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WorkCIVILIS

Own product2023 – 2024

CIVILIS

A civic consultation app for India. Read the law in plain words, have your say once and privately, and see what changed.

Role
Founder, research to build
Timeline
2023 – 2024
Scope
Research, brand, app, console
Platforms
iOS · Android · web
Origin
MSc HCI · Nottingham
Overview01 / 08
A person by a bicycle holding a phone that shows the CIVILIS logo
Brand on device · mockup
01 · The product

Read the law. Have your say. See what changed.

Most people never answer a public consultation. CIVILIS turns each one into a short brief, a private verified vote and a public record of what happened next.

0SUS score for the 2023 prototype³
0of testers would recommend it
0iterations, 2023 to 2024
Dig deeper · the project in one minute
The question

Can AI make public consultation easier to understand, harder to manipulate and more accountable, without taking the decision away from people?

The approach

Mixed methods: a literature and standards review, four interviews, empathy maps, 18 requirements, an information architecture, a task analysis and a clickable prototype.

The result

Thirty people tested the prototype in 2023 and rated it 89 on SUS. In 2024 we rebuilt it twice: first as a full system, then for less reading and more trust.

02 · The problem

Consultation exists. Participation doesn't.

Before testing anything, we asked 30 people how they take part today. Scroll through what they told us.

10 of 30 people

Pre-study survey · n=30 · 2023
Finding 1One in three had never taken part.

Ten of thirty had never answered a public consultation, a government survey or a town-hall meeting.

Finding 2Almost nobody trusted it.

Only three thought e-governance in their region was fully transparent. Their worries: manipulation and cyber attacks.

Finding 3The news arrives second-hand.

Twenty get political news from social media, ahead of TV (12) and newspapers (10).

Finding 4But they wanted a better way.

Twenty-two believed a good platform could raise participation. The gap wasn't apathy.

Three things were missing
  1. UnderstandingThe law, in words people use
  2. TrustThat an answer is counted, once
  3. ClosureSeeing what changed, and why
"A data breach, especially on a governmental platform, could severely damage public trust."P2 · Local government official
Dig deeper · who took part
Age
18–2420%
25–3433%
35–4423%
45–5413%
55–647%
65+3%
Where political news comes from
Social media67%
TV40%
Newspapers33%
Confidence the system represents them
Not at all10%
Very confident17%

Multiple answers allowed for news sources. Full results are in Appendix C of the paper.

03 · Process

Two years, three loops

Each loop ran the same five stages. The first was the research. The next two turned it into a product.

  1. 2023Desk research and interviews
  2. 2023Requirements and prototype
  3. Summer 202330-person study
  4. Sep 2023Dissertation submitted
  5. Early 2024Iteration 2 · the system
  6. Late 2024Iteration 3 · less load, more trust
04 · Evolution

What changed, and why

Drag across the phone to compare. Every change has a reason, and some have a number.

BeforeAfter
05 · Try it

The real app, in your browser

Pick an iteration. The phone is the working app: tap anything, or follow the steps.

Live demo · sample data⁴ · nothing you type leaves this page

    06 · The system

    How a consultation moves

    Sources in, verified people in, AI that cites its sources, and a loop that ends in public.

    SOURCESIDENTITY & CONSENTPROCESSINGOUTPUTS Citizen appiOS · Android · web SMS and voiceplanned next Officials' consolepublish · respond Official documentsbills · drafts · notices Verify onceVoter ID or mobile + OTPeligibility, not identity Pseudonymous IDone person, one voiceidentity kept separate Consent ledgerper purpose, revocable Plain-language briefLLM over official text onlyclause citations · confidence Editor reviewhuman sign-off beforeanything is published Responsesde-duplicated, receiptedcensus weighting Themes and sentimentclustering over reasonsand comments Moderation assisttone hints while writingflags with reasons Human moderatorsdecide · log · appeal Encrypted in-country storage · audit log of every actionrelational for structured data · document store for comments · scheduled backups Briefs and timelinesfor citizens Live verified resultswith method notes Insights for officialsthemes · quotes · export Open data and APIaggregates only Transparency reportremovals · AI corrections Feedback loop: the department's response is published back to everyone who took part
    AI drafts, people decideBriefs cite clauses, show confidence and pass an editor.
    Verified, never exposedChecked once, then a private ID. Built around India's DPDP Act 2023.
    Rules in publicHuman moderation, appeals and a regular transparency report.
    Dig deeper · the data pipeline, step by step
    1. CollectRegistration, votes, comments, plus timestamps and activity logs.
    2. Store and checkStructured data in SQL, comments in NoSQL, with validation and consistency checks.
    3. PrepareClean, de-duplicate, normalise; sensitive fields encrypted at rest.
    4. UnderstandLanguage processing, sentiment, theme clustering and moderation flags; LLMs draft summaries.
    5. ShowInteractive charts for results, simpler visuals for quick reading.
    6. ShareResults dashboards, per-consultation views, CSV and PDF export, open API.
    7. LearnFeedback on AI output retrains models; flagged content goes to people.
    Identity in eight steps
    RegisterStoreSign inSessionRolesVerify (OTP/2FA)ProfileAudit

    From chapter 9 of the paper: the data processing pipeline and the identity management pipeline.

    07 · Brand

    Civil, in every sense

    Latin civilis: of public life. And civil: courteous, calm. The name sets the tone for the product.

    C · I · V · I · L · I · SCivic Involvement Via Interactive Legislation Information System

    A civic building drawn in straight lines: the institution, and the connections that run through it.

    Primary
    On civic blue
    On ink
    Stacked
    ColourTap a swatch to copy it
    Aa

    Read the law. Have your say.

    Noto Sans · one family for every script we ship
    1. Display · 30Your two minutes today
    2. Title · 21Affordable Medicines Bill
    3. Body · 15Every point links to the clause it came from.
    4. Label · 11Consultation · 9 days left
    CIVILIS splash screen on a phone
    Splash
    Home screenBrief screenCommon ground screen
    Dig deeper · the 2023 style guide, and what changed
    2023 style guide: colours and typefaces
    2023 style guide
    What changed

    The 2023 guide paired Inter and Mulish. The build moved to Noto Sans, so English, Hindi and the next four languages share one family and one rhythm.

    Voice
    • PlainWords people use at home, not in ministries.
    • CivilCalm, never shouting. No exclamation marks.
    • HonestSay what AI wrote, and what it isn't sure about.
    08 · Outcome

    What it showed, and what we changed

    0SUS · grade A"Excellent" · n=30, 2023³
    Task completion, 2023 prototype
    Reach home25.0 s
    Find profile3.4 s
    Take part in a poll48.2 s
    Explore freely1 m 34 s
    Bar: completion rate · value: time on task
    0more positive about e-governance
    0felt more able to take part
    0would recommend it
    0felt more informed
    Less to read, late 2024²Iteration 2Iteration 3
    Choices before the first thing to do, home −86%
    71
    Words on the first screen of a brief −34%
    8959
    Words in the whole brief tab −42%
    15489
    01Trust is a feature, not a promise.

    Receipts people can check did more for trust than any privacy copy we wrote.

    02Detail on request beats detail by default.

    Three ideas first, the clause wording one tap away. Nothing is hidden, nothing is in the way.

    03Show agreement, not volume.

    Comment threads reward the loudest. Common ground shows where people already meet.

    The paper

    Designing a Human-Centred, AI-Powered E-Governance Platform

    MSc Human-Computer Interaction · University of Nottingham · 2023 · supervised by Nicholas Gervassis · 116 pages

    1. CIVILIS is planned to open as a public beta in Q1 2027, in English and Hindi.
    2. Measured on the two demo builds by counting words and choices on screen. Not a user study.
    3. MSc user study, University of Nottingham, 2023: 30 participants, think-aloud, System Usability Scale and before-and-after questionnaires.
    4. Departments, people, numbers and consultations in the demo are fictional samples. CIVILIS is our own product, not client work.
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