Designing Alternative Systems for Local Communities.

Alternative systems ranging from self-organized skill sharing to alternative micro-economies have been critical channels of community engagement and bonding. Technology is increasingly playing a role in the way people connect to these services at the (hyper)local level. While there has been considerable research on designing technology to support conventional, established systems of community organization and governance; mobile and ubiquitous technologies offer strong potential for alternative systems to be established in the local level. Do It Yourself (DIY) and maker movements are enabling grassroots activist groups to develop their own technologies or to hack existing tools to support bottom-up systems of self-organization, democracy and commerce. Based on these trends and the recent worldwide economic, political and societal crisis, this workshop will bring together researchers, practitioners and activists to re-envision how HCI tools can support alternative systems of local civic engagement.