Jason Goldman, @WhiteHouse Chief Digital Officer, comments on the digital institution We The People, the site used to create and maintain petitions to the White House.
A half million petitions. Over 40 million signatures. Hundreds of responses. We the People has been a remarkable experiment in a new kind of democracy: transparent, accessible, and responsive. A way for anybody, from anywhere, to send a message directly to the White House — and, if they collected enough signatures, to receive a direct response. When we launched in 2011, we were excited to bring a new level of transparency and access to the Administration, but we weren’t sure what would happen.
I’m very proud of the work that was started by the Office of Digital Strategy years before I joined — and where we’ve taken We the People since.
Half a million petitions – I had no idea. Mine was one of them – a failure, but a good failure. And the future?
While we’ve taken every step possible to make it easy for future administrations to carry on this tradition, it’s ultimately up to the incoming team.
You could see this as part of the political wars – an attempt to open communications with those currently living in their Fox News echo chamber. I’ve seen nothing on how well it worked.
This quote may turn out to be a little haunting:
“Citizens should be engaged and empowered. That those in power should serve the people, not themselves.” — President Obama, video message to the Open Government Partnership Global Summit, December 12, 2016
President Obama’s always had a clear vision of what government should be, and it’s a good one. I doubt Trump shares it. It would be a matter of morbid fascination to introduce the mythical truth drug into President-elect Trump and then ask him his opinion of the purpose of government.
