Frequently Asked Questions
This page will try to answer your most common questions about Decidim.
- What is Decidim?
Decidim is a Free Open-Source participatory democracy platform for cities and organizations.
- Who is behind Decidim?
Decidim was created by the municipality of Barcelona in 2016. It is now used and co-developed by many other organisations such as the city of Helsinki, the French government and several Spanish regions.
- Who is currently using Decidim?
You can check out the platforms of other users such as Barcelona in Spain, Helsinki or Tuusula in Finland or Lille in France. You can also see the full list of organisations using it on this page.
- What does free and open source mean?
Free as in freedom, which means that you can do anything you want with this tool. The source code of Decidim is open and anyone can reuse it without paying. Being able to see the code is also really important to verify that the tool doesn't manipulate people's votes or doesn't hide certain proposals.
- Does it mean I can start to use Decidim today without paying?
Absolutely! Decidim and its Swedish translation (which we did with the city of Helsinki) can be installed without restrictions on your own server infrastructure. If you are looking for help to deploy your platform or to adapt it to your participatory needs, Digidem Lab has accumulated the expertise and the skills to train you to use and administrate the Decidim, but also to design participatory processes mixing physical and digital parts and to support Swedish municipalities in all their projects concerning participatory democracy. Read more on our website.