Workshop: Residents in the driving seat — deciding together on AI in your city

Who actually decides which AI applications come to your city? And how do you ensure that residents have real influence — not just at the beginning, but throughout the entire process?

The research project Human Values in Smarter Cities spent three years searching for answers to that question, together with the cities of Amsterdam, Rotterdam and The Hague. The outcome is a practical handbook: Bewoners in the Loop - Samen beslissen over AI in de stad (translation: Residents in the Loop — Deciding Together on AI in the City). Central to it is the idea that technology is different from a fleet of street-sweepers. Specifications, use and consequences are difficult to predict, and software is continuously updated. This requires a cyclical approach in which design and deployment are constantly tested against the values the technology is supposed to express.

Residents should be involved at every phase of that cycle: from definition and procurement to design, rollout and evaluation. And the technology itself must be open — not closed black boxes, but systems that explain how they work and invite response and adjustment.

During this workshop you will work with the methodology from the handbook. What does this mean for a concrete AI application in your municipality? And how do you organise that process in practice?