Part Two of a two-part series on data at the subnational level | By Christine Ajulu, Deputy Director – Open Institute Earlier this year, I wrote about why data so rarely moves at the county level. That first article sat with an uncomfortable set of obstacles: data that clashes with political agendas, county staff with…
Across East Africa, governments have made significant investments in public participation processes. Constitutional provisions, county forums, digital platforms, and citizen consultations have become increasingly common. Yet despite these efforts, participation often remains procedural rather than meaningful. Citizens are invited to meetings, budgets are published online, and draft laws are shared for comment. But an important…
Across many communities, data is constantly being collected about people’s needs, challenges, and lived realities. Yet, the very communities represented in this data are often excluded from understanding, managing, or using it meaningfully. Evidence Mkononi is a project led by Furaha, our Community Manager at Maono Space, under the Data Values Advocate Programme and a…
Part One of a two-part series on data at the subnational level published by Christine Ajulu, Deputy Executive Director Imagine a nurse in a county health facility somewhere in Kenya. Call her Amina. Every month, she fills in a register on how many children have been immunised. She writes the figures neatly, signs the form,…
If you were to count every hour spent preparing meals, cleaning homes, tending to children, or caring for the elderly, how much of the economy would that be worth? For decades, the daily rhythm of unpaid work, mostly done by women, was invisible in national statistics. Time-use surveys started as simple diaries of how people…
By Florence Syevuo and Al Kags At a recent breakfast gathering in Nairobi, we asked each person who walked into the room to take a single puzzle piece. No explanation. No picture of the final image. Just that small fragment, handed over with a quiet challenge. As the morning unfolded, something wonderful happened. Strangers began…
The Civic Tech Innovation Forum 2024 opened up fresh perspectives on the interplay between technology, data, and governance across Africa. Themed “Under The Hood”, it caused civil society players to reflect on the relationship between self, community and tech while looking under the hood, underneath the surface of our work, our communities and the technology…
For years, the Open Institute has worked diligently to guide counties towards more effective, data-centred decision-making. Our focus has been on equipping local governments with essential tools and expertise, ensuring better resource allocation, stronger policies, and improved public services. In the last two and a half years, our partnership with Nandi and Kilifi counties has…
For the first time in a decade, the world has witnessed a significant decline in social progress. The Social Progress Index highlights that last year, 61 countries saw a decline, 77 stagnated, and only 32 made real progress, with the UK falling into the second tier for the first time. With 4 out of 5…
One of the main goals of our active citizenship work is making sure that data is widely accessed and used not just by governments but by citizens. We cannot achieve true data democracy when citizens are not involved in an active way in the data life cycle. We need to move away from only seeing…
📅 Dates: November 25 & 26, 2024
📍 Location: Nairobi, kenya
Unlock the future of data governance with industry leaders, insightful sessions, and networking opportunities!
