After my experience this semester, Civic Tech means more to me than just applying technology in communities to “do good”. It’s a manifestation of several larger societal factors, dependent and independent of communities, and in some ways, dependent and independent of technology. The Civic Tech movement comes from a cultural need to address deficiencies in the ways communities interface with governments, and also the ways communities interface with the private sector. Because there are goals to achieve for all players involved, for communities to improve themselves, for governments to improve their relationships and interactions with communities, and for the private sector to improve their relationships with communities and (in some respects) governments, Civic Tech forges itself through the collision of all of these entities attempting to improve the conditions on which they exist. I understand the movement as trying to “do good”. But this is a multi-faceted action. It is doing good for the benefit of communities, while improving government relations and efficiency within communities, with private sector involvement in performing market research, public relations, and general research and development, while interfacing with both government and communities. Civic Tech operates under the assumption that while doing good in communities is good, its overarching benefits also cascade across multiple sectors and actors. Civic Tech is born from an underlying societal shift in trust within communities, a shift away from trust in government and the private sector.
