ReConstitutional Convention
ReConstitutional Convention
From emergency city management in Detroit to platforms for crowd-sourced law in Scandinavia, the challenges of 21st century governance are generating new and disparate responses. Whether drastic reactions to political failures or tech-driven citizen-led innovations, these emerging experiments share a common foundation—the fact that our political systems must change to meet the needs of the future.
Finding a better way to make those changes is the mission of the Governance Futures Lab. In 2013, we convened a community of social inventors passionate about designing governance systems at our inaugural event: the ReConstitutional Convention. Participants included over 50 leading experts in social and political change, including James Dator, Jane McGonigal, Stephen Duncombe, James Fishkin, Hélene Landemore, Micah Sifry, Sanford Levinson, and many others.
2013 ReConstitutional Convention
Experts & Civic Innovators Gather to Ignite New Governance Design Thinking
As part of the ReConstitutional Convention, IFTF partnered with the City of Palo Alto to demonstrate what a governance design process looks like. We co-hosted an evening pre-event at the City Council Chambers to hear our world-class experts discuss foundations for a new way of thinking about governance. Palo Alto Mayor Gregory Scharff and IFTF Executive Director Marina Gorbis hosted this panel presentation.
At the 2-day ReConstitutional Convention in 2013, hosted at IFTF's offices in Palo Alto and around the world at several global nodes for the event, we imagined and prototyped new forms of governance together with artists, scholars, engineers, activists, entrepreneurs, performers, coders, and all those passionate about changing the future of governance. Everyone brought their skills to the ReConstitutional Convention events taking place in these locations:
- Birmingham, AL
- Chicago, IL
- Honolulu, HI
- London, England
- Los Angeles, CA
- New York, NY
- Palo Alto, CA
- Washington, DC
- Singapore
- Yangon, Myanmar
More Information
- Download Governance for the Future: An Inventor's Toolkit
- Check out the media advisory, IFTF Hosts ReConstitutional Convention: Social Inventors Wanted!
- Find out more about the IFTF Governance Futures Lab