Mission
The concept of democracy is all about collective self-governance. It is about inclusive, disciplined, rich and enjoyable conversation. And it is about community- based decision making and about public buy-in to legislation, which an older generation was far more inclined to accept as edicts from on high.
Problem
Humanity has prospered through its ability to act collectively. However, problems with how groups make decisions has led to critical challenges, including economic inequality, climate change, political instability, military aggression, and dwindling resources.
These are the great challenges of our times, and they cannot be solved using the same decision making processes of time’s past.
Democracy has been famously described as the worst system of government, except for all the others. But problems with democracy are becoming more apparent. Concentrations of power, undue influence, factional division, lack of accountability and disengaged citizens are bringing faith in democracy to an all-time low. At the same time, democracies are facing a challenge from technologically sophisticated authoritarian states.
To survive, democracy must use technology to deepen the advantages that group participation and collective wisdom can provide. We need to optimize mobile technology and social networks to access the best available human understanding. We need to integrate our collective intelligence using information technology and big data analytics. We need real-time feedback loops and inclusive, iterative processes that can generate broad consensus and united efforts for effective execution.
Solution
Ethelo was created to improve group decision-making using democratic principles. It harnesses the reach and computational power of the internet to aggregate the intelligence of groups in a fair and broadly supported way.
Ethelo avoids the polarizing dynamic of majority votes, in which a single “winning” faction holds all the power. Instead, it uses behavioural science and sophisticated data aggregation to achieve the fundamental democratic principle, “fairness in the distribution of influence.”
Ethelo allows broad engagement in solving complex problems of planning and public policy. These multi-factor problems can have thousands or millions of scenarios – far beyond the grasp of traditional processes. Ethelo uses social technology to distribute the task of decision analysis, and then applies tailored algorithms to find decision paths that will attract broad support.
Ethelo makes scalable, optimized consensus on contentious issues an achievable reality. Learn more about the technology here
Strategy
Our strategy for social change is to upgrade democracy by providing citizens with the tools to create and participate in democratic processes. Ethelo helps people and citizen organizations build a public mandate for political change.
We provide free Ethelo licenses for citizen groups to engage citizens in democratic decision-making on public policy issues. Upcoming in 2017 we will provide a public API to the Ethelo Engine, and open source access to the core Ethelo code for public interest-minded developers to experiment with and build upon.
Ethelo enables groups to come to collective decisions on political issues ranging from community action to public policy and legislative change. If you or your organization would like to use Ethelo to build a public mandate for social change, please contact us.
Feedback
“As opposed to all people shouting at once in a social media megaphone, the powerful thing about this new platform is its capacity to build on peoples ideas and create group cohesion through dialogue and conversation."
Elizabeth Geller,
Community Investment Manager
Vancity Credit Union
“An exceptional advance on the state of the art and can be considered new benchmark of state of art that is clearly ahead of competitors."
Public Works Supplied Assessment Panel
Federal Government of Canada
“Our group, Generation Squeeze, is a national lobby group for folks in their 40s and younger, and we operate with very few resources. This means it's difficult for us to find the opportunities to dialogue about the important issues facing our constituents. Ethelo's platform allowed our folks to not only vote on what was important to them, but also to add comments and build on other people's thoughts. The transparency was appreciated and our constituents really felt heard."
Erin Robinson,
Business Development
Generation Squeeze
“I am very excited about Ethelo's potential for dramatically expanding public engagement in the key policy issues of our time."
Antony Hodgson (Ph.D.),
President
Fair Voting BC
“Ethelo is a perfect example of real-time deliberation over long-distances, impossible before the internet, which ought now become the centerpiece of a new model of democracy. "
David Berlin,
Founder Bridge Party, Founding Editor of the Walrus
“Ethelo is a dramatic new technology that can facilitate democratic citizen participation in political decision making. As people insist on more say in the decisions that can affect them, Ethelo can make modern citizen engagement possible and practical."
Judy Rebick,
Founder
Rabble
“Ethelo is far more powerful than crowdsourcing. The sophisticated algorithm paired with the social media interface is unique in the marketplace."
Branch Director
Federal Government of Canada
“Its time to stop forcing people to stew in silence between elections and start opening up politics to continuous participation. Online participation software can provide a reflective and accurate snapshot of voter preferences and Ethelo is the most sophisticated solution I have come across."
Roslyn Fuller,
Independent Candidate
“Metro Vancouver Alliance organizes through relationships. The issues we tackle come directly from listening to our membership. We have found great value in using Ethelo for our transit fare consultation. Ethelo gave us a new option for consulting a large and diverse membership that was in line with our values and methods"
Deborah Whittman,
Lead Organizer
Metro Vancouver Alliance