The Blog
Dr. Fotis FitsilisNew article on parliamentary control
Hellenic OCR Team co-founders Fotis Fitsilis and George Mikros have published their latest open access article in the Journal of Open Humanities Data! This is the flagship publication on the science and methods behind the Team’s unique composition and approach.
My lecture at the UAegean
On May 21, 2021 I had the pleasure to give an invited lecture titled “Digital Transformation and Parliamentary Procedures” at the University of the Aegean.
EU Twinning Projects in Serbia
This is a state-of-the-art scientific analysis on EU Twinning Projects in Serbia just published on Contemporary Southeastern Europe. It was jointly drafted by Fotis Fitsilis and Aleksandra Jovanovic and among others constitutes good practice of Twinning follow-up cooperation.
Parliamentary Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic
New article by Fotis Fitsilis and Athanasia Pliakogianni on the response of the Hellenic Parliament to the pandemic published on IALS Student Law Review. Check it out and send us your scientific comments!
ParlTech: Transformation Framework for the Digital Parliament
Cool stuff from our newly forged research alliance! Dimitris Koryzis, Apostolos Dalas, Dimitris Spiliotopoulos and Fotis Fitsilis just published a new article about Parliamentary Technology on Big Data and Cognitive Computing, an MDPI journal.
Interview in futurized.co
Do not miss to check my latest interview with Trond Undheim in Futurized.co on Parliamentary Tech and Hypertransparency. Available as podcast!
Linking policy making with user experience
Our HCII 2020 contribution on ‘Policy Making Analysis and Practitioner User Experience‘ is out as part of the Springer Lecture Notes in Computer Science book series. Proud to be counted among a great team of scholars and practitioners.
New paper on the digital transformation of parliamentary control
Our joint ICEGOV 2020 paper with Sotiris Leventis and Vasileios Anastasiou titled ‘Application of enterprise integration patterns for the digital transformation of parliamentary control‘ can now be found in the ACM digital library.
Fall 2020 lectures and presentations
Fall 2020 started dynamically with a set of lectures, chaired conference sessions and presentations. It began with LEX2020 Summer School and ICEGOV 2020. Here’s what I did, so far!
Parliaments in the pandemic
The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic took whole societies by surprise. Naturally, parliaments worldwide did not remain untouched. Following months of research, my team and I came out with a set of related presentations and articles. Read and comment freely!
A follow-up on SDGs
Our new article with Franklin De Vrieze on parliamentary monitoring of SDGs in South and Southeast Asia has appeared in the Journal of Southeast Asian Human Rights.
A summer full of science
What a summer so far! Full of (virtual) meetings and events: ReMeP, Samos Summit, HCII, Digital Humanities, EDS Summer University and a virtual conference in beloved Argentina. Read the bullets below, check the presentations and watch the videos!
Media appearances
In the first week of June 2020, I had a couple of interesting media appearances to introduce the topic of digital regulation to the public.
Regulating the Digital World
On 4 July 2020, I had the privilege to co-organize, jointly with the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, a webinar with the title ‘Regulating the Digital World’. The event was based on my recent book Imposing Regulation on Advanced Algorithms (2019, Springer).
Knowledge management as a parliamentary challenge
This is the beginning of a series of brief articles originally posted on LinkedIn that have been developed to highlight significant concepts and argumentation in relation to parliamentary development and governance matters. The articles have been jointly developed by Dr. Fotios Fitsilis and Bruce Philip Todd and are pieces of a larger mosaic soon to be put together in the form of a book covering the sector. The first article deals with knowledge management in the parliamentary context.
My new article on SDGs
My new article, jointly with Franklin De Vrieze, just came out on the Journal of Legislative Studies. It is titled ‘How parliaments monitor sustainable development goals – a ground for application of post legislative scrutiny’.
Teaching at the National School of Public Administration and Local Government
Herewith I announce my appointment to the teaching staff of the National School of Public Administration and Local Government! This assignment is linked with the design and operation of an innovative legislative drafting laboratory.
Ανάλυση δραστηριοτήτων 2004-2009
Μετά από σχετική έρευνα στο αρχείο μου και σε ανοικτές πηγές, ιστοσελίδες και ΦΕΚ, παρουσιάζω έναν πρώτο κατάλογο της δημόσιας δραστηριότητάς μου για την περίοδο 2004-2011, κατά την οποία υπηρέτησα σε δημόσιες θέσεις στο υπουργείο Ανάπτυξης (2004-2007) και τη Βουλή των Ελλήνων (2007-2009).
New printed edition of Popular Economics (updated)
Good news for the fans of popular science! A new limited edition printed version of my 2013 electronic book titled “Popular Economics: A Reference Guide in Times of Crisis-the Greek Case Study” is out! Contact me and secure your personal copy.
Middle East Conference in Doha
I am delighted to announce that my paper has been accepted for presentation at the Inaugural Middle East Conference in Doha, originally planned for 20-21 April 2020. Unfortunately, also this conference has been postponed for reasons related to the outbreak of the COVID-19 virus. Below the outline of my presentation.
Workshop Report: IFLAPARL 2019
The new IFLAPARL Newsletter (February 2020 edition, pp. 6-7) contains the full report on our workshop during the 35th Pre-Conference of Parliamentary Research and Library Service, which was titled “Science and Innovation in Parliamentary Libraries and Research Services”.
Invited session at the ICEGOV 2020 (updated)
It is my very true pleasure to announce that my proposal, on behalf of the Hellenic Parliament, for an invited session at the ICEGOV 2020 UN conference in Athens has been accepted! ICEGOV 2020 will be held on 23-25 September 2020.
My appearance at the Hellenic Parliament TV
On Saturday 25 January 2020 I appeared at the Hellenic Parliament Television show “Member’s Card” to discuss about innovation in politics and parliamentarism.
Impressions from the ICON-S in Florence
The Italian chapter of the ICON-S organized its second conference, which took place at the premises of UniFI, Università degli Studi di Firenze, in Florence, from 22nd to 23 November 2019. This international public law conference was titled Le Nuove Tecnologie e il Futuro del Diritto Pubblico (New Technologies and the Future of Public Law).
Book review: Imposing Regulation on Advanced Algorithms
This is a book review by Omar Cíceri Pizo of my latest monograph Imposing Regulation on Advanced Algorithms. It appeared in November 2019 in Revista General de Derecho de los Sectores Regulados.
Διδασκαλία αρχών τεχνολογίας και προγραμματισμού (συνεχής ανανέωση)
Στο πλαίσιο των εξωσχολικών δραστηριοτήτων που προσφέρει ο Σύλλογος Γονέων και Κηδεμόνων του 5ου και 11ου Δημοτικού Σχολείου Αγίας Παρασκευής για το σχολικό έτος 2019-2020 λαμβάνει χώρα και η νέα δραστηριότητα «Αρχές Τεχνολογίας και Προγραμματισμού». Η διάρκειά της είναι 1 ώρα την εβδομάδα και απευθύνεται σε μαθητές όλων των τάξεων του δημοτικού.
Hellenic OCR Team’s second anniversary!
Something big happened back in November 2017; our scientific crowdsourcing initiative, the Hellenic OCR Team, came to life! This November, members and supporters celebrate our second anniversary. Look out for a special monthly meetup and get introduced into the state-of-the-art processing and analysis of parliamentary data.
My book presentation at the ICON-S in Florence
A book presentation and the following discussion are great moments for every author. Moreover, it does not get any better when these take place in the majestic environment of Università Degli Studi di Firenze, Italy, during an ICON-S conference, the International Society of Public Law, 22-23 November 2019.
My presentation on digital democracy
Glad to have participated on September 26th, 2019, to a highly specialized expert meeting on Digital Democracy organized by the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung Greece and Cyprus.
Open datasets in Figshare
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The opening of three very interesting data sets is announced today! These data sets originate from three distinct research sectors that are being pursued by our Parliamentary Foresight Lab, a virtual research laboratory in the Department for Scientific Documentation and Supervision at the Scientific Service of the Hellenic Parliament.
read more…
YouTube channel going live!
It is time to go live! Established long ago, it took some time to become fully functional, but now its here. My YouTube channel with my TV appearances and academic presentations is now up and running!
Participation to Open Science working group
The Hellenic OCR Team participates in the Open Science working group, which constitutes an initiative of the ATHENA Research and Innovation Center.
Hellenic OCR Team supports Post-Legislative Scrutiny
GSoC 2019 tool ready for use!
The Hellenic OCR Team announces the finalization of the software development project Tool for Extracting Quantitative Text Profiles. The code was developed by Panagiotis Papantonakis for GSoC 2019. Project management was undertaken by Hellenic OCR Team members, so called mentors.
Being at Wroxton (once again!)
My presentation on SDGs in Yangon
I had a great opportunity to present my latest research on the parliamentary monitoring of SDGs in Yangon, Myanmar at the Academic Conference on Post-Legislative Scrutiny in Asia, 17-18 June 2019. This was a joint contribution with Franklin De Vrieze titled: Interface between PLS and SDGs and the state of play in South East Asia and the Pacific.
Twinning talk at the Inter Pares conference
As a former Resident Twinning Advisor, I was honoured to represent the Hellenic Parliament at the INTER PARES inaugural conference, which took place at the European Parliament from 11 to 12 July 2019. The conference on this new EU global project to strengthen the capacity of parliaments was jointly organised by DG DEVCO and International IDEA.
My new book on the regulation of algorithms! (updated)
I am really excited to have learned that Springer has announced the publication of my new book Imposing regulation on Advanced Algorithms! Publication is scheduled for early fall 2019. Don’t need to queue at the bookstores; pre-order has started.
Mentor for GSoC 2019
In early May, Google announced this year’s projects for the Google Summer of Code (GSoC). The project proposal of the Hellenic OCR Team was among the ones that were accepted for implementation! As a mentor to the project, I am glad to be able to contribute to this exciting endeavor.
My presentation at the RES Workshop
On May 7, 2019, I participated at the regional consultation workshop of the Renewable Energy Sources community in Athens, Greece. My presentation was on ‘Lawsourcing and Post Legislative Scrutiny concepts in the area of renewable energy’.
My appearance on a TV series on the history of parliamentary assemblies in modern Greece
It is an honor to be part of this special documentary produced by the Hellenic Parliament Television on the parliaments of modern Greece. Take a tour back in time to see the historic background of the first steps of parliamentarism in modern Greece.
Hellenic OCR Team Newsletter #5: April 2019
Check out our newsletter no.5 (April 2019) for more information on current operations of the Hellenic OCR Team as well as details of our future activities.
Participation to the 2019 Google Summer of Code
Google Summer of Code (GSoC) is a global program focused on introducing students to open source software development. In Greece, the Open Technologies Alliance participates in GSOC 2019 with more than 25 open source projects. The Hellenic OCR Team has provided a highly intresting project proposal, which is presented below. We invite students who wish to participate to contact us in order to be guided through the process.
Hellenic OCR Team Newsletter #4: January 2019
Happy New Year! Check out our latest (#4) newsletter. Featured topics include the establishment of a sub-group on Linked Open Data, the progress towards organizing a hackathon for parliamentary open data and our prospective participation to the Google Summer of Code.
Η συνέντευξή μου στον “Τυπολόγο”
Στις 22 Δεκεμβρίου 2018 δημοσιεύτηκε στον “Τυπολόγο” συνέντευξή μου με θέμα “η Δημοκρατία μεταξύ της εξέλιξης και της παράδοσης”. read more…
Μελέτη για τον ψηφιακό μετασχηματισμό
Τον Δεκέμβριο του 2018 δημοσιεύτηκε η μελέτη του Forum Ελληνικής Καινοτομίας και Στρατηγικής για τον ψηφιακό μετασχηματισμό της δημόσιας διοίκησης. Ως μέλος του Επιστημονικού Συμβουλίου του Forum και εμπειρογνώμονας για τα ανοικτά δεδομένα και τις συμμετοχικές δημοκρατικές διαδιασίες, είχα την ευκαιρία να μετάσχω στην ομάδα σύνταξης.
My talk on the evolution of parliamentary institutions
Once in a month the Athens Chapter of the AHEPA order (HJ-1) organises a public lecture. On Nobember 16th, 2018, it was my turn to deliver a talk on the evolution of parliamentary institutions.
Happy birthday Hellenic OCR Team!
The Hellenic OCR Team, a novel crowdsourcing initiative for the processing and analysis of parliamentary data, celebrates its first birthday. What started as a confined experiment within the Hellenic Parliament and Greece’s oldest academic institution, the National Kapodistrian University of Athens, has now evolved into an international cooperative platform.
Cooperation with Patras Science Park
The Patras Science Park, a prominent Technology Park in the Greek ecosystem of research, technology and innovation, and the Hellenic Optical Character Recognition (OCR) Team, an innovative crowdsourcing platform for the processing and analysis of parliamentary data, are pleased to announce the launch of their cooperation.
My new article on the relation between Terrorism and Trafficking
My new article on ‘The Legal Dimension of Terrorism in Human Trafficking – The Cases of Italy and Greece’ has just been published by the Center for Security Studies at ETH Zurich.
About Me
Dr. Fotis Fitsilis
As engineer and economist Dr. Fotis Fitsilis has been active in a broad range of fields, from telecommunications and logistics to management and governance. After a career as a research engineer in Germany, he worked as Special Advisor for Business and Industry in the Greek Ministry of Development. Since 2007 he has been working in the Hellenic Parliament. Learn More..