Connected by data

Over the next year the UK government will be looking at how it replaces GDPR following Brexit, through the Data Protection and Digital Information Bill. At the same time all the major political parties will be developing their manifestos in the run up to the next General Election, scheduled for 2024 if not before.

We think this means there is a unique opportunity to influence the democratic and participatory governance of data, to ensure it works for us all, as part of the UK’s post-GDPR future.

Research ICT Africa (RIA) is running the Africa Just AI project with a three-year grant from the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) and the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA). Their intention is to serve as an AI Policy think tank in Africa using knowledge grounded in the historical and contemporary contexts of African countries; advocating for people-centred, beneficial AI innovation; and building local capacity and awareness – not only to develop AI systems, but also to govern them justly.

We believe effective data governance should be: collective, democratic, participatory, deliberative and powerful.

But what should organisations collecting, using or stewarding data, and the communities that data affects, do in order to achieve this? And how can we show that the often dry topic of data governance is something that demands creative and critical engagement?

Over 2023 we’re running a multi-stage design lab to explore the creation of a serious game (or games) that can help individuals and organisations to think about planning, running and evaluating collective and participatory data governance activities.

Many different groups around the world are coming to realise the value of collective and participatory data governance. There are strong academic research groups, for example those based at Tilburg University, University of Vienna, and the University of Sheffield. There are excellent think tanks, including the Aapti Institute, Open Data Institute, Ada Lovelace Institute and Research ICT Africa. And there are practitioners embedded within data holders (such as the UK’s National Health Service), working with communities (such as around Open Environmental Data) and operating as consultants (such as Involve or IpsosUK).

There is a huge opportunity for these groups to learn from each other, and to together develop shared resources that are useful for everyone. Our goal with this project is to help that happen. We want to:

make connections between different stakeholders that lead to successful collaborations and partnerships
co-develop common language, policies and toolkits that are adopted by those who are advocating for, designing and implementing collective and participatory data governance laws and practices
facilitate sharing and learning across stakeholder types that increases the quality and novelty of their work

CONNECTED BY DATA has been commissioned by the International Development Research Center (IDRC) to explore how the Global Data Barometer can be used to provide a baseline and measurement tool for the realisation of the Data Values Manifesto.

CONNECTED BY DATA was commissioned by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) to improve their understanding of the current landscape and stakeholders they want to support, work with, influence and inspire as they create a new insight and analysis infrastructure to help improve how the ecosystem understands inequalities, and how to solve them.

Connected by Data was been commissioned by Justice Lab (a special initiative of the Legal Education Foundation) to conduct an evaluation of the public deliberation exercise that led to the report Justice Data Matters: Building a public mandate for court data use in order to surface lessons for similar future exercises within and outside the UK justice system.

We worked with Create Gloucestershire, Active Gloucestershire and Barnwood Trust to organise a one-day county-based conference exploring how data can work better for local communities.

Projects

Our Data Futures

Research ICT Africa

Governance Game

Growing Data Governance Communities

Measuring Data Values Around the World

Ecosystem Mapping and Engagement

Justice Data Matters Evaluation

Gloucestershire Data Day

Do you collect, use or share data?

We can help you build trust with your customers, clients or citizens

Do you want data to be used in your community’s interests?

We can help you organise to ensure that data benefits your community