SPRIND Citizen Hackathon: Germany, what annoys?

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Under the motto “Germany, what annoys? What’s going on?” – much more impolitely in English “Germany, what sucks?” – the Agency for Innovation (SPRIND) is calling on citizens to participate starting in April. The model for the new initiative is the “Presidential Hackathons” successfully held in Taiwan. The proposed solutions for problems in Germany’s administration are ultimately to be cast into open-source software.

Wisdom of the (hacking) Crowd

In a first round, 30 topics selected by the citizens themselves will be addressed, according to the website of “Deutschland, was nervt?“. Subsequently, submissions that will go into development will be selected by the citizens themselves and the Civic Tech Teams of SPRIND. According to its statements, SPRIND will finance “15 ideas that have the potential for social leap innovations.” By the end of 2026, five projects will receive the commitment that they will be implemented in administration.

Blueprint from Taiwan

At SPRIND, Zahra Bruhn, among others, has been responsible for the new area of social leap innovations, SPRIND SOCIETY, since last year. These are considered just as important as technological innovations – from autonomous flying to AI. She recently explained this at the Munich conference Digital Live Design.

With these innovations, SPRIND wants to “relieve the budget and effectively strengthen the cohesion of our country.” Ideas and software hacks are being collected for digital citizen participation, education, social services, administration, health, and environmental protection.

The model are the presidential hackathons in Taiwan. There, Audrey Tang, who practically “hacked” her way into the office of the island state’s first digital minister, had made radical citizen participation a firm institution. Between 2016 and 2024, Tang introduced the presidential hackathons and “ideathons.”

Suitable for Germany?

According to SPRIND, Taiwan has extremely improved its approval ratings with radical citizen participation, and Tang, now Cyber Ambassador, is now working to advance the model internationally – for example, in California. Tang reported in Munich that, among other things, ideas and measures for early fire detection and better fire protection were collected in this way. “Turning complaints into energy,” is the principle, according to Tang.

In addition to the Baltic and Scandinavian states, Germany is now getting its citizen hackathon with the SPRIND initiative, for complaining and doing. What will actually be implemented in German government offices remains to be seen.

(dahe)