Developing a Co-Creation Workspace (EE0058)

Brief description of the commitment The state co-creation project creates a comprehensive workspace that covers the entire life cycle of the draft, enabling the co-creation of drafts and the management of amendments on the same platform. The system helps to involve the public, as well as increases the transparency and improves overview of the legislative drafting of the country

Problem definition
What problem does the commitment aim to address? Law is the most important policy-making tool that affects all people, and the way laws are made determines both the content of future legislation and how it will be adhered to. In a democratic state governed by the rule of law, legislation must be open, transparent, and free of bureaucracy. The existing technical solutions for legislative drafting do not provide the necessary clarity. Each draft has several versions during the procedure, which are formatted in separate Word documents. Incoming feedback and responses thereto are also presented in separate documents, which makes it extremely difficult to track changes and their causes. This means that it is difficult for the general public to gain insight because the information is fragmented in different places. In addition, the existing solutions do not promote the involvement of civil society in legislative drafting. Information about the topic often reaches stakeholders only when the first version of the draft is already completed. Cooperation between the parties during the procedure is also lacking. The legislative drafting information systems currently in use are technologically outdated. In addition, they do not create opportunities for cooperation or favour the use of modern co-creation opportunities in the legislative drafting process.

What are the causes of the problem? More specifically, the problems that will be solved by the project are the following:

 Lack of transparency – different stages of the procedure are not connected to each other in a sufficiently 10 traceable way.

 Inadequate solutions enabling cooperation – the solutions promoting cooperation are incomplete. There is no possibility to manage activities on the basis of a group or individually. The related parties communicate with each other by sending document files and presenting the amendments in the form of a table. The proposals, recommendations, and consents of the parties are in a separate text that is not related to the provision to be amended.

 Problems with the quality of legislative drafting – there is no up-to-date overview of which agencies deal with which topics; as a result, it is difficult to get involved and express an opinion at an earlier stage. The impact analysis is not linked between stages and is not sufficiently tangible.

 Lack of a technological solution supporting legislative drafting – the technological base (draft legislation information system EIS, EMS, Word, Excel, emails) and the information contained therein are fragmented, with different structure and logic; the existing technological solutions are outdated.

 Problems of usability, user-friendliness, and ease of use of existing solutions – in the usability analysis of the participatory website and the draft legislation information systems EIS, the user-friendliness of the EIS has been evaluated with, among others, the following comments: ‘terrible’, ‘this tool is not suitable for the ministry in its current form’, ‘the search engine is poor’, ‘too much of a burden’, ‘technical problems still unresolved’, etc.

The description of the problems has been prepared, among other things, with the help of the mapping of the legislative drafting procedure in 2012, the extensive involvement of the Innotiim, and the feedback received from the test groups of the prototype of the co-creation workspace. In addition, the PRAXIS analysis on the usability of the EIS and the reports of the Minister of Justice in the Riigikogu on the quality of legislative drafting have been used as additional sources.

Commitment description
What has been done so far to solve the problem? A prototype was created for the project in 2019. It has been introduced to approximately 300 future users both in focused and documented test groups (9 test groups of the entire project + 5 test groups of the EU case procedure) and at introductory events. There has been great support and interest from potential users. In 2020, the development of the MVP began, which can be considered the first phase of the project. In the second half of 2021 and the first half of 2022, piloting of the first phase started and the solutions continued to be improved. Wider piloting of the first phase is planned for the first half of 2022. In parallel with the development process, the needs to change the legislative drafting procedure are analysed with the aim of making them more suitable for data exchange instead of file exchange. In the beginning of 2022, the next stages of development of the co-creation workspace were launched, including both internal and public cooperation, the processing of EU cases, and the public view. SF funding for the project will last until August 2023.

What solution are you proposing? The proposed solution enables the following for the legislative drafting workspace to be created as a complete solution:  it is possible to participate in a public consultation and express opinions through the public user interface;  a selectable event for meetings with lobbyists and stakeholders has been created with the necessary data fields, which can be exported from the workspace by topic.

What results do we want to achieve by implementing this commitment? As a result of the development, a modern user interface for consultation with the public will be prepared, which will reduce the administrative burden of both stakeholders and drafters, will be more user-friendly, and create better conditions for the involvement of the parties. Covering meetings with lobbyists and stakeholders during the drafting 11 process increases the transparency of legislative drafting.

Commitment analysis
How will the commitment promote transparency? The changes would have a positive impact on civil society, enabling a better overview of the proposed legislative drafting and creating ways to get involved with less time, including presenting opinions on a specific provision. The number of manual steps in the legislative drafting process is reduced. The materials do not have to be moved from one system to another during the procedure as the entire procedure related to the matter takes place in one workspace, providing an overview of the schedule, related materials, involved persons, and amendments made over time.

How will the commitment help foster accountability? Prerequisites are created for improving the quality of legislative drafting. Involvement, including communication with lobbyists and stakeholders, is organised in a transparent and traceable manner.

How will the commitment improve citizen participation in defining, implementing, and monitoring solutions? Anyone who is interested in what is happening in society and wants to be informed about it or have a say can participate in legislative drafting through the public user interface. The changes would have a positive impact on civil society, enabling a better overview of the proposed legislative drafting and creating ways to get involved with less time, including presenting opinions on a specific provision. Even those who currently have less opportunities and knowledge can have a say in legislative drafting. Namely, pursuant to the procedure already in force today, senior officials disclose meetings with lobbyists, but meetings concerning draft legislation are excluded from this regulation. Disclosing the meetings regarding draft legislation as well provides better access to the legislative drafting process for various stakeholders.

Commitment planning Milestones Expected outputs Expected completion date Stakeholders

It is possible to pilot participation in a public consultation and expressing an opinion 1. It is possible to pilot the possibility for the parties to participate or be involved at an earlier stage of the procedure and to organise the involvement more efficiently: manual activities are replaced by August 2023 Lead: Government Office, Ministry of Justice Supporting stakeholders Government CSOs Others (e.g. parliament, private sector, 12 automated ones; the information is in one workspace and is not moved around manually. 2. A common procedural workspace that enables better ways of cooperation. 3. A convenient functionality for expressing opinions and discussing comments in a public cooperation workspace has been created, which can be piloted. etc.) Network of Estonian Nonprofit Organisation s, Estonian Cooperation Assembly, eGovernance Academy, Estonian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Transparenc y International Estonia

A selectable event for a meeting with lobbyists has been created with the necessary data fields, which can be exported from the workspace by topic 1. All meetings with lobbyists and stakeholders that take place within the framework of one draft legislation are visible in the procedure of the same draft legislation 2. The following information is available regarding meetings organised to discuss draft legislation with lobbyists and stakeholders: participants, time, and topic. 3. Information on meetings with lobbyists and stakeholders can be exported from the cocreation workspace. June 2024 Lead: Government Office, Ministry of Justice Supporting stakeholders Government CSOs Others (e.g. parliament, private sector, etc.) Network of Estonian Nonprofit Organisation s, Estonian Cooperation Assembly, eGovernance Academy, Estonian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Transparenc y International Estonia

Action Plan Review

Commitment 1.1 Developing a Co-Creation Workspace

● Verifiable: Yes

● Does it have an open government lens? Yes

● This commitment has been clustered as: Increasing co-creation in policy-making (activities 1.1, 1.2, and 1.3 of the action plan)

● Potential for results: Substantial

Government Office, Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Interior, Ministry of Finance

For a complete description of the activities included in this commitment, see activities 1.1, 1.2, and 1.3 in the action plan here.

Context and objectives

Estonia has sought to nurture participatory and co-creative policy-making practices throughout several OGP action plans. Increasing the transparency and accessibility of public decision-making has been the government’s and civil society’s shared priority as the government’s lawmaking process has been deemed complicated for the public to follow and take part in. [1] Symptoms of this problem are persistently low public participation rates in policy-making processes and civil society organizations (CSOs) being involved in policy processes too late when there is little time to substantially influence the government’s plans. [2]

This commitment continues the development of a government-wide digital tool for legislative drafting and co-creation that Estonia started in its fourth action plan. In addition to giving the public an integrated view of the policy cycle, the tool will enable citizens to participate in different stages of the lawmaking process. The commitment also continues the fifth action plan’s work on developing a public toolbox of co-creation methods to serve as a resource for policy makers, and the government will continue testing specific co-creation methods in real-life policy-making exercises.

• Under the fifth action plan, the government developed a minimum viable prototype [3] of the legislative drafting and co-creation tool, conducted user tests and launched pilots to test the functionalities of the tool in actual legislative drafting processes. For the sixth action plan, the government aims to develop a pilot-ready version of the tool’s public interface, which would enable the public to submit comments in legislative drafting processes. In addition, data on meetings with lobbyists where the particular initiative has been discussed will be presented next to each legislative initiative.
• Under the fifth action plan, the Government Office developed an online toolbox of co-creation methods, but publication has been delayed due to discussions around the technical solution. [4] The toolbox will include a repository of co-creation methods, guidelines, and real-life case studies, as well as an overview of the government’s ongoing policy co-creation processes. The Government Office published the first parts of the toolbox in November 2022 and regards it as a ‘live’ resource that government agencies and other stakeholders can update with their own methods and experiences. As part of the sixth action plan, the Government Office aims to add four new co-creation methods to the toolbox, some of them based on CSOs’ input to the action plan co-creation process.
• Under the fifth action plan, in 2021, the Government Office coordinated a large-scale participation initiative gathering young people’s proposals for improving the living environment in Estonia using the “opinion journey” co-creation methodology. [5] The sixth action plan will adopt a similar method but on a much larger scale: government institutions, CSOs, and individual adult citizens of different ages will be invited to conduct 150 group discussions all around Estonia to solicit input to the 2023 annual action plan of the national development strategy “Estonia 2035”. The methodology and lessons learned from this exercise will be added to the co-creation toolbox and the government will provide reasoned response to participants on how their input shaped the annual action plan.
• Under the fifth action plan, the Ministry of Rural Affairs analyzed the management and participation practices of their more than 20 advisory bodies with the aim to develop guidelines for better engagement of stakeholders in these bodies. [6] This activity is not continued in the sixth action plan.

As a new activity, the sixth action plan includes a review of the legal and policy landscape to create a roadmap for widespread adoption of co-creative policy-making methods at the central and local government levels. This commitment therefore seeks to advance both government transparency and civic participation by combining digital tools, methodological resources, public participation initiatives, and roadmaps for legal and policy change.

Potential for results: Substantial

The impact of this commitment is not likely to be immediate – major shifts in public participation are likely to happen only in the long term if the government continues advancing transparency and inclusion in policy-making processes. However, previous action plans have already made small improvements in transparency and participation that create a strong foundation for the sixth action plan.

First, initiatives such as the youth’s “opinion journey” have given a small number of policy makers direct experience of coordinating co-creation processes and a small number of citizens experience of participating in such processes. Positive experiences like this can encourage the government to implement similar participation initiatives on a broader scale. This is visible in the new commitment to conduct 150 group discussions with citizens to co-create the “Estonia 2035” strategy’s next annual action plan. As of November 2022, 115 discussions have already been registered, covering all 15 counties of Estonia. [7]

Second, the government has laid the groundwork for more open policy-making practices at the central level by developing a digital tool, the design of which enables and explicitly encourages transparency and co-creation. According to the current roadmap, a government-wide adoption of the tool would likely not happen before the year 2024 and further developments (e.g., integration of Parliamentary proceedings) may continue beyond 2025. [8] This means this commitment, if implemented as planned, will constitute an incremental, yet indispensable step in a long process of shifting to new policy-making methods and tools. According to the coordinator from the Ministry of Justice, the use of the co-creation tool will become mandatory for government agencies once it is ready for adoption. [9] She also notes that the government users who have piloted the tool have given positive feedback and expressed a desire to use it in the future. Both the obligation and intent to use the system are important, albeit not the only preconditions for successful institutionalization of new policy-making practices.

Although previous action plans have included capacity building of public officials and ministries’ public engagement coordinators, they lacked a comprehensive plan to drive deeper institutional change. Commitment 1.2 addresses this gap, by establishing an expert group that will analyze the gaps that hinder the adoption of co-creative policy-making practices in government agencies and local municipalities. The expert group will then develop a public roadmap laying out proposals for fostering co-creation at the central and local government level. According to the commitment coordinator, the expert group is led by two open government experts from civil society and is divided into two sub-groups, one focusing on the central government level and the other on the local level. [10] The expert group includes representatives from three ministries, the Government Office, and a number of CSOs and social partners. [11] The local government subgroup also includes representatives of municipalities. To inform the roadmap, the expert group is conducting interviews with ministries and plans a survey among key CSO partners to analyze their views on the barriers of public participation. [12]

Ultimately, this commitment’s impact will depend on the actual implementation process that follows the adoption of the roadmap. The government is currently considering two possible approaches to that. [13] The first would require the expert group and Government Office to work with ministries to carry out the roadmap’s proposals that relate to their policy area. However, if a stronger mandate is needed to drive action on the roadmap, the Government Office could take the roadmap to the cabinet of ministers, who could assign tasks to government agencies and oversee their implementation. Either way, the Government Office’s strong sense of ownership of this commitment increases the prospects of it leading to substantial changes in government transparency and civic participation in the long term.

Opportunities, challenges, and recommendations during implementation

Since this commitment continues work from previous action plans, the key challenges that may affect implementation have already been highlighted in previous IRM reports. These include the need to work on promoting the take-up of the resources created as part of the action plan, and the challenge of securing institutional will to change policy-making practices. [14] More specifically, the lead agencies could consider the following recommendations:

• Devote attention to fostering a culture of collaboration and dialogue in addition to promoting new co-creation methods. According to the Estonian Cooperation Assembly, the action plan’s focus on trying out new methods is valuable but carries the risk that more attention is paid to the technical side of collaboration than to fostering a culture of dialogue and creating spaces conducive to genuine co-creation between different stakeholders. [15] Possible measures to support cultural change include civil service training and capacity building, but also identifying and empowering innovators and community leaders within the public sector and civil society who can drive cultural change in their organizations or communities. The expert group could be tasked with analyzing what resources, experiences, and incentives public officials and CSOs need to become active proponents of co-creation in their organizations. For future consideration, stakeholders have also proposed the government establish a center of competence (either as a separate institution or department of a government agency) with the responsibility and resources to develop democratic governance in Estonia. [16]
• Include action to support ministries’ public engagement coordinators in the work of the expert group. The IRM has previously recommended strengthening the role of public engagement coordinators to advise engagement processes in government agencies. [17] Despite efforts to support the coordinators’ work, the role of engagement coordinators continues to be uneven across ministries, often depending on the top managers’ interest in public engagement. [18] The expert group could propose a course of action for strengthening the role of public engagement coordinators in ministries. This may require reducing other work in the coordinators’ portfolio to allow them to focus on supporting their institutions in public engagement. The Government Office notes that the expert group is autonomous in deciding what solutions it will propose, but leaders of the expert group have interviewed ministries’ public engagement coordinators and they are engaged in evaluating possible steps in the future. [19]
• Devise an action plan to foster active use of the co-creation toolbox. As this valuable resource becomes available, it is vital to plan concrete activities to promote its use. Ministries’ public engagement coordinators could jointly plan activities to promote the toolbox among their colleagues. In addition to ministries, the toolbox could also be interesting for CSOs and local governments. The Government Office could take the lead in disseminating information about the toolbox and work with the Association of Estonian Cities and Rural Municipalities and CSO networks like the Network of Estonian Nonprofit Organizations, the OGP civil society roundtable, Kodukant the Village Movement, and others to share the toolbox with various communities.
• Engage ministries from the outset to secure their commitment to carry out the activities in the roadmap. According to the Government Office, the expert group is interviewing ministries to identify their needs regarding the use of co-creative and collaborative policy-making practices. It is important that the expert group keep close contact with all ministries to ensure their awareness of the roadmap process and discuss their role and responsibilities in implementing the resulting proposals early on.