Looking back:
In the first year of the Coalition, a broad foundation was established to further build upon. A lot of enthusiastic ideas and support came from cities as well as partner organizations. The commitment grew, and so far, 45 cities formally confirmed to endorse the 5 principles of the Coalition. Their digital policy will pro-actively take Digital Rights into account, while implementing co-created solutions that adhere these rights. The first members meeting in June was successful in aligning its ambitions with city expectations and needs. Moreover, several informative webinars on e.g. AI in the city and Data-principles in action proved useful in sharing knowledge and evoking discussion. Finally, the workshop on AI Ethics held in Helsinki, was a productive next step in city-to-city collaborations, resulting in AI Ethics Guidelines from London and Helsinki. More deliverables like this will follow during the next year, supported by the working group ‘New Technology’.

Based on cities’ needs, 4 Working groups are created so far:

• New Technologies: Anticipate accountability when implementing new technologies in the city. AI as first focus.
• Open Technologies: Produce policies aiming to improve digital rights through the use of open technologies.
• Data Economy: Work towards a policy position about the role of cities in the data economy.
• Digital Inclusion: Prioritize initiatives concerning digital accessibility to advance social inclusion.

Looking forward – Next milestones:
For next milestones, the main focus will be on creating re-usable deliverables, mutual learning, and local implementation. These efforts will be driven by working groups and city-to-city collaborations, supported with expertise and knowledge from research or policy institutions. The next milestone will be the members meeting in June in Amsterdam, where the cities will present their learning questions, initiatives, deliverables and learning questions. The meeting will provide an opportunity to present final deliverables or put on-going work open for feedback. Next year in Barcelona, awards will be handed out to most impressive efforts and collaborations from city-members. Meanwhile, an online a knowledge platform on digital rights will be created. Finally, we will work towards a more global representation in terms of member-cities, while also actively recruit small and intermediate cities as member.

Take-ways from the Members Meeting:

• Working groups are successful working towards solutions when also meeting face to face.
• Align city-challenges with research institutions.
• Organize more workshops and learning to support training.
• Local implementation and city-to-city collaborations should be a main focus.
• Sharing procedures is key in copying successful implementation of methods.
• Cities can actively encourage cities in their own country to endorse the coalition.
• Workshops and meetings should be focused on in-depth topics.

These insights provided solid input to finalize the Strategy 2020 for the coalition, with 40 actions, 10 objectives and 4 goals:

• Policy Goals, driven by working groups:
  1. Joint initiatives and deliverables: City members have produced deliverables and concrete collaborations on the topics of Open Technology, New Technology (AI), Data Economy and Digital Inclusion that support local implementation.
  2. Train digital policy makers: Digital policy makers and managers from city members are trained in the field of digital rights. City-to-city collaborations address local learning questions while learning by doing in practice.
• Coalition Goals, driven by the core-team:
  1. Build the coalition: At least 120 Cities from the 5 continents are members of the Coalition, with more than 100 demonstrable projects to promote digital rights and city-members are in close contact to learn from eachother.
  2. Reach International Impact: International policies from several regional and global organizations increasingly take Digital Rights into consideration with use-cases and positions of city-members.

You can find below this post the Strategy 2020 document, take a look and feel free to start working, contact us to start collaboration, join the coalition! You can contribute as a city member, or start a project with us as a partner of collaborator. Together we will make the 2020 objectives reality!

To make this happen, we unite in collective action and local implementation by:

• City leadership on technology = Local implementation and mutual support

Applying expert-knowledge in practical city context to tackle challenges collaboratively.

• Communities of practice & knowledge = Collective action and sharing know-how

Forming working groups and partnerships focused on digital rights topics relevant for City-members.

• International policy & positioning = Uniting voices > Policy outreach and advocacy

Gathering local use-cases and experience to influence international policy.

Next events:

• March: Milano Digital Week: Digital Rights working sessions and key-note discussions.
• Webinars: The webinars will continue; every last Thursday of the month.

Cities can:

• Share reports, research, best-practices and procedures of implementation.
• Join one of the working-groups.
• State and share learning questions or support other cities in with learning questions
• Start collaborations with another city, or other cities, resulting deliverables.
• Organize events, workshops and (face-to-face or online) working sessions.
• Add to policy positions.
• Write blogs or give webinars.
• Put local policy or guidelines related to DR topics open for feedback.
• Invite cities in their own countries to become a member.
• Actively contribute to any of the 4 goals or 10 objectives.
• Show local leadership for implementation.
• Train and create awareness amongst local policy makers.
• Align local universities or research programmes to the work of the coalition

Final Strategy 2020 - CC4DR.pdf