How Open Data Is Transforming Democracy In Africa – And The Challenges It Faces

Kenya is at the forefront of the open data movement in Africa thanks to initiatives such as crowdsourcing software Ushahidi and government tracker Uchaguzi.

At the recent The Next Web Conference Europe held in Amsterdam, Marina Gorbis, Executive Director of the Palo Alto based Institute For The Future (IFTF) made a presentation on the “Nature Of The Future – Socialstructed World.”

Gorbis defines ‘socialstructing’ as “creating value by aggregating micro contributions by large networks using social tools and technologies”. In her talk and presentation she touched on topics around socialstructed work, socialstructed learning and socialstructed governance.

One of the key points raised by Gorbis in the presentation was the shifting of governance away from politicians and governments towards the citizens thanks to open data and social technology solutions.