in content lists or on the content page.Funding call: Integrating the Polis platform into municipal decision-making
Sitra is opening a funding call on using the Polis digital platform to promote residents’ participation in municipal decision-making. The call will be open until 12 noon on 6 May 2025.
What is it about?
Many important decisions concerning our daily lives will again be made in municipalities during the upcoming electoral term. Developing and updating the municipality’s primary services from a genuinely human-oriented perspective and with an understanding of the residents’ needs requires the local authorities to provide more effective ways for their residents to participate.
Residents’ opportunities for wider participation improve the quality of decision-making, increase the approval rates of the decisions and may even speed up the decision-making process.
According to Sitra’’s citizen survey (link in Finnish), people want to participate in societal decision-making. The survey shows that people are especially interested in anonymous, easy and digital forms of participation. As a result, Sitra developed and supported experiments of new forms of participation in the wellbeing services counties between 2023 and 2024. We are now starting work in municipalities to establish and promote forms of resident participation that are genuinely linked to decision-making, enhance the knowledge base for decisions and strengthen representative democracy.
Polis is a digital platform that enables the constructive exchange of opinions on a selected topic for large groups of people. On the platform, they can vote on other people’s conversation prompts and add their own prompts. The platform is easy to use, anonymous and makes it possible to discuss shared matters digitally. At the same time, the platform shows what the residents of the municipality agree and disagree on. This helps municipal decision-makers identify which issues can be promoted with broad resident support and which still require further work to find a suitable solution.
In the funding call, we are looking for municipalities wanting to improve their residents’ participation in decision-making using the Polis platform. Instead of individual experiments, the funding will focus on projects aimed at establishing the use of Polis in the long term. The funding may be used for purchasing the Polis platform, implementing a Polis discussion, developing the participation process related to using Polis and strengthening the required capabilities. To receive the funding, the municipality must organise at least five Polis discussions between 2025 and 2026.
All municipalities may participate in the funding call. In addition, a maximum of four municipalities, each with fewer than 20,000 residents, may also apply for funding together (consortium). However, Sitra will then issue a separate funding decision and conclude a separate funding agreement with each municipality applying for funding.
In the call, a maximum of five projects will be funded so that each party receiving funding will be allocated a maximum of EUR 25,000.
Sitra’s share of the funding may be up to 50 per cent of the total costs of the project. The costs eligible as project expenses have been described in the terms and conditions of Sitra’s funding. For example, 50 per cent of the total project expenses may be salary and indirect personnel costs resulting from the work input in the applicant’s project.
The project must be implemented and reported by 31 August 2026.
The funding call will open on 26 March 2025 and close at 12 noon on 6 May 2025.
Sitra will provide the projects with content-related support and regular coaching. Sitra’s role will be agreed upon in more detail in connection with the funding negotiations.
Read more and apply on the Finnish application site.
