In September 2025, two workshops took place as part of the SCALEDEM project: At the Translation Workshop on September 10-11, 40 consortium partners and external experts from academia, research, practice, and administration gathered at RIFS Potsdam to discuss how the scientific findings developed in the project so far can be translated into concrete criteria for the next project step: How can a scientific theory about how the scaling of democratic innovations works be translated in such a way that two funding programs to be set up as part of the project receive viable and practical criteria for the selection, consultation, and research of funded projects? High-level stakeholders from the Bertelsmann Foundation, Nets4Dem, DemocracyNext, FIDE, and the JRC European Commission were recruited to participate in the consultation.
Immediately afterwards, a consortium meeting was held at RIFS Potsdam on September 11-12, where the large project team evaluated the findings from the translation workshop and decided on concrete next steps. The two funding programs (Twinning and Piloting) are scheduled to start in December 2025 with a call for applications. The programs will use practical applications to test and deepen the social impact of democratic innovations. The nexus Institute is leading work packages 5 and 6, which focus on the implementation of the funding program for pilot projects.