Protopian Fiction Prize 2026: How Do Future Thinkers Imagine Change For the Better?
2026 was the inaugural year of the Protopian Prize Fiction Contest hosted by Metagov & The Public AI Network.
Over May to July, we received over 704 story submissions across two prize categories, 335 for Public AI and 369 for Democratic Futures. Two authors/stories were crowned the winners and three, runners up.
We also conducted a qualitative analysis on ultimately 418 stories which surfaced patterns we found across the stories of themes, theories of change, and types of characters. We have published a report on our findings called "Protopian Fiction Prize 2026: How Do Future Thinkers Imagine Change For the Better?"
This event start with a presentation on the results of our findings. Hosted in collaboration with Democracy Notes, we look forward to discussing many of the fascinating patterns with folks working at the forefront of democratic innovation, public interest AI, responsible technology, futurism, and more. Some findings we'll discuss:
Among Democratic Futures stories, citizen assemblies were the most common innovation depicted. For the Public AI Prize, knowledge/memory management systems were most prevalent–often with an emphasis on human accountability.
Many stories focused on local communities and climate responses.
Governments tended to play positive roles, corporations were imagined negatively, and non-profit organizations rarely appeared.
Change-making protagonists were usually system insiders, working for new transformations or improvements.
We will use breakout rooms to have smaller discussions about specific aspects of the paper - and where attendees can have a chance to share about how these findings relate to their own work.
Finally, we'll discuss the future of the Protopian Prize and how, together, we can continue to build on our Year 1 foundation to provide people with opportunities, infrastructure, and community to imagine and manifest positive, hopeful futures for humanity.
This event is being hosted in collaboration with Democracy Notes, a trade publication and field-support organization helping our audience of 15K+ funders, practitioners, and job seekers stay up to speed on the field. Visit: https://democracynotes.substack.com/