustbetween local government and citizens whilefostering volunteerism.ImpactAthens hopes the project will give visibility andcoordination to volunteer efforts as the capitalpositions itself to benefit from the potential ofco-created solutions. Amalia Zepou, an activistturned-civil-servant,has been championing theproject for more than a year. Her inclusion inthe city’s government already signals a desire toexperiment with new forms of governance and anopenness to partner with citizens.ImplementationAthens has already worked to create a networkof activists operating within the city, and themunicipality plans to increase the sustainabilityof the project by hiring external experts to traincity staff and by involving city officials morebroadly. A pilot phase has shown some positiveresults and, in the future, open data will be usedto increase transparency by allowing citizensto measure the success of specific projects. Thecreation of a department for civil society furtherhighlights the municipality’s desire to have citizensdrive government innovation. In doing so, localgovernment wants to connect with citizens, butZepou believes that Athens also benefited from“being part of, and seeing itself as equal to, a groupof other cities from other European countries.”TransferabilitysynAthina contributes to resolving the challenge ofinadequate operational capacity at the municipallevel, particularly when it comes to responding tothe smaller scale day-to-day needs of its citizensin an open and transparent way. The perceiveddistance between citizens and government is aproblem affecting many European cities, as isthe need to find alternative methods to fund localprojects and services. However, the feedbackloop of using citizen proposals to impact by-laws,regulation and policy is relatively rare and suggestsopportunities to involve citizens in local governancein ways that go beyond initiatives to expand voting.36