Introduction
Democracy does not stop after an election.
For citizens in Uganda, democratic participation also means being able to engage with local government, access information and raise concerns about decisions that affect their communities.
Public Dialogue Forum, a civic accountability organisation wanted to understand what citizens wanted their local leaders and institutions to address and how they experienced opportunities to participate in local governance.
Through a WatchTower deployment, citizens could share their experiences, concerns and priorities across different communities.
“We know who represents us, but we do not always know how to raise an issue with them.”
One report captures one citizen’s experience. But when similar reports emerge across different communities, they can reveal recurring issues and barriers to participation.
WatchTower was used to bring these experiences together and make community concerns easier to understand.
Hearing what the numbers can miss
Government records can show projects, budgets and administrative decisions. But they do not always show how citizens experience those decisions or whether people feel able to engage with local government.
Citizens can describe challenges around accessing information, raising concerns, engaging local representatives and participating in decisions that affect their communities.
Community reporting creates another layer of evidence, grounded in what people are experiencing and raising themselves.
How we listened
WatchTower was deployed to make it easier for citizens to share their experiences and for the organisation to understand community concerns across locations.
Reporting in familiar languages:
Citizens could share their experiences in languages they were comfortable using, making it easier to communicate local concerns in their own words.
Voice and text reporting:
People could submit reports through voice or text, giving them different ways to describe issues and experiences.
Translation and organisation:
WatchTower helped transcribe, translate and organise reports from different communities so they could be understood together.
Connecting related reports:
Reports could be explored across location, issue and time, helping recurring concerns and patterns in local participation become easier to identify.
Privacy by design:
Personal information could be minimised or generalised where necessary, particularly when people were reporting sensitive concerns.
A picture began to emerge
As reports accumulated, individual questions started to connect.
- Related reports
- 105
- Communities
- 25
- Languages
- 5
- Reporting period
- 10months
Where reports came from
Reports highlighted recurring concerns around community participation, local decision-making, access to information and engagement with local representatives.
Together, these reports helped the organisation understand the issues citizens were raising across different communities and where opportunities for greater engagement with local government existed.
Explore on mapFrom evidence to action
Listening is only useful if what communities share can inform what happens next.
The organisation could use these insights to support community dialogues, civic education, public accountability initiatives and engagement between citizens and local institutions.
The reports could also help identify recurring concerns and inform conversations with local representatives around the issues communities were raising.
Why it matters
Democratic accountability depends on more than elections.
It also depends on citizens having meaningful ways to access information, communicate concerns and engage with the institutions and representatives responsible for public decisions.
When citizens can share those experiences in their own languages and those experiences can be connected and understood together, community reporting can help make local governance more responsive to the issues communities are raising.
WatchTower helps organisations listen to those concerns and understand them at scale.
