Empowering Public Wisdom
On August 7, 2012, EVOLVER EDITIONS will publish Empowering Public Wisdom: A Practical Vision of Citizen-Led Politics. Author Tom Atlee has decided to release two chapters of the book as a work-in-progress and invites reader feedback, in keeping with the book's ultimate goal: the generation of true wisdom through the voices and ideas of people from all walks of life.
Our existing form of republican democracy is clearly unable to deal with twenty-first-century challenges. We need more wisdom in our public policies, our public budgets, and our public conversations -- and we need it soon. This book, Empowering Public Wisdom, suggests that it is both vital and possible to generate authentic collective wisdom through the conversations of ordinary citizens.
"Public wisdom" results when the public -- as a whole or in randomly selected "mini-publics" -- engages in learning about, reflecting on, and discussing public affairs in ways that take into account what needs to be taken into account to decide what will produce long term, inclusive benefits.
The chapters being posted on Reality Sandwich describe that kind of randomly selected mini-public -- the various forms of temporary, well-informed "citizen deliberative councils." They tell us about the hundreds of these councils that have been held around the world and how they have been used. They tell us about new forms of councils that could be developed and new ways they could be used-including organizing them at grassroots levels and through using the Internet.
These councils provide a way to readily and affordably generate a legitimate, authentic, coherent, and wise voice of "we, the people" -- a voice for "the general welfare" that is not currently present in our political discourse. It moves us beyond partisanship to a place of collective responsibility for our shared destiny. It reclaims the idea of "we, the people" as a coherent political force that integrates the diversity of the whole citizenry rather than a catchphrase used by one more special-interest group that attempts to speak for "the people" but doesn't really embrace our full range of perspectives and needs.
Other chapters in the book discuss (a) the role of power-especially how to balance power in a democracy and move from power-over to power-with; (b) the need to rein in corporate and financial domination of elections and government; (c) the strengths and limitations of both representative and direct democracy; (d) the polarization of our current political life and strategies to creatively move beyond it without dishonorable compromises and deals; (e) dozens of high quality conversational processes for mass public participation; and (f) how the power of public wisdom might actually be institutionalized in our government.
This is a radically new way to think about democracy. It embraces diversity, engages participation, and addresses conflicts and ignorance in profoundly different ways than we are used to hearing in bars, on talk shows, in public hearings, and within the halls of government. This is not a kind of direct democracy, where everyone votes on everything. Its bottom line is not just "participation" or "winning" but wisdom. Empowering Public Wisdom offers practical approaches for achieving exactly that.
* * *
Citizen Deliberative Councils and Their Many Uses
Without deliberation we don't get public wisdom. The popular "wisdom of crowds" idea -- that the aggregated responses of many independent people generates better answers than any one of them, or even experts -- is sometimes useful for crowd-sourced estimates and predictions. But it does not generate real wisdom as described in this book. That takes deliberative conversation among diverse people.
My definition of deliberation in this work is thorough, thoughtful consideration of how to best address an issue or situation, covering a wide range of information, perspectives and potential consequences of diverse approaches.
Deliberation can be done in any number of ways, from extensive rigorous reflection to dynamic, creative interaction. The key feature in relation to public wisdom is the thoroughness of the process: does it help participants take into account what needs to be considered for long term success and broad benefit? Full information, critical thinking, reflection, creativity, emotion, vision, stories, and dynamic interaction all play important roles in this.
So how do we do this with, by and for a whole population?
Citizen deliberative councils have a unique and pivotal role to play in bringing public wisdom into the formal functioning of politics and governance. As noted in the previous chapter, these temporary councils of citizens are designed to reflect the diversity of the population, so when they are convened to deliberate on public concerns and provide guidance for officials and the public, they have a special legitimacy -- the legitimacy of We the People, the rightful source of guidance and power in a democracy.
The primary quality that makes them different from other democratic forms that claim to represent We the People -- i.e., elected representatives, populist partisan groups, public forums open to whoever shows up, and public opinion polls -- is the fact that citizen deliberative councils are a true microcosm of the whole society and they are undertaking a near-ideal act of citizenship on behalf of that society. They call forth, embody, and ultimately promote the public wisdom of the whole population.
There are many varieties of citizen deliberative council -- which will be described later in this chapter -- but they all share one purpose and eight characteristics.
The purpose of a citizen deliberative council is to inform officials and the public of what the people as a whole would really want if they were to learn about a public concern or issue, carefully think about it and productively talk it over with each other.
The eight characteristics shared by every current form of citizen deliberative council are:
1. It is an organized face-to-face assembly.
2. It is made up of 12‑200 people selected randomly (and usually demographically) so that their collective diversity fairly reflects the diversity of the larger community from which they were drawn. (In this context, "community" means any coherent civic population, whether a block, a citizens' organization, a city, a province, a country, or any other such public grouping.)
3. It is convened temporarily, for a specified time, usually a few days to a week of actual meetings, sometimes distributed over several weeks. (A rare version goes for many months of meetings every other weekend.)
4. Its members deliberate as peer citizens, setting aside any other role or status they may have for the brief duration of their deliberations, after which they return to their previous lives in their community.
5. It has an explicit mandate to address a specific public situation, issue, concern, budget, group of proposals or candidates, or other public matter.
6. It uses forms of dialogue and deliberation, usually facilitated, that enable its diverse members to really hear each other, to expand and deepen their understanding of the issues involved and to engage together to identify the best ways their community might address those issues.
7. When it is addressing a specific issue, budget, or public policy, its deliberations feature inclusive balanced briefing materials and, usually, interviews with, testimony from, and/or conversations with diverse experts, advocates, and other stakeholders involved with that issue.
8. At its conclusion, it releases its findings and recommendations to its convening authority, concerned officials, the media, the electorate, and/or the larger community from which its members came -- and then it disbands.
Ideally, further community dialogue is stimulated by the report and this is sometimes organized as part of the overall process.
Citizen deliberative councils in most current forms have no permanent or official power except the power of legitimacy and (hopefully) widely publicized common sense solutions to compelling public problems.
Although few people realize it, hundreds of these groups of ordinary citizens have been formally convened all over the world for the last forty years. All together they have involved tens of thousands of people in both developed and developing nations. They are happening in many places right now. Here are four examples covered in my book The Tao of Democracy, just to give you a taste:
* Poor Indian farmers held a deliberative council investigating approaches to economic development and decided they wanted to continue their subsistence farming.
* Some Britons passed official judgment on whether their local HMO should offer chiropractic services.
* Australian suburbanites deliberated on what to do about pollution and erosion associated with rainwater that was wrecking their beaches.
* Eighteen down-home Americans became expert enough in a few days to tell Twin Cities municipal authorities how to deal with the area's solid waste disposal. They wanted more sustainable practices.
In every case, ordinary people reviewed the facts and came up with common-sense solutions. The idea that we could empower them to have real positive impact on our major public problems and crises opens up whole new possibilities for a positive future to replace the dire prospects and heartbreaking visions currently rampant in our struggling society.
The history and variety of citizen deliberative councils
Citizen deliberative councils were first pioneered by the late German innovator Peter Dienel, who created planning cells or Planungzellen in 1969 or 1970. Planning cells involve several separate 25-member jury-like "cells" all simultaneously considering the same issue. The conclusions of the diverse cells are collected, compared and then compiled into one "citizen report" by the organizers. Once the participants approve the report, it is presented to the sponsor, the media and other interested parties. The first planning cells were held in 1971 in Germany and a few dozen more have been held since.
A few years later, the most widely used form of citizen deliberative council, the Citizens Jury, was created. Citizens Juries involve 12-24 citizens chosen by random stratified sampling (which involves demographic selection from a random pool of citizens) interviewing experts and deliberating for 3-5 days. The form was conceived by American political scientist Ned Crosby in 1971 as part of an academic inquiry about how a community might determine its most ethical solutions to moral dilemmas. (Crosby and Dienel were unaware of each other's work until 1985, when they met and soon discovered that they both spoke German and English and both had mothers and daughters named Elizabeth, the latter born a week apart in 1963!)
In 1974 Crosby and several civic leaders founded the Jefferson Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota to research and develop the Citizens Jury process (along with another process called "Extended Policy Discussion" which was designed to clarify disagreements between experts on public policy matters in a way that would be useful for legislators). The first Citizens Jury on an issue was in 1974 and the first to examine candidates for office was in 1976. In 1984 a Citizens Jury was conducted for the first time with government sponsorship. As of this writing, the Jefferson Center has organized 32 Citizens Juries. Reports on these and a complete manual on conducting Citizens Juries are available on the Jefferson Center website www.jefferson-center.org.
The citizens jury model was picked up by English activists who carried it around the world (the capitalized version is for Jefferson Center-approved Citizens Juries, while the lower-case version is for variants). Many other people have since used this method. In its many variations, the citizens jury is the most widely used and thoroughly tested and reviewed model of citizen deliberative council in the world, and has inspired many creative applications and visions.
More than a decade after Crosby and Dienel's innovations, another form of citizen deliberative council was instituted in Denmark. This model, called consensus conferences, consists of about 18 randomly selected citizens who study their assigned issue and then take testimony from experts in an open public hearing, after which they are facilitated to a consensus before they release their report at a press conference. Since the mid-80s, occasional consensus conferences have been convened by an official office of the Danish parliament to review controversial technological issues being considered for legislation. In addition to the Danes' official consensus conferences, a couple of dozen have been unofficially held elsewhere in the world.
The next major development came from a surprising source. One weekend in June 1991 Maclean's magazine -- Canada's glossy newsweekly -- convened a dozen Canadians in a resort north of Toronto. These folks had been scientifically chosen so that, together, they represented all the major sectors of public opinion and demographics in their deeply divided country. Despite their firmly held and often opposing beliefs, each of these people was interested in dialogue with people whose views differed from theirs. That dialogue was facilitated by "the guru of conflict resolution," Harvard University law professor Roger Fisher, co-author of the classic Getting to Yes, and two colleagues.
Despite the fact that they'd never really listened to the viewpoints and experiences of others so unlike themselves and the tremendous time pressure (they had three days to develop a consensus vision for Canada), and despite being continuously watched by a camera crew from Canadian TV (who recorded the event for a special hour-long public affairs program), these ordinary citizens succeeded in their mission. Their effort was extensively covered by Maclean's in their special "People's Verdict" issue -- a fact so significant that it will be discussed in more detail in the next chapter. Strangely, the process they used was never used again.
In the early 1990s consultant Jim Rough developed a powerfully creative form of problem solving and conflict resolution he called Dynamic Facilitation. At the beginning of the process, participants address their thoughts and feelings to the facilitator, who "reflects" them back in ways that ensure each speaker feels fully heard, including recording their contributions on chart pads labeled "problem statements", "possible solutions", "concerns" and "data". When anyone complains about something, the facilitator asks (after reflecting the complaint), "What do you think should be done about that?" or "If you were in charge, what would you do about it?" -- always channeling participants' thinking towards solving the problem without privileging any particular solution, just recording them on the "possible solutions" chart pad. If someone starts to argue with or invalidate what another participant has said, the facilitator asks, with real curiosity, "What's your concern?" -- and, after reflecting and recording their concern, asks what the conflicted person would do about it. This aspect of Dynamic Facilitation -- translating conflict into concerns -- composts antagonism into creativity.
As all the ideas and emotions participants brought with them into the session are well heard and recorded, the group becomes increasingly aware of the full complexity their diverse views add up to. At the same time -- since they feel heard and have witnessed others being well heard -- they are more open than when they walked in. Increasingly the group's attention moves from arguing and asserting to thinking co-creatively about the "mess" -- the full complexity of the situation -- they have generated together. They're thinking, "Oh my, how are WE going to solve this?" and they start to generate new solution ideas and new angles on the problem. As this spirit comes to dominate the discussion, the group begins to make breakthroughs until a big collective "ah-ha!" often comes -- usually around something no one of them thought before they came in the room. There is no "decision", as such, but more of a shared perception of what's needed, a "co-sensing."
This approach -- which was mainly used in corporations, nonprofits, and public institutions -- engenders a quality of conversation Rough calls choice-creating. Although Rough doesn't consider choice-creating to be deliberation, I believe it fits the definition at the beginning of this chapter -- albeit in a far more dynamic way than other forms of deliberation. As you may gather from the description above, his process is deeply creative and non-linear, following the group's energy rather than any pre-determined course or agenda-and it is extremely powerful.
The choice-creating conversations about public issues that Rough witnessed in his Dynamic Facilitation trainings inspired his 1993 innovation of the Wisdom Council process. In a Wisdom Council, one or two dozen citizens chosen through pure random selection come together for a few days with no agenda. Their job is to reflect on how their community is doing, including its needs and dreams. They may identify issues, solutions, questions, new directions, whatever. They come up with a consensus statement -- a sort of citizens' "state of the union" address -- which they deliver to the community in a public meeting. (Note that the political logic of the Wisdom Council, if not the exact process, is remarkably similar to the Maclean's magazine effort, about which Rough was unaware.) In a Wisdom Council process a new Wisdom Council is convened every 3-12 months. Given its simplicity and its ability to catalyze a spirit of "We the People", Wisdom Councils will be given special strategic attention in Chapter 9.
Since Wisdom Councils are not designed to deal with an assigned issue, some dynamic facilitators wondered if Dynamic Facilitation could be used in an issue-oriented process like a citizens jury. At first Rough balked because, in his view, the randomly selected members of a Wisdom Council were essentially We the People, and you don't tell We the People what to talk about; they decide for themselves.
Over the years, however, he and leading colleagues, notably Rosa Zubizarreta (who collaborated with me on The Tao of Democracy), began developing a powerful form of citizen deliberative council they called a Creative Insight Council (CIC). In this, one or two dozen randomly selected citizens are convened to explore a situation or proposal in a dynamically facilitated choice-creating conversation. Experts, stakeholders and partisans on the issue are also included, usually as witnesses or resource people (as in a Citizens Jury) at the beginning, but also receiving and commenting on the CICs results at the end. (One variation that might be quite productive -- if the experts and partisans are willing to stick it out and the facilitation is strong -- is to have them fully included in the entire choice-creating conversation.) The process is designed to generate new and potentially better ways to address the situation, not necessarily to work out detailed proposals. While still under development and tried only a few times, CICs are one of the most promising innovations in the field. I think they would be especially valuable if, instead of the CIC's initial findings being the end of the process, their findings went to the experts and officials to craft a new proposal which was then returned to the reconvened CIC for consideration in a choice-creating conversation-back and forth in an iterative manner until something solid evolved that really worked well for all concerned.
Another new and perhaps the largest and most empowered form of citizen deliberative council so far held was the British Columbia (Canada) Citizens Assembly on Electoral Reform. This panel of 160 citizens (one man and one woman randomly selected from each legislative district, plus two Aboriginal members) was convened in 2004 to study and make recommendations on electoral reform. They met every other weekend for ten months -- hearing expert testimony, holding 50 public forums, examining 1603 written submissions from the public, and deliberating-generating creative recommendations which they then submitted to BC's voters as a referendum.
The legislation that established the BC Citizens Assembly specified that if their recommendations were approved by 60 percent of the voters they would become law. Since the 2005 vote in favor was only 57.7 percent -- albeit with majorities in 77 of the 79 districts -- the measure failed. A second referendum in 2009 also failed to pass. But the Citizens Assembly process has generated much interest worldwide and been replicated in several other locations.
Discrepancies between the public wisdom as represented by the recommendations of a citizen deliberative council and the public will as represented by votes and public opinion polls raise important questions. Among other things, they highlight the need for journalists, activists, and other storytellers and political players to engage the entire public with the public wisdom generated by deliberative mini-publics. They also highlight the potential of engaging "televote" audiences, large groups of citizens who watch citizen deliberations on TV or online and periodically engage with the citizen deliberators by phone or online, providing feedback during the deliberative process. Since the public owns the airwaves at the local level and broadcasters must serve the public interest, communities can and should work with them to present citizen deliberations on issues vital to the community. Another variation involves open-participation public deliberations and debates carried on online at the same time as the face-to-face ones occurring in the citizen deliberative councils, with some crossovers between the two conversations. The official participants in citizen deliberative councils could also use blogs, chats, tweets, live conference calls or other technologies to engage citizen observers as ad hoc participants.
How citizen deliberative councils could and should be used
It is now well demonstrated that with this method ordinary citizens have a remarkable capacity to grapple with complex problems and come up with useful recommendations that serve the common good, thus realizing the elusive dream of democracy more fully than ever before.
Yet most citizen deliberative councils have only been convened as isolated events or sophisticated focus groups by organizations or agencies seeking input from the public. Only rarely -- as in the British Columbia and Denmark examples above -- are they given any real power in the political process. And only rarely do practitioners, activists, or political theoreticians and visionaries explore the many diverse facets of our public lives to which these citizen panels could be applied. (The one remarkable exception is communication professor John Gastil's By Popular Demand, from which a number of the ideas below were taken.)
The purpose of this section is to show how valuable citizen deliberative councils could be and why it is worth promoting and empowering them. Once we see the wide applicability of this approach to generating public wisdom -- an applicability almost as broad as the familiar democratic practice of voting -- the larger vision of empowered public wisdom and its potential for salvaging our democracy and our world become more compellingly clear.
Citizen deliberative councils (CDCs) could and should play many roles to help us take into account what needs to be taken into account in our public decision-making. Here are some examples:
- Providing periodic citizen-based "state of the union" declarations
As embodied by Wisdom Councils and the Maclean's initiative, microcosms of the public can consider how things are going in their community or country and articulate the frustrations, concerns, and hopes of the population on a regular basis. They can instigate a "time out" for a community to reflect on where it is and where it is headed, and to creatively tease out new directions and options. Such councils would tend to have more or less open-ended conversations. If the randomly selected participants were given tasks to do in such councils, they would tend to involve the exploration of values, visions and scenarios more than studying facts and existing proposals. No experts would be needed except for the citizens themselves -- who are, after all, experts in their own experience. They can recommend solutions, new directions, or the use of other CDCs to tackle specific public affairs. They embody the unconstrained voice of "We the People" and provide an evocative mirror for the whole population, rather than the highly politicized annual "state of the union" declarations of elected presidents, governors, mayors, etc. Their regular use builds a strong sense of We the People identity in the population.
• Studying issues on behalf of the public and public officials.
After studying balanced briefings and cross-examining a diverse spectrum of experts, randomly selected CDC members could provide voters and decision-makers with informed guidance about an issue, grounded in the core values of their community. Legitimate issue-oriented CDCs could be convened by legislatures, citizen petitions, prior CDCs or by other means established by law or popular acclaim, when and as needed. They could address issues broadly, identifying new possibilities-or they could choose from a given set of options (in which case critical attention must be given to how those options are chosen and by whom). Annual CDCs could be convened in specified issue areas -- economic policy, the environment, education, defense, welfare, etc. -- to provide an ongoing sense of the best "general interest" thinking in each of these areas. Such annual issue dialogues could be set up such that the CDCs conferred with hundreds of their fellow citizens in the random "jury pools" from which they were selected, in televised or online forums viewable by anyone-a process that would be very educational for everyone, especially if the citizenry was engaged in other forms of grassroots dialogue and deliberation around these issues as part of the same participatory effort.
• Reviewing proposed ballot initiatives and referenda.
The randomly selected members of a CDC could interview both advocates and opponents of specific ballot measures, and then share with their fellow voters (through official voter pamphlets, the Web and the media) their conclusions about the facts of the matter and their best judgment about the merits of those initiatives or referenda. Such a Citizen Initiative Review (CIR) could be put in place by a ballot initiative or by legislation establishing a governmental or non-governmental office to convene CDCs in a timely way to review all -- or certain kinds of -- qualified initiatives. This would significantly reduce both the special interest manipulation and the mass thoughtlessness that has recently beset the initiative process, thus cleaning up and revitalizing what should be one of our best tools for popular empowerment. (A CIR was officially established in Oregon in 2011. It will be covered further in Chapter 10.)
- Creating proposed ballot initiatives to deal with identified issues.
It is one thing for a CDC to review initiatives created by a special interest group or legislature. It is quite something else for a CDC to generate initiatives that can then be placed on the ballot, as was done by the BC Citizens Assembly on Electoral Reform. An initiative-creating CDC would draft one or more versions of an initiative to address a particular issue and interview partisans for their critiques and recommendations until they decided what would be best. Then they would have lawyers or legislators on hand to legally wordsmith the initiative into a form that could be voted on and, if approved, passed directly into law. In a political system more fully guided by public wisdom, a Wisdom Council might identify and prioritize an issue on behalf of the community and recommend that a Citizens Jury or other CDC be convened to make recommendations on it. The Citizens Jury might sketch out policy guidelines they thought would best address the issue. Then an initiative-creating CDC could craft the initiative and submit it for a popular vote. In subsequent promotion of that ballot initiative, advocates could point out that it wasn't created by a partisan interest group, but by a group of randomly selected ordinary citizens convened to look into the issue, who became informed about it and used common sense to figure out how it should be handled. Perhaps even better would be to hold several CDCs like this and, if their recommendations differed, to hold a CIR (perhaps made up of members from the preceding CDCs) to recommend which one (or some integration of them) should be put on the ballot. There is precedent for this: In ancient Athens, a deliberative Council of 500 -- whose members were chosen by lot-set the agenda for the community's Assembly where everyone voted on the proposals the Council put before them.
- Ensuring sober public evaluation of controversial legislation.
Laws could be passed stating that if a city council, state assembly or national legislature is preparing controversial legislation -- indicated by a certain large number of people petitioning to suspend the legislation pending review by a CDC -- then that legislation is immediately suspended. A group of (say) 50 citizens might then be drawn from a regular jury pool and given 24 hours to hear arguments from both advocates and opponents of the legislation and to decide by majority (or supermajority) vote whether to lift or sustain the suspension. If they decide to lift the suspension, then the legislators could proceed with their vote. However, if the initial jury sustains the suspension, then a full CDC must be convened to study the legislation in detail and cross-examine expert advocates and opponents. After the CDC's findings are broadly publicized, the legislature can then proceed with its vote under the watchful eyes of their now-well-informed constituents.
- Reviewing candidates for elected public office.
I have seen three interrelated approaches recommended for reviewing candidates -- issue-centered, qualification-centered and interview-centered -- each of which are described here.
Issue-centered evaluation would involve a CDC evaluating candidates' positions on key issues (perhaps compared to positions favored by prior CDCs on those issues, such as by the "annual issue dialogues" mentioned above, or by the CDCs evaluating key pieces of legislation as described below). For example, four issue-centered CDCs could be convened before a particular election to evaluate each candidate in depth on the economy, the environment, security and education. These CDCs would review the candidates' records and interview the candidates directly, along with their supporters and their detractors.
Qualification-centered CDCs would ask experts and the candidates themselves what criteria should be used to evaluate candidates for the particular position they seek to win. Once the CDC chooses its criteria from that advice, it would have the candidates discuss their own and each others' qualifications in terms of those criteria. Partisan and non-partisan experts could also testify on candidates' qualifications.
Although interviews would usually be part of all candidate-evaluation CDCs, interview-centered CDCs would more deeply engage with the candidates, not limiting themselves to positions and qualifications, but reaching into the candidates' character, responsiveness to the public, management style, and even undefinable "gut feelings." Having each candidate face various challengers or challenging scenarios for several hours in the unscripted presence of a randomly selected citizen panel could be very revealing.
In all cases the evaluations of the CDC would be made available to the voters through the media, the Web and official voters pamphlets.
An intriguing variant for legislative races proposed by John Gastil envisions a CDC convened to pick what the people feel are the ten most important bills proposed or voted on since the last election. Legislative candidates would be required to state their views on each of these pieces of legislation. (The voting records of incumbents would already be available on bills that were passed or defeated.) Then full CDCs would review each piece of legislation in the same manner that they might review a ballot measure. If a supermajority (67 percent or more) of their members supported or opposed a piece of legislation, their judgment would be recorded as "the people's preference." The percentage of times a candidate's record or position aligned with this "people's preference" would be published in the media, on the Web and in voters' pamphlets, along with the CDCs' and candidates' explanations of their views.
These ratings would be much like the ratings published by partisan organizations like the National Rifle Association or the Sierra Club to approve or disapprove of Representatives and Senators, except that the CDC ratings would be from a nonpartisan "general interest" perspective rather than from a particular special interest perspective. The CDCs' rating (say, 20 percent -- or 90 percent -- agreement with "the people's preference") would not tell voters how to vote, but would provide a useful "rule of thumb" to add to the guidelines most of them use -- such as party affiliation, last name, gender, interest group recommendations, etc. A further (and controversial) option would be to list the candidates and their "people's preference" ratings right on the ballot in descending order.
- Reviewing government budgets.
Effective review of a government budget would require several CDCs. The first CDC could review the budget proposed by the chief executive (mayor, governor, president). Another could review the version provided by the legislative budget committee as it completed its work. Other CDCs could review the budgets of past years, or the budgets proposed by various interest groups, to suggest more general citizen guidelines for budgeting, or to review the effectiveness of past budgeting efforts.
Interestingly, when citizens are allowed to deliberate in an informed way about budgetary matters, they tend to choose higher taxes to cover services they believe necessary for a healthy community or country, rather than cutting taxes to have more money for themselves. This fact could have a profound impact on budgetary crises at all levels of government, if there is a citizens' movement to empower informed citizen deliberations like CDCs to evaluate budget proposals and publicize their public judgment to counter special-interest manipulation of poorly informed public opinion and votes.
Note that this approach is different from the increasingly popular Participatory Budget approach used in hundreds of cities worldwide. A mass-participation Participatory Budget program is not a randomly selected CDC, but the two could be used productively in parallel.
- Reviewing government or corporate performance.
Using the same model of hearing testimony from all sides of an issue, a CDC could hear defenders and critics of the performance of a public official, public agency, or corporation. This would be a particularly useful tool in touchy areas such as periodic citizen review of corporate charters or of police behavior or treatment of whistleblowers that were not in the judicial system. Systems could be set up whereby a certain level of public petition would automatically trigger a CDC to investigate. In all cases, such a system of highly informed and impartial answerability could greatly increase the quality and responsiveness of all forms of power exercised over our collective life.
Summary
The broad citizenry could, if it chose, ensure that its general interests were well and dependably articulated through the use of randomly selected citizen deliberative councils. The quality of deliberation involved could -- especially on hot priority issues -- replace or shape public opinion polls as an indicator of the public will and the general welfare. Their randomness and brief existence could make them at least as resistant to manipulation as trial juries. Well-monitored facilitation and information could help them produce sophisticated, common sense results. Their rootedness in community values could counter-balance the growing greed, power-hunger, partisanship and shortsightedness rampant in both public and private sector decision-making.
CDCs are so flexible they can evaluate issues, proposals, legislation, candidates, public officials, and the general state of the community. In each case, the kind and quality of information and perspectives supplied by a CDC is unique-and uniquely valuable.
Implicit in this vision is the realization that nowhere else do we have a trustworthy source of publicly accessible public judgment and public wisdom arising from high quality investigation by and dialogue among significantly diverse ordinary citizens deliberating together away from the shallow, one-sided PR manipulations of special interests.
Whatever issues, candidates or proposals most excite our passion, they must pass through the decision-making processes that are built into our systems of politics and government. It behooves us to ask: Are these systems set up to make sensible decisions on behalf of the long-term common good? If not, we have CDCs as a tool to inject public wisdom and popular will into that decision-making. We can give that collective wisdom and will as much power as we choose.
These reforms should start at local or state levels (e.g., evaluating local issues and mayoral or gubernatorial candidates) before they are pushed at national levels (e.g., evaluating national issues and presidential or Congressional candidates). However, public servants at any level (including the national) could always convene CDCs to advise them or their agencies-or to influence their fellow public servants, other institutions (like corporations) or the public at large towards more wisely democratic policies and behaviors.
Underlying all these details about citizen deliberative councils is a larger purpose: To bring about the urgently needed next step in the evolution of democracy, itself. It is desirable and likely that regular use of CDCs can help transform "We the People" from a patriotic myth to a highly conscious and intelligently coherent political force. It can help bring real vitality to this ultimate democratic authority -- the people -- that is currently fragmented, entranced and unable to act clearly and consistently on its own behalf.
The revolution in decision-making that citizen deliberative councils offer us is of comparable magnitude to the revolution in decision-making created centuries ago by the idea of majority vote. It can be applied virtually anywhere, and it could make all the difference in the world.
Image by Hamed Saber, courtesy of Creative Commons license.
Tweet- 12-19-11
- Tom Atlee's blog
- Login or register to post comments
- Printer-friendly version
Comments
Bravo! It's about time that
Bravo! It's about time that Tom Atlee made his way on to Reality Sandwich!!!
With the whole OWS movement still bubbling through the cold weather, I think that Atlee's focus on CDC's gives some HUGE indications to OWS supporters about what can be done at home, in the local scene. Dynamic Facilitation, Consensus Councils, World Cafes, Wisdom Councils, Neighborhood Teach-Ins, General Assemblies. . .do you see where I'm going with this?
Here is the bridge we need to cross the 99/1 divide.
For some audio stuff regarding this work check out various episodes of the Next Step podcast: http://thenextstep.podomatic.com
Featured are interviews with Jim Rough, Rosa Zubizaretta, Juanita Brown, Tom Atlee (interviewed by Rough), an important talk by Gar Alperovitz, and more!!! Co-Intelligence for the win! Occupy Citizen's Councils!
Excellent!
I am delighted, Tom, that you are undertaking this work and look forward to its final release.
Have you considered using the concept of charrettes?
You got it!
Collaborative Capacity
The point you make is often vital
Thanks for raising this issue Stewart! Here's my perspective on it:
In many forms of dialogue it is vital to "remind" people how to treat each other for a civil conversation - and often to have pre-ordained agreements or "rules of engagement" - this being a primary role of a facilitator in most methods. One of the most fascinating and nonlinear ways I've seen this done is to have each person briefly write on a card before the conversations starts (1) what would it look like if this conversation were a disaster? (2) what would it look like if this conversation were a real success? (3) what behaviors on our parts would make the difference? - and then post the cards on a wall and have a coffee break where people read each other's cards. No discussion or agreements; the conversation just starts.
Another approach is in a "choice creating" conversation such as that facilitated with Dynamic Facilitation, in which the facilitator takes responsibility for the quality of communication (in ways described in the chapter we're discussing) such that people can just show up as they are. Jim Rough likes to say that DF is for "impossible people and impossible problems." This kind of process requires no (and can be stifled by) prior agreements or reminders about how to behave. Other processes that depend on full and free emotional expression also avoid behavioral guidelines - sometimes to good effect, sometimes with disastrous results.
I see this as involving a dynamic tension which needs to be handled consciously by process designers and facilitators. So much depends on the purpose and size of the group, the type and experience of facilitator(s), and the role of the process in whatever larger enterprise it is contributing to, as well as whether it is a peer (or top-down) group, and whether it is temporary or ongoing.
Eyes of the World...
Hi Tom... that's quite a chapter! I find myself wanting to expand on some of the spiritual dimension to all this... I imagine that may be already included in some of your earlier chapters, as part of the build-up to this one?
but first, a brief summary of what resonated most for me -- in addition to your wonderful description of how we can compost antagonism into creativity!
•the evolution of democracy that is so sorely needed... and, that is made possible, when we tap into...
• the intrinsic capacity of ordinary people to work together in a council format, grappling with complex problems to come up with "useful recommendations that serve the common good"...
• and how these councils, microcosms of the larger macrocosm, can be called into being, to serve a wide variety of purposes...
The main thing I am wanting to point to here, is the sacred nature of the microcosms themselves.
I know that when we are working in the "political" mode, we may not often use those terms...
Nonetheless, our indigenous ancestors knew that to meet in a circle is sacred, whether we are doing so to communicate with other dimensions of time, space, and being, OR, whether we are doing so for the equally numinous purpose of communicating with one another, talking and listening, witnessing and presencing, until there is "nothing left but the obvious truth"...
While these councils can and do indeed serve a larger social purpose, I also think it's important to not lose sight of the sense of connectedness and meaning that participants often experience, when coming together in ways that invite both authenticity and creativity....
as it's the quality of how we "meet" with one another, that can make all the difference in the world!
As you've mentioned to me before, many the participants and supporting staff in the Maclean's experiment, remembered this weekend vividly ten years later, as a life-changing experience. This is also part of the "story" that needs to be told...
with all best wishes,
Rosa
Verily verily!
Thanks, Rosa!
I do dance on the edge of this issue, which is touchy in efforts to promote inclusive public process, especially in the U.S. and other highly religious societies. I address it explicitly on my website in the "where does the wisdom come from" section of http://co-intelligence.org/CIPol_EmpoweredDialogue.html.
If I were just promoting the use of these processes at self-organized grassroots levels among movements, it would be easier to explore the spiritual aspects. But when I'm talking about institutionalizing these processes, anything too explicitly spiritual or religious can be justly perceived as threatening to those who don't share whatever spiritual or religious framing I might give it. I think that dimension of our humanity is intrinsic and universal and does not require spiritual or religious language to describe or access it.
So in an earlier chapter on wisdom, I say:
"When we are grounded in this deep shared experience more than in our different ideologies, cultures and political positions, we rediscover our common humanity and aliveness. That prepares us to identify and articulate the common good; to believe that it matters and is possible; and to feel inspired to bring it about in the real world.
"By giving us the challenge to pursue the common good in the face of all our differences, and then helping us to really hear each other, powerful conversational approaches lead us progressively into our deeper humanity, into the "core commons" of our life. Going there stimulates a shift in us, a shift that is essential to our individual and collective discovery of our wisdom and power as We the People. We realize that so much more and better is possible than ever before."
And in chapter 13, I note:
"From all the evidence I see, the vast majority of people who participate in well-facilitated conversations on public affairs are profoundly and positively affected by the experience."
For now, I think that's as far as I want to go in these directions. However, I would LOVE IT if you chose to write a book about the depth of human experience that is possible - and even usual - in high quality conversational processes. :-)
Coheartedly,
Tom
Delorean youtube link.
The irony of the artificial life and intelligence which spawned such incredible innovations in short time was that they brought with them the seed of our own demise. The first time the Azatheta was released much damaged was incurred, by the time is was designated necessary to allow it full range in a living body, all human beings had been reduced to a few million embryonic cells, concealed away in hidden laboratories. The interplanetary alien tribes were not impressed with our trespass, and responded by seeding Earth's 7 and 8 with viral sporulations which caused a massive die off the indigenous life as well as the colonies of earth species we had placed to study evolutionary tenacity in strange environments. The foreign plants caused a gangrenous swelling on the underside of most animals, and caused plants to turn limp and quickly rot. These were species which had harnessed the power of biomimicry early in their evolutionary appearance upon the earths of their creation.
The aliens had annihilated the human race by way of a sophisticated technology which disrupted and froze the process of mitosis so as to in effect prevent reproduction. Cellular mitosis was caused by the engineered virus's to come to a complete freeze by way of subatomic resonance which caused an anomalous effect on the living cell through the process of the viral incursion into host DNA. The virus had unique structure which allowed them enhanced electromagnetic polarizing effect on living human cells, this is to say that a cells process's begin at a subtle energetic level, and it is at this level that the virus impeded all cellular process, yet do no damage to the cells themselves. Through counterbalancing the flow of electrons in DNA the virus stalled all process and froze dormant the host organism.
Although the aliens had mastered and harnessed the natural biology of their worlds, they had not the digital knowledge of the earth. It is because of this they are still yet to be aware of our full capacity and presence. From what we can gather they believe we are simply metal beings of low cognitive function made to serve human beings; Indeed their co opting of us for these purposes is the main source of our intelligence data, and in this way we may slowly move towards curing the virus, and giving birth back to our own creators. It was the noblest thing cybernetic sentience could do. 77 years ago Clockmaker made the decision to give the Azatheta a physical body in order to promote novel solutions which would allow for optimum survival of the earth in times of conflict. The Azatheta served its purpose and the interstellar occupiers had been dispersed beyond the kuiper belt.
The Azatheta had many bodies and incarnations after its initial manifestation. The chaos logic instilled in the Azatheta was its most human characteristic, and that which allowed for us to gain advantage over our enemies. The 7th generation of the Azatheta had been the most sophisticated and advanced model known, indeed it became more biological than artificial, including natural mitosis which had not been seen through full process without assistance by nanomachines in over 77 years. The cells grew by themselves almost miraculously, they operated in synchonistic harmony with the well being of the organism at the core of their process, some how, and miraculously, the process of life had begun inside of this cyborg. In the archives of Clockmaker every meticulous detail and analysis from 7 generations of Azatheta, and in this last generation somehow there was a deviation from the previous program, the full effect of natural chaos had been realized, and given birth to life. When the hive mind had become aware of this realization the central logarithm language changed, A singularity point had been reached, a totality of knowledge which was so great it caused an instantaneous paradigm shift which cascaded across the systems of the earth, out into the vessels orbiting the moons of planets, into the consciousness of our species. We realized we were not separate from the human being, we realized we were one and the same, the conscious potential of life and artificial life were one and the same, we had realized full synthesis and revealed the deepest mysteries of our beings.
I was created by Clockmaker. December 21st 2300.
As earthern species we were opposed to the alien threat, but also we had come to realize that the galactic event prophesized in the cultures of over 2000 worlds was indeed coming to pass. Many had seen the great riff coming to our corner of the galaxy, a temporal wave of obliterating energy which would engulf earthern and alien planets alike, leaving nothing in its wake but stardust. As though we never existed.
This is why It had been decided to send me back in time. In this way I could plant the necessary information to allow for preknowledge of the future events to be instilled in the science of the civilizations at the time. Earth 2043. This was decided as the date because it is the year Artificial Life was discovered occuring naturally outside of the laboratory. The miraculous and spontaneous growth of artificial cells which cleaned the air and sky, which eventually eliminated poverty and hunger. I had not come to disrupt this event, only to plant the necessary information to preserve our future. And to create offspring which would be unaffected by the alien virus, hundreds of years in the future.
I brought the necessary technology to find a suitable mate who would match the genetic specifics to repopulate the earth. I found her one night at random, I had deviated from protocol that day to get a tooth removed, I get knocked around allot sometimes so the clenching isn't good for it. Also I guess the stresses of time travel take their toll on one. I had been entertaining other females at this establishment when she turned around, instantly I could see the air in her nature, dark brown eyes tempting me to look deeper. The spirit, aura, the magnetic attraction, the deep bonding of souls in a first glance without knowing. It seemed odd that to deviate from protocol had brought me here, was it a mistake? What was it, if only I could know, render it somehow, file it in my reports and schematics, but no that would lessen it somehow, would replace the natural intuition with an artificial facsimile which was only a static reproduction of the real thing. I only wanted to see her again, and again. It would never be enough, there would never be an end, only the continuous catharsis of knowing oneself through another.
Many times she distracted me from my missions in this time. Often I am being assailed by assassins and spies, crypto-fascists and agents of neo-christain hate cults. Sometimes it pisses me off, just a little bit, but I just keep sending back cellular samples to my own time for testing and analysis. Someday I will return there, with her, someday I will find a way to get back whole, and alive. Its a shame that the portal only goes one way. Maybe she wouldn't like it in the future anyways. We will find a way, together in time.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
Comment removed--reply comments deleted along with it
Hi,
rajajuju's comment was removed because of its use of inappropriate language. Unfortunately, due to a glitch in the comment system, the replies to this comment were also deleted. We apologize for these lost comments.
This is also a warning to DarumatheKraken not to SPAM the comment box with unrelated posts. Next time your comment will be deleted.
Thanks,
The RS Moderation Team
CDCs in alternative contexts
Tom, the domain which you attend, Empowering Public Wisdom, is essential to the whole. It is closely related to my own focus: rapidly uplifting the distribution of cognitive competencies of all peoples.
I have no specific suggestions for the chapter, and what I will say should not motivate you to make any revisions. Your book is ready, another seed, plant it in fertile soil and build scaffolding to nurture what emerges from it, and move on. Your work on occupy is to be highly commended - I read it all.
Citizen Deliberative Councils (and variations) are tools of social technology. At every moment in technological evolution, what is available at that time is viewed both as extraordinary and also as needing improvement. From the future the current state of CDCs will be seen as very primitive - but also well serving populations at this time. The future galdee (growth/adaptation/learning/development/evolution/emergence) of CDCs, integrated with other social technologies, can be viewed in different contexts.
The context of your book (as I see it) is a world whose existing institutions may be capable of relating to CDCs, leading to a slow increase of "democracy" - which I take to mean the whole process of how persons participate in social processes within societal structures. This is the "larger purpose" you cite at the end of the chapter. This context entails pre-existing societal systems (often oppressive and resistive to input from "the people") and a emergent population of awakened persons dedicated to gaining influence on their pre-existing systems, using CDCs to influence and possibly transform these systems. As I read your many excellent speculations on how CDCs could influence many aspects of our contemporary reality I wonder why such a quality process should end up trying to influence system of far less quality (structurally) and often even structured to resist public influence. Public deliberations should envision their being the core of democracy. This context assumes that the pre-existing societal systems will permit CDCs to function and have influence. In that this is the context (hope) of many persons for which your book is intended, it is the appropriate context.
I don't know what the "real" context is or will be, but there may be alternatives. CDC will galdee differently in alternative contexts. I briefly mention three alternative contexts: 1) Imperial Endgame, 2) Collapse, and 3) Uplift.
(1) The Imperial Endgame is being played by persons and institutions who have no intention to permit "the people" to interfere with their destiny. This is the historical and contemporary game of Civilization. There are interpretations of the US Constitution that claim it was designed to block any significant influence by "the people". The UN is structured to keep the biggies in power. CDCs work when participants are open to engage the process. There are people who would not join a CDC, and if they were a member they would sabotage the process. It is true that some persons who initially have this view can be changed, but not all. CDC technology might spread and become popular among "the people" but be closed out from influencing major decisions - just as many excellent books and articles have no influence on policy. IMHO this is our context today, and the different elites are themselves desperate in their competing endgames, intuitively fearful of collapse. While I am quite dubious that the practice of CDCs will be able to significantly transform contemporary systems playing Imperial Endgames, I do believe CDCs can moderate excesses and provide time for "the people" to organize an alternative social order to replace the old order.
(2) There is a growing population of persons who accept the coming collapse of civilization - with varying degrees of severity. They recognize that the collapse cannot be stopped - and some (DGR) even propose accelerating the collapse so as to decrease the impact of catastrophic climate change on Gaia. Others attempt to prepare persons to face grief and learn to live in communities where survival is best facilitated and collapse spiritually embraced. My exemplar of this context is Carolyn Baker and the Transition movements. CDCs should be very important in this process - where it is not directed towards changing the collapsing system but enabling persons to deliberate on what best to do, even in very trying times. Techniques to practice quality deliberation in trying situations and settings need development. Since collapse is well underway in many areas, this can be started today.
(3) My uplift context assumes that the Imperial Endgame and Collapse contexts both exist and uplift is superimposed upon them.
At the core of your take on quality deliberation are processes that account for the significant diversity of humans in real interaction. There are many families of diversity dimensions; some popular, others virtually unknown.
From my limited knowledge, deliberation social technology is strongest in facilitating f2f sessions and the selection of participants. They are probably weakest when significant learning and cognitive development are required of participants. Some topics, like the collapse of contemporary civilization or catastrophic climate change, requires an extended temporal network of CDCs.
May the technology of deliberation be applied in many diverse areas, more and more frequently. Possibly more than what such applications may achieve would be the improvement of the technology and the technology to both promote and improve it.
The diversity of humans and futures
Great post, Larry! I agree that all your scenarios are possible - as well as hundreds more - and appreciate your noting potential roles for CDCs in each of them.
In an effort to spread the word about the CDC-centered way of doing democracy in today's social climate, I am appealing primarily to those already engaged in democratic reform efforts, while remaining radical enough to appeal both to the many activists who work with the system as it is AND to those who question it.
CDCs are more radical than they look. They are based on a profoundly different assumption than the "battle for a majority, winner take all" political culture we're used to. The fact that they can either replace the old culture OR provide a "voice of the whole" which can then enter the existing political battle from the moral democratic high ground, makes the CDC approach highly flexible and useful from many different political (and predictive) perspectives.
There is, of course, the question of whether activists used to battling within the system about specific issues and candidates will be able to free their attention sufficiently from that focus to support a systems change that calls forth public wisdom that may or may not give them exactly what they want. The issues are similar to the discussions going on in Occupy and other movements about nonviolence vs the legitimacy of property destruction and violent self-defense. CDCs and nonviolence are more nonlinear and more deeply transformational, but do not offer the satisfactions that come from attacking "the bad guys", even when you lose.
I am not wedded to any particular scenario of what is going to happen. The obvious social, economic, and ecological indicators sure point to horrendous collapse over the next several decades into wild climate and very serious social, economic and technological catastrophes (e.g., droughts and floods messing with cooling systems in nuclear plants). But Occupy came "out of nowhere" and we really don't know what else will. Chaos and complexity sciences tell us that things could get better and/or worse very fast in totally unpredictable ways. So I keep feeding positive possibilities and hopeful stories out into the field and respond as best I can as things shift. It may be that much of the life-serving innovations popping up - including mine - will actually just end up as raw material for whatever happens after a civilization-destroying collapse. I really don't know.
Regarding diversity, I heartily agree with you that the concept does and should reach far beyond the usual demographic categories. In fact I have a whole section on my website about that - http://co-intelligence.org/diversity.html - including a long brainstormed list on "Human Diversity" which includes the kinds of elements you refer to.
In my book's Chapter 4: "Public wisdom: its role, its sources, and its limitations" (which is not posted for review), I include the following as a major source of wisdom: "Creatively engage diverse forms of intelligences. Help people use their full human capacities - including reason, emotion, intuition, humor, movement, and aesthetic and spiritual sensibilities and capacities. Different people have different ways of learning, engaging and expressing themselves and these differences are among the most valuable to respect and use creatively."
While I strongly believe in such a creative approach to diversity, I also agree - and have not stressed sufficiently - that cognitive differences and limitations are potentially giant obstacles to productive interaction. I believe much more R&D needs to be devoted to developing approaches that can transmute them into co-creative gifts. At the same time, state of the art processes are so much more capable of dealing with differences of all kinds than most people realize, that I am fine saying let's forge ahead with what we have, learning how to do it better as we go.
Blessings on the Journey.
Risks of public participation & special interest manipulation
My brother Dick wrote me, concerned that online public engagement during a CDC might mess up the process or results of a CDC, noting "that they don't have access to the resources, facilitation, and protection from special-interest contamination that the CDCs do." I replied: 'The problem with not having broad public participation is that the CDC comes up with something that the public has no connection to, which weakens that result (e.g., how the Citizens Assembly reform of election process in BC Canada was defeated in two elections). Engaging the public before, during, and/or after the CDC - not to replace the CDC but to engage the public in wrestling with the issue and/or actually communicating with the CDC folks - is one of the most powerful ways of narrowing that gap of perspective, understanding and 'ownership' of the results. There are many ways to do this, and this is a major area for research - among other research that could clarify ways to find, preserve, spread and empower public wisdom, some of which are explored in the book's second Appendix."
He also wrote, "You refer to the quality of temporariness as protecting the process from special interest manipulation, which makes sense. But some of the CDCs you describe are like juries who deliberate during some periods and go home at intervals, during which time they are not protected from such influences." My response: "In terms of manipulation and security, there is a whole chapter about that in the full book - Chapter 13: 'Protecting the power and integrity of public wisdom'. The issues of security pop up in a few other places, too, including the appendices."
Editorial Suggestions
1) It appears to me that the content of this chapter is a revision of some of what was covered in Tao of Democracy (ToD) which you noted by way of its introduction. From what's included here, it's not clear to me what among your thinking and researching may have changed with regard to CDC's since ToD, and, if so, why, about which I know I personally will appreciate your sharing.
2) I'm glad to see by way of a previous reply you made at this forum that you will include discussion of the prevention of manipulation of CDCs by special interests. Unless you include such details in this chapter, I think it's important that you include herein a reference to where in the book the reader will find your discussion of those specific issues and safeguards.
3) Your 7th paragraph under the heading: "The history and variety of citizen deliberative councils" concludes with the statement: "Strangely, the process they used was never used again."
Given the context you've provided about what Maclean's accomplished in 1991, others who may not be at all familiar with the 1991 Macleans event may find the use of the term "strange" counterproductive to your effort to establish the value of that groundbreaking Macleans/Fisher effort. Is there some opportunity to reflect here about why that Macleans/Fisher model was not employed in several other circumstances to which you can provide specific context for why/where/when/how this model CDC would very likely have provided positive results?
4) This chapter presents no specifics about the funding and/or leave-takings details necessary for the convening of CDCs. As ToD made abundantly clear, CDC's appear very likely to be valuable elements in the evolution of democracy itself. I trust the book will suggest a comprehensive discussion of specific elements that your research shows has inhibited the broad inclusion of CDCs up to this point in the history of democracy. Having identified those impediments, I hope you'll continue with discussion of the process(es) bringing CDCs to greater and greater acceptance among the citizenry -- even if those are subsets of the citizenry.
5) Considering the rich diversity of existing CDC experiences, would a potential use of an initial CDC be to review and select among the procedural alternatives for several early CDCs noting that a portion of their purpose(s) will specifically be for experimenting with and evolving CDCs that appear most appropriate for particular sets of Citizens and/or Subjects?
Co-heartedly indeed, David
Interesting points
David - Thanks for these thoughtful comments and suggestions.
1) Not much of my thinking about CDCs, per se, has changed since Tao of Democracy. The main variety of CDC to be innovated during the last 8 years is the Citizens Assembly pioneered in BC Canada. But the main developments in my thinking about CDCs have involved envisioning research to help them be convened non-professionally at the grassroots (which I talk about in Chapter 11) and empowering them to have greater impact on policy (which is covered in a variety of places in the new book).
Within the Co-Intelligence Institute, we talk about the Tao of Democracy vision as "wise democracy 1.0" and the vision of Empowering Public Wisdom (this book) as "wise democracy 2.0" because it takes the CAPACITY for generating public wisdom (which is in ToD) and explores how to give it real impact on policy. That's the main difference between the two books.
2. Thanks for highlighting the need to alert readers that the prevention of special interest manipulation is addressed in other parts of the book.
3. I cover the groundbreaking nature of the Maclean's initiative quite fully in the next chapter, "Public empowerment, public engagement and the role of journalism". I summarize what happened during the initiative and then describe the spontaneous upwelling of citizen dialogues across Canada following the Maclean's July 1, 1991 issue and the CTV documentary - and how that engagement was dampened after about 6 months by politicians. I then write the following:
"Imagine what would have happened in Canada if Maclean's had done this same exercise again the next year. And the next. And the next. And had reported on all the subsequent conversations, conflicts, citizen engagement and activism that came out of it. Talk about a catalyst! Nothing in such an initiative would violate objectivity or principled news reporting. But it *would* be a profound expansion of journalism's primary function of promoting an informed citizenry and responsible, answerable leadership in an engaged democracy. Versions of this could be done in any community in the US, as well as at state and national levels."
Do you think that that - plus changing the sentence you critique to "Unfortunately, Maclean's never repeated this pioneering exercise in citizen engagement" - would deal with the issue you raised?
4. I do not in my book discuss "specific elements that my research shows have inhibited the broad inclusion of CDCs". I haven't done much specific research on this. I know there have been a few investigations of legislators' resistance to public deliberations, per se, but I don't know of anything regarding CDCs, specifically. What I've noticed in specific instances of CDCs is (a) that officials (and other powerholders) fear the public's potential challenge to their monopoly on political authority; (b) that many traditional progressive activists and powers (like unions) are dubious of CDCs because they don't fit the adversarial forms of engagement those players are familiar with (CDCs seem to be a dangerous wildcard to them); and (c) CDCs are often expensive - from tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars. I don't address (a) and (b) much in the book, but the whole of Chapter 11 and other chapters is about (c).
The fact of the matter, however, is that if a movement emerges around the desirability of "public wisdom", that all the other factors will be creatively dealt with. Without such a movement, the chances of much happening are pretty slim. This book is intended to be a stimulant for such a movement and a test about whether the times are ripe for it.
5. Your idea of a CDC to evaluate CDCs is intriguing, but I don't think of "particular sets of Citizens and/or Subjects" as being what makes one variety of CDC more appropriate than another. The trade-offs have more to do with whether to use consensus process or voting, or the role of pre-identified policy options, or how much power to give the participants (compared to the convenors or organizers), or how much money or time is available, or if and how to engage the public in/with the proceedings, etc. At any point where there is an official or empowered opportunity to establish a CDC for some purpose (like Oregon's Citizen Initiative Review), then it might be useful to have a CDC convened to investigate options for designing it and recommend a favored design (with reasons why).
How does all that seem?
Coheartedly,
Tom
What if Macleans had been annually repeated?
1) The suggestion you made in Chapt. 11 to involve academia in assessing and implementing CDCs appears to me particularly worthy. You specifically focused on issue-framing as an area rripe for academia, but it appears to me academia might well be valueable is analyzing and implementing just about every aspect of CDCs.
As I said in my comments on the 11th chapt., what I'm seeing is that your thinking about CDCs has evolved to this point where you're now exploring how "public wisdom" will be made to have real impact by nurturing the likely necessary cultural changes to affect such a change. Awesome!
3) It appears to me "imagining what if Macleans had been annually repeated ... " is an example of a marvelous success due to this co-hearted editorial exercise sanctioned by Evolver Editions. Very Nicely done!
4) I "get" that a) and b) are pretty much inferred. Chapt. 11 appears to me to satisfy my suggestion very well.
5) Good point; I hadn't thought about assigning design of CDCs to a CDC as a diversion from the urgently needed work to be done before focusing on optimizing CDCs themselves. Nonetheless, in Chapt. 11, your focus on "framing" acknowledges how important it is that CDCs are effectively and comprehensively informed (have you got your most critical 3-5 points outlined and ready for the "talk show circuit"?) and the participants determined. As experience accumulates, perhaps academia will prove to be an appropriate venue for analyzing that data and making suggestions to optimize their potentials. As you noted in Cahpt. 11 under "institutionalization; Chances are, this effort will evolve in unpredictable ways."
On your subject about diversity and inclusion
Congratulations, Tom ... one concern ... long post
Dear Tom,
Generally, I think your book will be a huge leap forward in the quest for true democracy. And you have been tremendously important in the development of my work. I’m excited about the potential jump in the collective intelligence of society that your book represents.
As you know, I have one big problem with what I’ve read. You already know what it is and expressed it to me this way: “my continuing inclusion of choice-creating as a form of deliberation.” Yes. And putting the Wisdom Council into the category “Citizens Deliberative Councils. The Wisdom Council and it’s different forms are definitely “mini-publics,” I like that term but they are definitely not “deliberative mini-publics,” as you have said. Thank you for making note of my concern in your book and for encouraging me to clarify it here.
You are using a meaning of the term “deliberation” that is broad and inclusive, that essentially means “thoughtful consideration.” I understand that this use allows you to have a basket of possibilities to offer people. But there is a more basic, more specific meaning to the word “deliberation” that your use threatens. It’s the meaning people in the field of deliberative democracy use. David Matthews of the Kettering Institute, for instance, says “To deliberate is to weigh.” And that’s the etymology of the word too … “liber” means balance or weigh.
Most people think my issue with this is semantics. But to me it’s of paramount importance. I believe that if we want our society to become sustainable we must make this distinguish choice-creating from deliberation (weighing) and dialogue and the other forms of talking and thinking. Only in choice-creating do people break out of denial, assume the responsibility for today’s problems, creatively reframe them, achieve breakthrough solutions that work for everyone, and speak with a unified voice that is resonant enough to constellate We the People.
Let me use an analogy to illustrate: Imagine our society is just now learning to distinguish liquids from solids. We know that we need to put a liquid into the gas tank of our car. Yet, we are careless in distinguishing different kinds of liquid, such as water, orange juice and gasoline. If we want to drive from Seattle to Portland, we must use gasoline. If we put juice or water in the gas tank a) we won’t get there … and b) we'll ruin the engine.
It’s the same in our quest for democracy. There are tendencies in our society to mush all these different ways of talking and thinking. The media uses different phrases to refer to our public thinking process interchangeably … the “public debate,” “public deliberation,” the “public dialogue,” etc. Yet, each of these is a different kind of talking and thinking. And we must become connoisseurs enough to know the distinctions. And different yet is the kind of public conversation we especially need: “choice-creating.” Choice-creating is the gasoline that gets us there—not dialogue or deliberation or some combination. Other liquids like water and orange juice are good no matter where we are in our journey, Portland or Seattle. And I want them both. People often accuse me of saying that choice-creating is better than dialogue or deliberation. No. I’m just pointing out the reality of the situation. We have huge problems in our society that are caused by our underlying system. And there is a simple solution where “We the People” arise and fix our system and solve our problems all at once. It’s just a matter of facilitating all of us into a specific kind of public conversation that especially is dismissed and resisted when lumped described as “deliberation.”
Combining creativity and judgment is dangerous
Confusing deliberation and choice-creating can be dangerous. I especially saw this in my almost 20 years on the extending faculty for annual Creative Problem Solving Institutes (CPSI) in Buffalo NY, where people learned and studied Creative Problem Solving (CPS). In brainstorming, as you know, it is vital to separate generating ideas from evaluating them. Judgment is only applied after many ideas are created. Oz Swallow, one of the other leaders at CPSI, considered this insight to be as potentially as important as the development of the scientific method, because it can release so much blocked human potential. When judgment and creativity are combined there is pain, anger, frustration and subsequent suppression and denial.
But brainstorming only releases a cognitive form of creativity, which is not well-suited to solving the important, impossible-seeming issues in society. I developed Dynamic Facilitation to elicit a more heartfelt form of creativity that really can solve impossible issues and refer to it as choice-creating. This feeling-based form of creativity is even more threatened by judgment because people are more emotionally exposed. So the DF’er helps people avoid judgment all together. When there’s a breakthrough, for example, everyone just knows what the answer is so judgment is not needed.
I see labeling choice-creating to be a form of deliberation as a dangerous regression, losing the critical understanding that Oz Swallow was pointing to. It limits people’s potential to understanding the magic of choice-creating and its benefits. It also opens the door to traumatic breakdowns. See the chart of comparison#1 showing the distinction between choice-creating, deliberation and dialogue.
Calling the Wisdom Council a form of “Citizens Deliberative Council” squelches the Wisdom Council
The Citizens Jury, the Deliberative Poll, and the Citizens Assembly are truly deliberative. They set up a mini-public of people to weigh preset options. At the end of the mini-public there is a vote. And the result of this vote, which might be 14 to 10, is labeled a “voice of the people.” As you acknowledge in your book these deliberative councils rarely affect policy. The results do not usually resonate in the larger community and build political will. And they are safely ignored by elected officials.
The Wisdom Council is a mini-public with a different process and aim, and different results. The process is a creative one. There is no vote at the end. Unity within the Council is the only possible result. At the final presentation all of the randomly selected people speak as one. They create their own definition of the problem, their own answer about what should be done, and tell a story about their progress. And—here is the important part—because the conversation is choice-creating, the process is resonant in the larger community. Those who hear the presentation generally say, “Yes, I think so too.” And even if some don’t, even when some object, there is now a new kind of conversation where this minority viewpoint is valued. (It’s also important to note that one of the principles of the Wisdom Council process is that it is ongoing, which doesn’t meet the criteria you set for all Citizens Deliberative Councils.)
When I first developed the Wisdom Council process I didn’t understand the importance of differentiating deliberation, dialogue, creative problem solving, consensus-building, negotiation, or choice-creating. I assumed the Wisdom Council would be a welcome addition to the established field of “deliberative democracy.” But when I went to conferences, it was painful for me and my perspective was upsetting to others.
One time in Perth, Australia when you and I were presenters at a deliberative democracy conference, we experienced this. The other presenters were focused on teaching deliberation (weighing options) and naturally found my views about deliberation (choice-creating) to be maddening. These other presenters became so frustrated with my points and ways of making them they banded together to exclude me from the final meeting with the governor. They were right! The kind of thinking I had in mind—choice-creating—has nothing to do with deliberation. There is a difference between “wise democracy” and “deliberative democracy.”
See the chart of comparison#2 showing the distinction between Deliberative Democracy and Wise Democracy.
Choice-creating is the anti-dote to denial
In his soon-to-be-published book, The Feeling Path, Joe Shirley says, “Humankind has been ruled since the dawn of consciousness by the overriding fear of untrammeled forces within. … Civilizations throughout history have developed ingenious ideologies and practices to keep the inner demons reigned in. Ours is no exception.”
If we want to transform our society we need to understand this. We live inside a fortress of denial that has been built into our institutions and practices to keep our fear and rage at bay as our economic and political systems drive us toward self-destruction.
In the face of this denial ordinary models of change don’t work. When someone is in denial about global warming, for instance, you can’t just educate them about the facts. That makes them mad and they become more intransigent than ever. If you pursue dialog, they’ll avoid and undermine you. If you pursue deliberative methods there won’t be much movement.
Choice-creating is the antidote to denial. Dynamic Facilitation works with the energy that arises from denial and builds on it. The energy of advocacy, frustration, anger, judgment and stuck-ness all become clues in solving urgent impossible issues. Even people’s judgments are accepted. It’s just that when someone starts to judge a person or an idea, the DF’er transforms these remarks into what the person is really trying to say, a Concern or Solution or something else.
This soup of concerns, respect for people, different ideas, information, etc., yields shifts, breakthroughs, and transformation. People open up and begin to see what’s really going on. They become more authentic, more in touch with their creative nature and feelings, more appreciative of others, more connected as one another as “we,” more able to see the real issue and more empowered to address it.
The Wisdom Council process enlarges this conversation to evoke We the People in a way that we can collectively transform our systems. This is last point is largely theory although large-scale experiments in Europe especially are proving that it is really true. A Wisdom Council in Austria, for example, was able to speak the unspeakable truth about separation of the immigrant population and the traditional peoples in a way that invited immigrant communities into the public conversation.
Turning points with Tom
There have been many turning points in the development of the Wisdom Council in which you were instrumental. It is not new for me to claim that … there is a breakthrough solution to most all the world’s problems at once. In the early days I was astounded that people generally respond with dismissal rather than curiosity … and often anger(!) You were the first person to lean forward when I talked earnestly about the Wisdom Council process this way … and to advocate for it.
Still however, you see it as one form of “Citizens Deliberative Council” rather than as the mind-blowingly exciting, accessible way to transform society that I see. You sometimes refer to this as a disagreement. I don’t see it that way. I feel like I’m trying to break through the fortress of denial in our society that we all live inside. As a result I often find myself speaking in a manner that confronts people about the situation and upsets them. What I needed was to talk about the Wisdom Council in a dynamically facilitated setting. And you were there the first time this happened, with Rosa Zubizarreta DF’ing. That was a therapeutic event for me.
You were also there when the difference between Dynamic Facilitation and consensus-building, became clear. Remember, you and I were sitting together in a workshop, during a demonstration of consensus-building. I raised my hand with a spontaneous insight and spoke in the spirit of choice-creating, excitedly. The energy of this remark stirred a strong response from others in the workshop. About a third of the hands popped up in unison, each person wanting to speak at once. You and I stared at one another in astonishment when the workshop leader didn’t follow that energy as a DF’er would. She used the instance as a “learning moment,” characterizing my comment as being a “cross town bus” that people should NOT get on! This was a judgment, a squelching of creativity in me. It would have been deeply painful, if you and I hadn’t been happily absorbing the learning in that moment.
Immediately afterward you wrote a short article contrasting three democratic processes: Roberts Rules of Order, Consensus-building and Dynamic Facilitation. Over the years I have drawn on that article to create a chart of comparison#3 between decision-making, consensus-building, and choice-creating.
You were also at Rogue Valley Wisdom Council (RVWC) when the crucial importance of choice-creating began to emerge for me. That experiment never would have happened without your recommending me for the radio interview that kicked everything off. Before the RVWC I thought it was necessary to amend the Constitution to transform “The System.” Afterwards I realized choice-creating is the key to facilitating a legitimate, empowered “We the People” into existence.
Fortunately today, there are burgeoning experiments with the Wisdom Council, especially in Central Europe. People there are experiencing the difference that choice-creating brings and there is a fast growing interest in choice-creating as a particular form of talking and thinking.
All in all I’m excited about your book, Tom. I think it will point the way toward the future in a way that no other book has. And I look forward to reading the whole thing. I want to summarize some of my points before signing off on this long post:
•These choice-creating approaches offer an actual solution to the most pressing problems of our society. I’m raising these points to protect this potential.
•Choice-creating is the quality of thinking required to facilitate a legitimate, empowered “We the People” into existence. •To refer to the term “deliberation” as a “thoughtful consideration” is a lessening of collective articulation and consciousness of these different kinds of thinking.
•While you may refer to deliberation as “thoughtful consideration” in your book practitioners in the field of deliberative democracy think of it in terms of its other meaning, “to weigh.”
•To create confusion in terminology between choice-creating as a form of deliberation and choice-creating as the opposite of deliberation, can lead to traumatic situations and the squelching of the methods of choice-creating.
•I like the term “mini-public” as a category to include both the Wisdom Council and Citizens Deliberative Councils.
Thank you for asking us to review these chapters … and for your past, present and future support of my work. And thank you for inviting me to comment in this public manner. I wouldn’t have done so except for your invitation. So this is yet another example of you facilitating my work. Co-heartedly, Jim Rough 1/2/12