Cecilia Passanti discussed the “Agora of the Digital” at the Social Innovation Pavilion in Nairobi

In spring of 2026, the Innovation Foundation for Democracy wrote a white paper containing reform propositions that were presented to African and European Heads of State and Government meeting at Africa Forward Summit (11-12 May 2026, Nairobi). Postdoc Cecilia Passanti contributed to Georges Eyenga Macaire chapter titled ‘Digital technologies in support of material security and the rule of law’ - with her idea of the ‘agora of the digital’. She presented this idea at the Social Innovation Pavilion of Achille Mbembe’s Innovation Foundation for Democracy in Nairobi on 10 May 2026.

The ‘agora of the digital’ denotes the creation of participatory spaces enabling public intervention in digitization projects developed by and for state administrations. As public goods, their development cannot be left to experts and auditors. But these projects need to be opened up, becoming themselves a moment of democracy production. The agora allows to produce shared knowledge, learning and innovation around the possibilities of “the digital as it is” and not “how it is in theory presented to be”.

In practical terms, the agora allows digital projects to increase the collaboration between African public administrations and the social sciences – especially, linking African university laboratories engaged in anthropology and critical studies of the digital. The anthropological reading of digital governance allows to re-socialize technology through collective knowledge and sustained human engagement, bringing the society back in. Normalising the presence of social scientists around the development of digital public projects, this model of production could be similarly developed in western countries.

To listen and look the Pavillon interventions, click here:

Social Innovation Pavilion: Bringing Society Back In (Cecilia’s presentation from 3:09:00 to 3:13:00)

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