Ten Years of Impact
From a Conversation to a Movement
Over a decade ago, at Cornell University, a simple question began to take shape: How do we bring citizens closer to where decisions are made and make freedom tangible in daily life?
That question deepened at Syracuse University’s Maxwell School during Dr. Álvaro Salas Castro’s PhD, where it was incubated from academic inquiry into a blueprint for action.
One late night at VBar off Sullivan Street in New York City, the blueprint became a plan for Demo Lab Foundation: turn urgency into infrastructure, turn ideas into action, and fund freedom like the future depends on it. The ethos was punk rock and practical: freedom is not handed down, so build it yourself.
What began as sketches in a notebook became a living freedom and democracy lab inside Costa Rica’s Congress, where citizens, ministers, and journalists shared the same table to redesign how power listens. It was bold, unorthodox, and it worked.
That experiment became Demo Lab, rooted in one conviction: freedom must come before democracy, because only free people can build and sustain robust and healthy democratic societies.
A Decade of Milestones
2015: From Idea to Institution
Demo Lab is formally established at the Costa Rican Consulate in New York, transforming a PhD question into a permanent "freedom and democracy lab" with the remit to increase civic participation.
2016–2017: Proving the Model
Inside Costa Rica’s Congress, ministers, journalists, and citizens test new ways to make decision-making more transparent and efficient. Early prototypes in civic participation, technology, and culture take off.
2017–2018: Early Breakthroughs
Diputometro is launched to provide the population with transparency on congressional representatives. Satellite internet backpacks connect rural communities. A Broadway production on Henrietta Boggs shows how rule of law and coalition-building shaped Costa Rica’s democracy.
2019: Community as Method
On Democracy Day, Demo Lab raises capital to scale and forges alliances with partners including Cornell University, the Human Rights Foundation, and Atlas Network, setting a strategy around education, innovation, and ecosystem building.
2020: Pandemic Response
When COVID hits, Demo Lab helps build a national task force with the Ministry of Health and INCAE Business School, mobilizing over $2 million in emergency supplies and activating a volunteer corps across civil society.
2021: Scaling Civic Tools
Diputómetro reaches hundreds of thousands of people, making legislative performance visible and giving citizens a sharper tool for accountability as autocrats around the world coordinate their playbooks.
2023: BLISS Is Born
The first BLISS Summit in Nosara launches as a global gathering for freedom, locking in Demo Lab’s three pillars:
Freedom Academy (education), Innovation Lab (solutions), and BLISS (the annual convening).
2024: From Lab to Ecosystem
The Reynolds Foundation makes a pivotal commitment and joins the Board, backing Demo Lab and the wider freedom ecosystem.
2025: Expansion of our Projects
By 2025, BLISS partners have contributed more than $60 million, supported over 90 organizations, and brought voices from more than 62 countries. Freedom Academy goes digital to reach the world.