The chapter provides a view of the ongoing innovation of ‘citizen panels’ as a method public participation. It shows how recourse to technoscientific modes of political ordering is met by reflexive engagements. Critical academic discourse, direct protest actions, and dedicated assessment exercises work together as a form of informal technology assessment. They counter the emergence of a transnational technocracy of political procedure. A closer look at an assessment exercise on the future development of ‘citizen panels’, carried out April 2014, reveals the potential and irony of reflexive engagements with technologies of participation. The conclusion extends this to other areas of social innovation.BMBF, 01UU0906, Innovation in Governanc
