Civic crowdfunding research: Challenges, opportunities, and future agenda

Abstract

Civic crowdfunding is a sub-type of crowdfunding through which citizens, in collaboration with government, fund projects providing a community service. Although in the early stages of development, civic crowdfunding is a promising area for both research and application due to its potential impact on citizen engagement, as well as its influence on the success of a wide range of civic projects ranging from physical structures to amenities and local services. However, the field remains under-addressed in academic research and underdeveloped in terms of the number of civic projects posted to crowdfunding platforms. Acknowledging these issues, we outline the history of civic crowdfunding and describe the current landscape, focusing on online crowdfunding platforms established specifically for the funding of civic projects (Citizinvestor, ioby, Neighbor.ly, Spacehive). The challenges and the opportunities of civic crowdfunding are examined, and its distinguishing characteristics are outlined, including a consideration of the impact of social media and platform features. We then propose a research agenda to help shape the future of this emergent field.

Civic crowdfunding

“…In addition to crowdfunding's widespread growth over the last few years in terms of geographic reach, funds raised, and number of platforms [17], various 'sub-types' of crowdfunding have also emerged. One of these is civic crowdfunding, a process through which citizens, in collaboration with government, can fund projects providing a community service [23]. Civic crowdfunding projects can be large-scale, such as funding the Glyncoch Community Centre in Wales 1 , although the emergent "typical" civic crowdfunding project tends to be smaller scale [5], such as funding an urban community garden.…”

Using Social Media and Mobile Technologies to Foster Engagement and Self-Organization in Participatory Urban Planning and Neighbourhood Governance

“…Governments have not yet been able to tap effectively into citizens' online social networking practices that are part of citizens' daily routines. The same applies to the use of social media as tools for crowdsourcing that replace traditional data collection or funding mechanisms, in particular in grassroots movements, bottom-up initiatives and new forms of urban regeneration led by citizens (Seltzer & Mahmoudi, 2012;Stiver et al, 2015). The capacity to access the expertise of quieter voices is acknowledged as a key advantage in online crowdsourcing approaches in participatory planning (Brabham, 2009;Jones, 2015, this …”

Potential of civic crowdfunding to the intelligence of cities and social innovation: an exploratory study

“…Civic crowdfunding is the funding of projects which, directly or indirectly, benefit from government funds, assets, or sponsorship, and may include the development of public assets such as public parks, sidewalk maintenance, and wireless Internet [Davies 2014[Davies 2015. Civic crowdfunding has attracted attention for its capacity to partner project creators with municipalities, organizations, and individual citizens interested in online and offline contributions [Stiver et al 2015]. It is an appealing alternative source of funding at a time of constrained government budgets [Bernardino, Meira and Freitas Santos 2015].…”

“…It is an appealing alternative source of funding at a time of constrained government budgets [Bernardino, Meira and Freitas Santos 2015]. Additionally, civic crowdfunding has great potential for non-financial benefits such as facilitating networking, and encouraging collaboration between citizens and government [Stiver et al 2015].…”