The Third Pillar: How Markets and the State Leave the Community Behind

by Raghuram G. Rajan

For instance, an app called SeeClickFix allows community residents to report potholes, broken streetlights, abandoned vehicles, building violations and other civic complaints, using their GPS location to pinpoint where the problem is.8 The community webpage then displays the complaint for all to see, and reports when the local government actually fixes it. Citizens who lodge the most genuine problems can be acknowledged on the app, and even awarded prizes by the community. Apps like this allow local government to get to know of problems more quickly, involve the community, and make the performance of the local government more transparent to all. Even as I write, three open complaints have been closed in the City of Chicago SeeClickFix website. City officials could not find a car that was reported abandoned (perhaps not surprising because the officials arrived a month after the report was filed) and two instances of graffiti were removed (within a couple of days of the reports).

Seeclickfix app