Action Path

Action Path is a mobile app for civic engagement produced by Erhardt Graeff at the MIT Center for Civic Media.

Since 2013

MIT Media Lab, Amherst Street, Cambridge, MA, USA

Action Path is a location-based civic engagement platform for Android smartphones that prompts citizens to explore their cities and participate in governance around infrastructure issues and planning. Existing platforms for civic engagement, whether online or offline, are inconvenient and disconnected from the source of issues they are meant to address. They require that citizens leave the places they normally inhabit physically or virtually and commit to a separate space and set of processes. Action Path answers the challenge: How do you address barriers to effective civic engagement in community matters, and ensure all citizens can have their voice heard on how to improve their local communities? It does so by converting individual actions into collective action and by providing context and a sense of efficacy, which may help citizens become more effective through regular practice and feedback.