Artificial intelligence (AI) and digital transformation are not separate from the everyday lives of citizens: rather, they are closely interwoven with them, yet for many people their conditions and consequences are invisible or difficult to grasp. The possibilities for controlling and monitoring AI and digital transformation processes are even more difficult. More information alone is of little help when many citizens (and even scientists) experience the “digital revolution” as inevitable and unstoppable. What is needed here are innovative approaches and methods that enable citizens to grasp and critically examine digitization processes and their own experiences with the latest digital technologies, and to imagine alternative futures based on these. The project moves away from pure information and knowledge transfer and instead relies arts-based methods and future methods. The project brings together the researchers involved in these projects, as well as local practitioners and people from the city, plus other scientists working in this field, at the end of September 2025 to identify good practice examples for involving citizens in the explorative-creative examination of AI and digital transformation and to create a handbook “(Re)-Imagining AI with Citizens”.
The project is funded by the German Academic Exchange Service DAAD in the Arqus European University Alliance. Partners are Juliane Jarke, Graz University, Rob Kitchin, Maynooth University, and Federico Neresini as well as Stefano Crabu from Padova University.