Leveraging Institutional Analysis and Participatory Design in the Development of an Innovative Data Dashboard System

• In Event: Lightning Session: Social Equity and Race

Abstract

Community-based organizations are key actors in the struggle to address food insecurity and other equity issues.  However, many community-driven food systems initiatives are hampered by limited funding, which in turn compromises their management and organizational capacities.  Institution-community partnerships offer one opportunity to address these challenges by leveraging institutional resources to advance community efforts in the expansion of access to fresh, affordable food and to the equitable economic opportunities that these local food systems can facilitate.  In this presentation, I describe a design-based needs assessment and evaluation project that generated the People’s Market Dashboard System (PMDS) for the Multnomah County Health Department and PlayGrowLearn— a community-based non-profit in East Multnomah County (Portland Metropolitan Area).  The PMDS is a digital platform that supports market data management, administrative decision-making, and partner collaboration for enhanced market operations and organizational sustainability.  Using a thick description case study, I 1) discuss the evolution and participatory development of the PMDS as a data management platform; 2) illustrate how an institutional analysis approach (Ostrom, 2011) provided reciprocal benefits to the PMDS development and year 2 market operations planning, and 3) identify further applications of IAD in similar contract-based, socially-driven initiatives. This presentation discusses a novel, applied context in which the practical utility of IAD is demonstrated and its theoretical utility as an explanatory tool of collective action is expanded.

Author

• Lauren Forbes, University of Cincinnati
  Presenting Author