--- tags: Polis --- # 2020-08-10 Polis for Lebanon :date: When? Mon, Aug 10 @ 5-6pm ET :family: Who's here? Divya Siddarth, Patrick Abi Salloum, patcon, Sari Louis. :raising_hand: Join: meet.google.com/fqo-hgff-nwr ## Notes - intros - patcon. civic tech. community member. - Team Polis = colin megill. chris small aka metasoarous. - sari. living in DC. friends and fam in lebanon. history of corruption. whatsapp was straw that broke. came across vtaiwan last year. big problem in lebabnon is consensus. - oct rev. leaderless by necessity. but hard to have unified message. looked into polis at the time. reached out to andrew. slow reply. took a few months. - propose name for alt gov that people are behind. choosing names as a first pilot? - sari feels polis could be good for eventual constitution rewrite - interested in getting things out as fast as possible - FB. RTL language. - how to get people to participate? everyone in lebanon uses whatsapp. but maybe FB messenger is the best bet. - patrick abi. - on the ground in lebanon. - software dev. known sari for 25 years - worked with audrey on XXX in past decade - take back parliament campaign in 2012. start of activism. active since. - last election was that first time ppl from outside parties participated. activism goal = trying to get people aware of who is running from outside corrupt political structure. - not huge success, but got to know the process, and what's going wrong. e.g., people feel that politicians are ruining country, but have no choice but to elect - 2018 = garbage crisis. protest stopped when garbage cleanup started again. - last year, econ situation deteriorated - problem = no unified opposition against gov. - first few months, very busy on the ground, so no time for online. but covid hit, so was online anyhow. why not tech now? - idea to use polis to hone name. trial for bigger later things - thought had more time. government resigned last night. - there's a window to use this on-the-ground. - starting to pitch to various groups - yes, trying to reach consensus n ground and failing. so opportunity - ... missed some context - lots of people only speak arabic, so really important - people don't use email or even web for organizing. mostly whatsapp or facebook - need to funnel through these thing - sari: barrier to entry is the biggest. - re: pilot. at first could have gotten away without arabic. but now, it's crucial. - feeling bullish on FB messenger - divya. volunteering with polis for police reform convo in MPL. eager to see how polis can be adapted to various contexts. not big on tech pieces. want to offer support. - patrick: initiatilly resistence to using online tools. old fashioned people wanting to use in-person ways. - sari: anonymous? if anon, how do we create trust? - divya: still in-process of deciding this for MPL (minneapolis) - patcon: - pilot. mailing list conversation. or some other place. - ORID => (objective) facts. (reflective) feelings. (interpretive) idea. (decisional) decisions. - possible pilots - name of new coalition - how do people feel about the party lines - different ppl feel problem lies elsewhere - more informing decisions than being decision-making tool - stakeholders. legitimacy. digital ad targetting. - depends on whether government will to be player. - patrick = start with internal small thing. - being careful not to exhaust social capital on the tests - language is RTL, so not totally straightfwd. - institutional partners? news media is the sort that Team Polis seems to recommend.