Democracy Hackathon

The Council of Europe has initiated a political and strategic consultation for a New Democratic Pact for Europe, aiming at addressing the current democratic backsliding. The 17-19 June 2026 Democracy Hackathon will feed directly into this consultation process to strengthen the foundations of democracy, amplify its benefits, restore trust, and innovate its forms to make it tangible and meaningful for all.

By joining forces with the No Hate Speech Week, we are creating a unified front against the rising tide of online hostility and disinformation. Together, we are making democracy tangible by building the very tools that will defend it.

BE THE BEST AT TECH AND AT DEMOCRACY

Maximising Ethics, Human Rights, and Utility, the Council of Europe is calling on multidisciplinary minds to design bold, human-rights-based solutions. Your team’s project should focus on one or more of the following thematic goals:

DATA PRIVACY: Balance the Privacy-Utility Trade-off: Build tools that effectively identify hate speech while remaining agnostic to the personal attributes of users.

NO HATE SPEECH: Neutralise Corrosive Narratives: Detect coordinated inauthentic behaviour or targeted harassment across digital platforms.

PREVENT MALICIOUS DOXING: Ensure that detection mechanisms cannot be weaponised to re-identify or expose anonymous online users.

BRIDGE THE GAP TO POLICY: Create actionable insights that feed directly into the Pact’s thematic workstreams and democratic consultations.

SOCIAL TRANSFORMATION: Solutions that transform the social dynamics of online hate by preventing, contextualising, and empowering through an intersectional lens.

INSTITUTIONAL ACTION: Create tech-enabled referral pathways that turn raw reports into structured evidence for electoral commissions and institutional actors to effectively prioritize and escalate online violence. Note: These goals form the foundation of our four specific Challenges. You are invited to select the challenge that best matches your team’s expertise.