Judith Innes included this cartoon in a 1999 paper entitled Consensus Building as Role Playing and Bricolage published in the Journal of the American Planning Association. She wrote: "The big challenge for consensus building is to make reaching agreement as exciting as conflict." We should talk more about this....
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Danish non-profit 21Gov.net has just launched a new eBook entitled State of the eUnion: Government 2.0 and Onwards (PDF 1.1mb) under a Creative Commons Licence. Available in print form soon.
From yesterday's press release:
The future of eGovernment is up for discussion today, when ministers of IT and Technology from all over Europe gather in Malmö, Sweden, for the Fifth Ministerial Meeting and Conference on e-government.
But what is the status of eGovernment? In a new book, published today, 34 global thought-leaders in the field, including Don Tapscott, Tim O’Reilly and Lawrence Lessig, have contributed their views and ideas about the current state of eGovernment and what has come to be known as Government 2.0.
The book ... is assembled and published by one of Denmark’s leading government enterprise architects, John Gøtze, PhD.
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Published under a Creative Commons License
Our family has had a tough week. My 5-yr-old daughter was admitted to Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne with a severe kidney infection. For four days my wife and I played tag team as she recovered. Allison is doing well now, back to normal activities with no permanent damage, although it will still take several weeks for optimal renal function to return.
To advance my research while at the hospital, I read the many contributions to the Handbook of Constructionist Research (2008), edited by Holstein and Gubrium. Constructionism is an approach to understanding human activity, learning and experience that presumes that they are ongoing accomplishments and evolving social practices. Constructionist research is a qualitative endeavour that reveals how participants (and researchers) build their coherence of complex life situations.
This is in contrast to the predominant view that life is merely the inevitable consequence of either individual cognition, of competing preferences or of institutional or cultural forces (as with constructiVISM). Constructionist research rarely seeks to prove hypotheses of predictable, universalised truths. Instead, it examines real life situations in appreciation of the multiple and changing perspectives of participants. Constructionists view knowledge as socially created through interaction. Constructionism is a postmodern approach that celebrates subjectivity and particularity in context. There are strands of constructionist inquiry in sociology, social psychology, anthropology, communications studies, educational research, linguistics and political science. Each discipline brings its own nuances to the approach. I could write a great deal more here, but I should leave that for my thesis.
Every young patient in the hospital ward had a medical situation that was more dire than that of Allison. I couldn't help but notice how many in the ward acted in ways that ameliorated their situation, that constructed optimism. For young Allison, it was about making friends with the others. One teenage patient, who I believe was battling the complications of a kidney transplant, was very kind and enjoyed her company, playing her games and asking her questions. They both appeared to benefit by that interaction.
It was apparent that the young man had taken ownership of the medical procedures he had to endure. He (and his father) spoke as equals to the medical staff, correctly pointing out errors made in the treatment. The staff promoted this transformation by speaking to them without condescension. The medical outcome is directly influenced by the constructed social situation.
One morning, while walking down the corridor, I passed a conversation between a registrar and some parents. The doctor was visibly unfit, standing with one hand on his hip and the other leaning on a door frame. He spoke at the parents, at a distance from them. I heard him say "You MUST ...". He was stamping his authority on the situation, in no uncertain terms. When the registrar had finished, he shuffled quickly off to the lift, where I was, checking his mobile phone (which should not have been switched on in the ward). He needed to be somewhere else.
When Allison's two renal specialists (one on the weekend, one during the week) spoke to us and to Allison, they were open and friendly and preferred to be addressed by first name. They both appeared fit and their body language was at ease. They sat close on the bed. They started every conversation with questions and it was clear by their responses that they had listened to the answers given, including Allison's. Their recommendations to us about the appropriate conditions for discharge and for subsequent diet at home emerged as a collaborative endeavour between us all. I am sure that both specialists were well trained to talk effectively to parents and patients, but I am equally sure that they were naturals at it. Their conversational turns, especially with Allison, showed that they enjoyed the interaction and valued all perspectives related to their work. They were not compelled to try to impress us. For all the downplay of their authority, I view them with greater respect than the I do the registrar.
A common thread in constructionist study is its focus on language, narrative, discourse and performance. It is quite literally a natural fit for my study of deliberation and deliberative processes.
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Published under a Creative Commons License
Published under a Creative Commons License
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) may well be one of the leading government agencies in the world when it comes to public participation. Their public engagement site offers a plethora of useful information including tools, definitions, case studies and much more. Their Public Involvement Network News electronic newsletter is another great resource. More....
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Published under a Creative Commons License
A state election in Victoria, Australia is imminent. Each day the television news hour includes footage of the Labor incumbent pretending not to be in campaign mode, and the opposition leader being critical of current Government policy. The media depicts it as a contest between the leaders of the Labor and Liberal parties. Of course I'm voting for neither of them, I'm voting for a local representative. If I wasn't involved myself in local issues, I'd know little about these people or what they stand for beyond their party ideologies. Since we must vote by law, and our system is fully preferential, the distribution of How to Vote cards is indispensable. Critical analysis is entirely optional.
In the past few weeks, I've also voted in three other elections. First, my automobile club wants its members to elect board members. We get a three-line bio on each, which gives me nothing to go on. I have no idea about the boardroom battles that have recently been fought, or what real difficulties the organisation faces. I select an incumbent who also belongs to a bicycle advocacy group, and newie who has and engineering background. These are the two who are left after I've rejected the real estate tycoon, the career board member members, and others who don't provide any qualifications at all. In other words, I have no idea who to vote for.
Then I get a ballot for the Senate at my university. Some candidates provide a long list of current affiliations. These are the intellectual and cultural elites of Australia. Some are well-known alumni. But I know absolutely nothing about how these people view the university. Do they care that it's turned into an undergraduate degree factory for foreign students, like most campuses in Australia? What do they think about the Government squashing student "unionism" (nothing of the sort). I set the ballot aside. A few days later, I'm on Facebook, and see an advert for one of the candidates. Seems that a few have banded together as a working group, stating progressive aims in common. Nice work, so I vote for them all, and send the candidate a good luck email. He is very appreciative.
Today I received a ballot from a public company of which I am a shareholder, to re-appoint their directors. There are no alternatives. But their constitution demands that they send out the ballots anyway. Their share price plummeted after the GFC, but now it's climbed back to within 10% of its previous high. I don't think that has anything to do with management, but they take the credit. Since most of the shares are institutionally-held, who will assign their votes to the Managing Director by proxy, the vote is a complete waste of time. I chuck the ballot in the bin.
So all of this is just sham democracy. We are given the illusion that we are making choices. But these people are just chimeras on our horizon, unknowable and unaccountable to us after their election. The voting procedure actually serves to protect the distance between us and the institution, and we buy it. I am sure that the brass of most institutions are quite happy for the ballots to be completely ignored, contenting us to the meagre opportunity offered.
Maybe one day I'll receive an invitation to contribute to some real decision-making by those institutions. To complete a prioritisation survey at a minimum, or ideally to be selected to deliberate about an issue. Now that would be a worthwhile expression of democracy.
Then I'd have a very, very good reason to vote for the leader who championed that engagement.
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We are happy to present to you, "Working Together to Strengthen Our Nation's Democracy: Ten Recommendations [PDF]," a report from this summer's Strengthening Our Nation's Democracy II conference.
On August 2-4, experts and advocates for strengthening our nation's democracy came together to create new momentum and plans for bringing together the emerging democracy reform movement behind a common set of priorities. At the second Strengthening Our Nation's Democracy conference, participants shared what they have been learning from their work across the country, and rolled up their sleeves to create collective recommendations and action steps.
Participants came from across the 'democracy reform and civic engagement' community: public deliberation practitioners, community problem solvers and organizers, election reformers, advocates for transparency and accountability, national service proponents, media reformers, educators, and others. Some of the cross-field collaboration was relatively new, while some has been developing over the past several years. Yet the meeting reflected a strong sense of a diverse and growing community to strengthen democracy in the United States, and a strong belief that we will remain committed to working together.
The enclosed report detailed recommendations for both the Administration and the democracy reform movement itself. The recommendations are not meant to be a comprehensive agenda for the democracy reform movement, but rather a set of broadly supported steps that can be taken to move us closer towards our collective goals.
Already, significant progress has been made on several of these recommendations. In the coming months, we look forward to reporting on the success of the many work groups that have been created to advance the outcomes of the conference. If you are interested in contributing to any of these groups, please contact one of the co-chairs listed on page 31 of the report.
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