September 04, 2026

Update: Co-designing community assemblies on AI

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In brief

Since we launched the Citizens’ Track on AI Whitepaper alongside the UN Global Dialogue on AI Governance in Geneva in July, and building on our workshop at the Palais des Nations, we’ve been spending the last six weeks planning out next steps, laying groundwork, and working on a number of funding bids to take the Citizens’ Track on AI from theory into practice.

Read on for details, and information on how you can get involved by:

Co-design Sprint: A toolkit for Community Assemblies on AI

Community Assemblies are events that bring together diverse members of a local community to learn about, discuss and share ideas and actions about a topic.

Over October 2026, we are running an online co-design sprint to build the first version of an open, adaptable Community Assembly Toolkit on AI. The toolkit will provide practical guidance, deliberation modules, and feedback tools to help local organizers across the world facilitate informed community dialogues on AI that connect directly to local and global governance processes.

This is a critical component in our goal to support hundreds of community assemblies across the world in the run up to the next UN Global Dialogue on AI Governance next year.

We’re inviting a cohort of 10–15 practitioners, facilitators, educators, and deliberative designers to collaborate across five weekly 90-minute online sessions alongside asynchronous drafting. You can read more about the toolkit and process, or apply by 25th September to join the co-design sprint.

Community Assembly Toolkit: Briefing and Kick-off workshops

In the lead up to the co-design sprint, and for those who can’t make the sprint but would like to contribute ideas, we’re running a number of short workshops to share more about the Community Assembly model, and to explore priority topics, potential activites, and key design principles.

We’re running the first of these online on Monday 14th September at 15:00 UTC (9:00 Mexico City; 16:00 London; 20:30 Delhi) followed by in-person sessions in San Francisco on 16th September 16:00 - 18:00 and Washington DC on 18th September 15:00 - 17:00.

We’re also hoping to organise a session on 22nd September in New York alongside UNGA, subject to securing a venue (recommendations/offers welcome!).

If you know someone working on Critical AI literacy, participation or community engagement who might be interested in joining one of these sessions, please so forward details on.

We would also love to also organise further outreach sessions like these, both online, and with participants of the co-design sprint. If you think you might be able to help out, get in touch.

New Social Media Presence

We’ve created LinkedIn and Bluesky accounts for the Citizens’ Track. We’re still in the process of getting them set-up, but to hear ad-hoc updates outside of these occaisional newsletters:

We’ll be working next on moving this e-mail list to a proper mailing list platform.

Funding Foundations and Growing Governance

The design phase of the Citizens’ Track on AI has been carried out with in-kind support from Iswe Foundation, Connected by Data, University of Sheffield, Ada Lovelace Institute and a number of other partners, as well as a small start-up mandate from the Swiss Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It has been run as an informal partnership project.

As we look ahead, we’re looking to raise funds to:

  • build a core delivery team supporting community assemblies and creating docking points for public voice;
  • develop a network of regional fellows initiating and supporting community dialogues on AI;
  • provide micro-grants to address gaps in current AI engagement, ensuring all voices are heard; and
  • bring public participants together in moments of transnational deliberation.

We are working on a number of funding applications at the moment, and in September, along with ISWE Foundation, we are also part of a number of funder roundtables (In San Francisco, and alongside the UN General Assembly meetings in New York) focussed on mobilising wider support into the democratisation of AI governance.

You can support this work making a donation to the Citizens’ Track on AI, getting in touch if you could offer a letter of support for one of our upcoming funding applications, or reaching out if you spot an opportunity to explore a joint funding proposal.

In parallel to fundraising, we’ve been working to bootstrap the future governance of the Citizens’ Track on AI:

  • We’re aiming to create an unincorporated association to provide project oversight with a small board of partners from across the world;
  • We’re drafting membership and partnership agreements to set out clear relationships for fiscal hosts of activities, lead partners, supporters, and other collaborators;
  • We’re working on website updates to include more information about the team and partners involved, funding, governance and activities.

We’re committed to working collaboratively and in the open.

Community Updates

Have you been running a project engaging the public on AI? Get in touch to make sure it is featured in the Public AI Voice and Engagement Case Book, and so we can share news in future Citizens’ Track on AI newsletters.

Keep in touch

Any questions? Ideas? Get in touch by reply, or mail contact@citizens-track.org.

Thank you once again for your support

Tim Citizens’ Track on AI convenor

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