Deliberations

[Update: self-funded op scheduled for 10 Aug, for considerably less $ than expected. I’ll be okay.]

Last Thursday I was scheduled at the local public hospital to get my prostate removed, as I have prostate cancer. The operation didn’t happen.

In my confused and distressed state that morning, I just got up and ate a piece of toast, without thinking. That broke the 6-hour fasting rule I absolutely had to obey. I had the information, but it just wasn’t in my head that morning.

So when I turned up at the hospital, they turned me away. The risk of regurgitation and subsequent death while under anaesthetic is a liability that the hospital cannot carry. The surgical team had the afternoon off, and I’m back on the waiting list for another eight weeks. I had already been given a priority slot, and I blew it.

But two months is too long because there is evidence that my cancer is on the move.

So I’ll have to either pay $15K to get the operation performed in the private system in about three weeks, or opt for a different treatment altogether (hormone treatment and external beam radiotherapy), which offers a similar probability of survival in my high-risk case.

My biggest mistake was to not explicitly hand over my care that morning to my wife, but that was complicated by difficulties in our relationship that have been exacerbated by the crisis. She is justified in calling the situation a debacle.

I have been beating myself up over this for three days, with little sleep. Writing this post is part of my therapy to resist emotional withdrawal and depression, to stop replaying the mistake in my head, and move forward. My heart is not pounding right now, which is a positive sign.

Several friends have told me that they could have made the same mistake. My friend Matthias told me that in Germany public hospitals induct patients and then fast them before operations for the very reason that too often the same mistake was made. This doesn’t change my situation, but at least it helps me avert feeling like the most stupid person in the world.

I’ll survive for quite a while yet, but the cost of eating one piece of toast two hours too late looms large.

I am especially grateful to my family and friends who, while shaking their heads in stunned disbelief, continue to offer their love and support.

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Posted by Ron Lubensky at 09:28 AM | Link | Comments

I wrote this in a conversation this morning:

My professional background happens to be e-learning, so I’m very much onto the link between computer supported collaborative learning (CSCL) and online deliberation. I believe we need to avert the idea that we need to “educate” the participants [of a Citizens Assembly]. I’d rather take the approach that people come to the forum already having valuable lived experience, present to them perhaps just a bit more about the various options (they should have some power to determine that agenda) and especially how they are framed, then work hardest at providing scaffolds in the online environment that help them in the area of critical thinking to judge those various positions in the context of overall national needs. The design effort for us is in those scaffolds.

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Posted by Ron Lubensky at 01:12 PM | Link | Comments

The National Times, the online feed by Fairfax Newspapers, which publishes the Melbourne Age and Sydney Morning Herald, published a slightly edited version of my article, which I posted here earlier.

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Posted by Ron Lubensky at 10:48 AM | Link | Comments

I wrote this in a post this morning:

I think most people (including the Climate Minister) misunderstand what the Citizens’ Assembly should do. They aren’t going to reinvent the wheel because all the “facts” and “proposals” are out there with considerable stakeholder investment. Participants won’t become educated to become climate scientists or economists or pansies of the Government position. Instead they need to get past the political and media rhetoric and figure out a reasonable and reasoned way to judge the polarised spread of public, private and institutional claims and interpretations of those positions. They need to explore what is credible and what matters to whom. Their challenge is to determine the normative agenda of a nation when it comes to climate policy. Their task is ethical rather than empirical. That’s why we need ordinary people to do it.

The CA would recommend criteria that would help the Government to choose a policy design that most Australians can live with, that appears legitimate to the public (ie. not privileging particular interests, including the Gov’t‘s) and that has the best chance of enduring the whims of successive elected governments. The “deep” consensus that Gillard and Wong talk about isn’t so much about agreeing on all aspects of the policy, but about the method to judge them and perhaps rework them in the future.

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Posted by Ron Lubensky at 11:08 AM | Link | Comments

My friend Carolyn Hendriks’ op-ed in the The Age newspaper was accepted before I submitted mine. I don’t mind, as it makes excellent points!

Suspend your cynicism for one moment and consider what this citizens’ assembly might potentially offer.

Citizens’ assemblies are tools for eliciting considered policy advice from informed citizens. They are not about building “ommunity consensus”, educating “the people” or even about gauging opinions. For these we have elections, information campaigns, and opinion polls.

What citizens’ assemblies bring to democracy is deliberation. Issues are placed under scrutiny not by experts and politicians but by ordinary citizens.

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Posted by Ron Lubensky at 10:16 AM | Link | Comments

[I submitted the following text to The Age (Melbourne) for publication]

There is a simple reason why so much hot oil has been poured on Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s proposal to convene a Citizens’ Assembly (CA) about climate change policy: few commentators understand how a CA is designed and what it sets out to do. Unfortunately, misinformation comes from some of the most influential commentators.

There is no such thing as a “best” policy, because there are a diversity of incompatible priorities and interests among individuals and institutions. When contested through brute-force argument and activism, policy will usually be unstable as each successive Government shoves it this way and that based on their purported electoral mandate.

Climate policy is also contentious because of disagreement about the credibility of facts and how they should be interpreted. Everyone thinks they have the ticket to absolute truth. Trust is like globally-warmed thin ice.

Commentators cry, “Just make a decision, Julia, lead us!” Then when the decision isn’t what they or half of the population likes, the same commentators will lambaste her. She can’t win, and neither will the governments after her.

So how can the competing positions be bridged instead of perpetuated in this puerile and distorted war-by-media? Gillard’s proposal to convene a Citizens’ Assembly is a reasonable alternative.

The format for a CA has been tried and tested in Canada and elsewhere. In 2009, an Australian Citizens’ Parliament was convened along similar lines and may serve as the process model for what Gillard has in mind.

If it is anything like other CAs, a large number of citizens randomly-selected from the electoral roll in each federal electorate will be sent invitations to participate. From those who register, a second stage of random selection is performed using computer software to obtain the 150 attendees distributed on demographic dimensions like locality, age, education level and perhaps political leaning to match official statistics.

A CA has some similarities to a jury, but scaled up in size to bring a full range of relevant perspectives into the deliberation. What distinguishes a CA is that the participants drive the agenda and learn from each other with the assistance of unaligned small-group facilitators. The participants are also urged to seriously consider the views of people and institutions that are not directly represented amongst them.

Participants converse, but it’s not a festival of talk or a competitive “ideas” summit. It’s far more than a focus group or a show-piece “deliberative poll”.

The facts and options will always come from experts and stakeholders, including those who may not align with the Government’s mission. What the CA will do best, with the help of impartial facilitation, is to ask better questions than reporters and opinion pollsters usually do.

Some participants will have environmental, finance or other expertise to contribute. But none of the participants are expected to become climate experts or economists. They assemble to compare judgements about the presented positions. Of course, they will learn some climate science, but more usefully they will listen and reflect on how different people ascertain and judge the facts, and appreciate the local impacts of proposed options. Other CAs have taken six months to complete on average, including online sessions and a final face-to-face plenary.

There is never pressure on participants to change their preferences or political views. Importantly, there is no demand for a contrived consensus. The emphasis is on listening to each other and getting past the rhetoric. The facilitators help participants unpack the positions and judgements for themselves. Funnily enough, when you trust that you are being listened to properly, you don’t try so hard to pound your ideas across the table! The deliberative group process helps participants be more effective individuals.

Many commentators incorrectly presume that the CA decides the final policy. But the intention would only be for the CA to inform the elected representatives and the Executive about which policy options the country as a whole can best live with for the long term.

The Government must publicly endorse and celebrate the Citizens’ Assembly process and the dedicated work of the participants. The process should be transparent, and organised by an agency that is independent of government.

The output of a CA will be judgements that the Government can apply with confidence to satisfy and respect the broadest range of public, private and institutional interests, with a greater chance of achieving support from across the political spectrum. Provided that the Government implements policies that are consistent with those judgements, the CA adds legitimacy to those policies that will stand the test of time.

Evidence in similar, well-designed public participatory events has shown that randomly-selected citizens of all stripes can be trusted to work together productively and competently to see beyond their local echo chambers and make real sense of national policy options.

Ron Lubensky is a Research Associate and PhD candidate at the Centre for Citizenship and Public Policy at the University of Western Sydney.

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Posted by Ron Lubensky at 09:27 AM | Link | Comments

I write you as one of the PhD researchers who helped set up and run the Australian Citizens’ Parliament in 2009. It is with great surprise and excitement today that I read media reports about your proposal to convene a Citizens’ Assembly (CA) to inform climate policy!

This is fantastic news for those of us working in public participation circles who believe that deliberative procedures should be formally embedded in policy generation processes. In addition to our own research-oriented example, I point to the Canadian experience with its Citizens’ Assemblies for Electoral Reform in British Columbia and Ontario.

I’d like to help you dispel the nay-sayers about your CA. Reading the newspaper columns and the raging public commentary, it is apparent that most people do not understand what a CA is about. For example, many presume that the CA will be a stacked, stage-managed talk-fest or a town-hall style “consultation” without genuine influence, that facilitators are not neutral, that the randomly-selected citizens are to somehow become climate science boffins, that the CA is an elaborate opinion poll of participants’ predispositions, that the effort is somehow crippled because it is not initiated as a direct democratic process, or that there are already 150 elected representatives of the people. Unfortunately, such incorrect expressions amount to the prevailing uninformed and elitist discourse about government-convened public engagement. These must be countered.

Deliberative processes bring people together to learn from each other the diversity of values, beliefs and private interests that underscore policy preferences. Of course, they will learn some climate science, but more usefully they will listen and learn how different people ascertain and judge the facts, and appreciate the diversity of values and local impacts of proposed options. While many in the public ask, “will the assembly recommend better solutions”, there is rarely a single “better” that stands out universally over all others. It is up to the assembly to frame and sort out the options and design a recommendation that they believe most citizens and institutions can live with. What the CA will do best, with the help of expert and impartial facilitation, is ask better questions.

The CA will work diligently and collaboratively in the interests of all Australians, you can count on that. The Government should publicise its respect of those participants and of the collaborative process, which should be conducted transparently. The work of the 150 citizens should be celebrated. (Such publicity did not occur in Canada, which directly led to the failure of the subsequent referenda on electoral reform.)

The newDemocracy Foundation is the non-profit organisation associated with the Australian Citizens’ Parliament. I recommend that you refer to its experts about process design considerations. Although I live in Melbourne, I am currently working for the Centre for Citizenship and Public Policy at the University of Western Sydney, which can also supply resources. My particular interest is in the use of online technology to augment the face-to-face assembly. I would be pleased to assist in any way I can.

Best of success in the upcoming election!

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Posted by Ron Lubensky at 03:40 PM | Link | Comments

I’m chuffed that the academic review panel at the Fourth International Conference on Online Deliberation (#OD2010) conference (30 June – 02 July) has accepted a paper I wrote, entitled Online deliberation as preamble to large-scale facilitated engagement events (pdf 107kb). I had intended to travel to the University of Leeds to present it, but my current health crisis has nixed that.

The organisers have kindly allowed me to produce a short talking-head video that they’ll show instead. My thesis is that online deliberation in the lead-up to face-to-face public engagement should constructively focus on the diversity and multiplicity of values, ethics, beliefs and even self-interests that public policy in a particular context should satisfy. Public deliberation would be more inclusive and legitimate if this landscape is well-explored before policy solutions are considered. A protracted online phase provides the time necessary for this exploration, at relatively low cost.

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Posted by Ron Lubensky at 12:00 AM | Link | Comments

My family and most of my nearby friends already know, but I can’t put off writing about it any longer. I have prostate cancer.

In 2007, after turning 50, I submitted myself to what was to become an annual check-up that included a PSA test, an indicator of prostate health. But my local GP let me down badly by not telling me that my PSA was already elevated (I know that now), perhaps putting me on a watchful wait scheme. I returned to the GP a year later for an unrelated issue but my record was obviously not reviewed and the test was not repeated. Now I’m in strife.

I’m having my prostate removed on 22 July by laparoscopic surgery. The wait is about the same in both the public (my choice) and private system here in Australia. That doesn’t make the wait any easier. I’ll receive radiotherapy afterwards.

So far, cancer is not detected outside my prostate. My chance of cure is good, but considering the advance of the disease, I’m going to need a good dose of luck.

I’m doing my best to maintain a positive outlook and minimise the inevitable stress that I am living. It has been especially difficult for my wife. I’m so grateful to friends, including a prostate cancer survivor, who have already provided fabulous encouragement and support. Don’t be afraid to write me (privately) about it, as I benefit by the conversation.

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Posted by Ron Lubensky at 04:24 PM | Link | Comments

This was the question that was posed to me in an email by an IT academic. Here is my response:

But your question is odd. A PLE is not necessarily a single piece of software. I presume you have read my 2006 article. In it, I talk about a “facility”. What does that word mean? It is a something that makes something else easier to achieve (the root word of facility is facile, which means easy). Think of the word “catalyst”.

Maybe it’s just a disciplined way of organising your life and connecting to others and their activities using a dynamic set of tools. Maybe it’s your relationships with others and to institutions, as a denizen of a network. This is what George Siemens and Stephen Downes are on about.

For some people, iGoogle is enough. They attach widgets that connect them to what they think is important. For some academic researchers, Zotero is their focus. For me, my RSS aggregator is crucial. So is my blog for archiving my thoughts and concerns. For [us at our universities], it’s about access and personal archiving of resources behind the VLE walled garden. Each of those scenarios identifies different sources of knowledge and participation.

So your starting point should not be the PLE, but rather what is important to your lifelong learning. In particular, you should think beyond institutional boundaries. Once you identify the kinds of things that are important, then the question comes, how can you cope with all this? What tools can help? I can’t answer that for you. That’s why it’s personal.

Here is another approach. Think about something you experienced or learned perhaps two years ago, but it’s now a vague memory. Thought experiment: if you had had an ideal behaviour/facility/tool then, what could you have done then so that you could reliably ask an arbitrary question today about that experience, and retrieve an artefact about it that supports an answer?

Hope that helps,

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Posted by Ron Lubensky at 01:04 PM | Link | Comments