From (Design) Theory to (Participation) Practice: Leveraging a Taxonomy for Digital Involvement Projects

Abstract

Amidst the rapidly evolving landscape of digital participation formats, navigating the field becomes a challenge for practitioners, policymakers, and researchers. This paper investigates how a taxonomy for digital involvement projects can be leveraged to capture design knowledge on participatory projects and make it accessible to relevant stakeholders. Employing a Design Science Research approach, we develop and assess an interactive web application, and preliminary design archetypes based on 46 project examples. Our research contributes to capturing the diversity of participatory project design, bridging theory and practice in the digital governance domain and beyond.