In the second chapter from his upcoming book, Tom Atlee picks up the topic of learning in deliberation, something he has written about previously. It’s a thorny issue and generally applies to public participation as well.

One problem, as I see it, is that quality deliberation requires informed participants, but properly framing the issue and creating the necessary briefing materials can be quite costly. The challenge is how can we meaningfully involve participants in the co-creation of the briefing process and its outcomes in order to improve quality, lower costs and help make quality deliberation more widely available.

Here’s Tom’s take (as pre-released on Reality Sandwich last month):

Deliberapedia

As noted earlier, framing an issue for deliberation means providing balanced information that helps deliberators take into account the range of views on their issue and the trade-offs connected to whatever choices they might make. Traditionally, it involves condensing a lot of information about that issue into 3-5 approaches for addressing the issue — representing as broadly as possible the full public debate — with the arguments and evidence for and against each approach. Sometimes issue framings also include information about who supports and opposes each option, and a profile of the values that it represents and appeals to.

Most citizen deliberations are framed by professionals who produce “issue books”, videos and other briefing materials, many of which are available at low or no cost, but are quite expensive to put together in the first place. Framing for broad self-organized grassroots deliberations, in contrast, would be crowdsourced, using the fact that advocates for various solutions to a public problem have already developed arguments for their solution and against their opponents’ solutions. Our challenge is to create a context where opponents in the fight over an issue end up participating in co-creating a wiki that channels their information into a coherent frame that clarifies that issue for everyone else. Most of the partisans involved would not participate out of their civic-mindedness but because they wanted their viewpoint to be well represented in this public document. This is the idea behind “Deliberapedia”.

The Deliberapedia vision is inspired by Debatepedia, a leading debate society’s online forum to collectively work up and share arguments pro and con various propositions, creating a database that can be used by debaters everywhere. Deliberapedia would be a massive, readily searchable, rapidly expanding and developing wiki database of organized arguments for and against all sorts of policy solutions to all sorts of public issues.

Deliberapedia would provide a powerful — perhaps even necessary — foundation for a self-organizing grassroots citizen-based deliberative system capable of generating empowered public wisdom with minimal ongoing cost. It would also constitute one of the greatest contributions we could make to democracy even if the rest of the deliberative system for which it was designed is never developed.

Note from the author: The final version of Empowering Public Wisdom will include an appendix showing one way in which Deliberapedia could function, including a special network of grassroots groups focusing on issues they’ve chosen, as well as a chapter on the creation of official legislature of ordinary citizens, who could both contribute to and use Deliberapedia.

It’s still true today that “[i]nside every public participation program is a good public information program.” However, I think we need to be moving from simply informing participants (if understood as a top-down, one-way activity) towards a more participant-centric model that takes into account the entire learning experience. Last Spring at SXSW, I took the liberty to slightly rephrase the guideline as follows: ”Inside every public participation program is a good public learning program.”

The wiki approach Tom proposes has opportunities but also many challenges. In order for the whole to be greater than the sum of its parts some level of editorial leadership would still be required, and the need to coordinate non-expert contributors will create certain overhead costs which may at some point outweigh the benefits.

In the context of specific projects, though, one possible solution might be found somewhere in the middle between a top-down and a purely participant-driven (crowdsourced) approach. As I started to outline last year, I agree there is a lot of potential in granting the participants a much more active role in this important pre-phase of any deliberation, consultation or general public participation effort:

• Building on the diversity of participants’ knowledge and experiences could help improve briefing materials in terms of scope, accuracy and accessibility.
• Giving participants ownership of the research process and the outcomes it produces may build buy-in and increase trust.
• Offering participants more variety in the ways they can contribute (e.g. by taking on the role of “researcher, interviewer, fact checker, curator, editor etc.”) might increase overall engagement, with more people participating at a higher enjoyment factor and hence more likely to stick around, invite others etc.

I’d be interested to know who has integrated innovative content co-creation and e-learning components into their online consultations. If you have any leads, please leave a comment. Thanks!

Tom Atlee will be presenting at this week’s NCDD Confab Call. From his blog:

I’ll be doing an online dialogue in the 2-hour National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation Confab Call on Tuesday, January 17th at 2pm Eastern (11am Pacific). Ben Roberts, a principal in both weDialogue and Occupy Café, will be facilitating the call on the Maestro conference call platform (which enables questions, voting, breakout groups, etc.).

Tom will cover various themes from his new book “Empowering Public Wisdom: A Practical Vision of Citizen-Led Politics” (to be published in August 2012), including this question related to e-participation:

• What is gained and lost in the choice between online and face-to-face citizen engagements? Do conference calls and video conferencing have a potential role to play in formal citizen deliberations? Is it actually possible to have quality online deliberation among ordinary citizens – especially if they are randomly selected? What do we need to know and do in order to achieve high quality online deliberation?

Great question, and I look forward to the conversation. Our short answer is that a combination of good process, skilled facilitation and the appropriate technology can make high-quality online deliberation possible, whether stand-alone or in combination with face-to-face.

Head over to Maestro to RSVP for this event.

Via Alex Moll on Twitter, I just came across OpenGov.gr, the website for the Greek Open Government Initiative. From the English language version:

Opengov.gr has been designed to serve the principles of transparency, deliberation, collaboration and accountability and includes three initiatives:

Οpen calls for the recruitment of public administration officials. Top level and mid-level openings in the public sector are available on the Internet. Applications are submitted on-line using a platform available on the opengov.gr website. See the latest Open Calls here (in Greek).

Electronic deliberation. Almost every piece of draft legislation or even policy initiative by the government, are posted in a blog like platform prior to their submission to parliament. Citizens and organisations can post their comments, suggestions and criticisms article-by-article. See the latest Electronic deliberations here (in Greek).

Labs OpenGov. An open innovation initiative that brings together ideas and proposals from citizens, the public and the private sectors. Labs.OpenGov.gr attempts to release the power of decentralised knowledge and explore new ways to tackle modern public administration problems. See the latest Labs events here (in Greek).

The online deliberation site runs on WordPress using at least one plugin (for up-or-down voting).

A couple of screenshots below (using Google Translate).

This particular “Public Consultation on the creation of new corporate structure” ran from November 22 through December 7, 2011. Two documents related to the consultation are available for download (PDF). The results are available for download as well (Excel) and include the list of full-text comments including number of positive and negative votes received.

If any of our Greek readers familiar with this site could share some additional information, that would be great. For example, how popular is this offering? How are comments being processed? The usual stuff. Ευχαριστώ!

Tom Atlee is working on a new book (due out this Summer). From an email he sent this morning:

My new book – “Empowering Public Wisdom: A Practical Vision of Citizen-Led Politics” – has gone through two rounds of editorial review. It is scheduled for publication in early August 2012. The publisher – North Atlantic Books, whose books are sold and distributed by Random House – has agreed to post two chapters on the web for pre-publication public review and comment. (This is not something that is ordinarily done, and they are, to their credit, going out on a limb to do this.) In addition to crowd-sourcing editorial perspectives, we want to seed the book’s ideas into the public conversation (in a very hot election year!) and get an early sense of public reaction.

You can get the sneak peek here (one chapter this week, another one next week): Empowering Public Wisdom

From the introduction:

“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.

And here are the eight characteristics Tom has identified:

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.

The chapter goes on to share some of the rich history of citizen deliberative councils and how they could and should be used today.

This looks like a publication to really look forward to. And who knows, maybe subsequent editions will have to revise the first characteristic to also include online assembly.

Earlier this summer, I happened to come across an excellent new article on online deliberation design. Now that it’s out of draft mode, I can finally share it here.

Online Deliberation Design: Choices, Criteria, and Evidence (PDF, final working version) by Todd Davies and Reid Chandler is currently in press and will appear as chapter 6 in Tina Nabatchi, Michael Weiksner, John Gastil, and Matt Leighninger (Editors), Democracy in Motion: Evaluating the Practice and Impact of Deliberative Civic Engagement, Oxford University Press, Fall 2011:

Abstract: This chapter reviews empirical evidence bearing on the design of online forums for deliberative civic engagement. Dimensions of design are defined for different aspects of the deliberation: its purpose, the target population, the spatiotemporal distance separating participants, the communication medium, and the deliberative process to be followed. After a brief overview of criteria for evaluating different design options, empirical findings are organized around design choices. Research has evolved away from treating technology for online deliberation dichotomously (either present or not) toward nuanced findings that differentiate between technological features, ways of using them, and cultural settings. The effectiveness of online deliberation depends on how well the communicative environment is matched to the deliberative task. Tradeoffs, e.g. between rich and lean media and between anonymous and identifiable participation, suggest different designs depending on the purpose and participants. Findings are limited by existing technologies, and may change as technologies and users co-evolve.

Table 6.1: Summary of Five Design Categories

The authors present a number of design issues, grouped into five multi-dimensional categories (click to enlarge image on the right):

[...] These issues have been selected for inclusion mainly because they have been the subjects of empirical research. As should be apparent, the issues discussed below represent a relatively small subset of all the potential choices a deliberation designer faces. Nevertheless, these issues do provide a way to organize the empirical literature relevant to deliberation design. [...]

Table 6.1 (page 3 in the PDF) illustrates the five design categories and the dimensions they include:

1. Purpose: Why is the deliberation being designed?
   • Outcome (decisions-beliefs-ideas)
   • Collectivity (group-individual)
2. Population: Who will be involved?
   • Recruitment (random-selected)
   • Audience (public-private)
3. Spatiotemporal Distance: Where and when will participants be interacting with each other?
   • Colocation (face to face-telecommunication)
   • Cotemporality (synchronous-asynchronous)
4. Communication Medium: How will communication occur?
   • Modality (speech-text-image-multimodal)
   • Emotivity (impeded-enabled)
   • Fidelity (transformed-unaltered)
5. Deliberative Process: What will occur between participants
   • Facilitation (moderated-unmoderated)
   • Structure (rules-free form)
   • Identifiability (identifiable-anonymous)
   • Incentivization (reward-no reward)

Under “Design Criteria” (page 9), the authors share “some of the [success] criteria that have been applied in the past, especially by researchers evaluating different design choices [...]“. They are:

• Quantity
• Quality
• Inclusiveness
• Preference
• Efficiency
• Efficacy

The article goes on to describe empirical findings related to each of the design dimensions, touching upon some of the key trade-offs involved in choosing either between online and face-to-face or between various online setups, and mentions plenty of opportunities for future research, including:

• Effects of random versus non-random sampling for participant recruitment
• Effects of audience (public versus private deliberations)
• Effects of various modalities
• Effects of structure (specifically, particular techniques)
• Effects of incentives

This research potential is summed up as follows (page 22):

Remarks on Result Specificity and Culturalism

The studies we have cited in this section, together with the design dimensions into which we have organized them, demonstrate that the main question facing future deliberation designers as they contemplate online designs will increasingly be not whether but how to use online tools. Early research in this area tended to treat technology as “a dichotomous variable … either present or not.” But as technologies have evolved, the range of experiences they offer now span a broad spectrum from the simple and truncated text of a Twitter message to the high verisimilitude of the most advanced virtual reality environments, as well as augmented reality systems that attempt to give us the best face-to-face and online experiences simultaneously. Online deliberation and its public version – online deliberative civic engagement – are rich areas of study and design because of the huge space of possibilities within them.

Great stuff! It is clear that given certain objectives, requirements and conditions a variety of design choices may be viable. Furthermore, every tool has its strengths and weaknesses and must generally fit the design approach in order to perform well. There can never be a single most effective web tool for online deliberation (or for public participation, for that matter). That question falls short as long as it’s not based on at least some specifics.

Following my previous post about the upcoming Deliberative Poll here in California, I have been invited to attend the event as an observer. From the invitation email:

I am writing to invite you to observe an exciting civic engagement event this summer that will help chart the course for California’s future.

On June 24-26, a broad coalition of reform-oriented organizations will bring together a random sample of 300 Californians in Torrance for California’s first-ever Deliberative Poll. “What’s Next California?” is an unprecedented attempt to bring Californians into the conversation of whether California’s governance can be improved, and if so, how. “What’s Next” will allow a microcosm of the state to spend a weekend working together to better understand and share their views on a range of issues including legislative representation, fiscal and tax policy, whether local governments should have more autonomy and control over public services, and the initiative process.

“What’s Next California?” will also present an unusual opportunity for policy makers and advocates to observe a deep discussion among Californians and experts with whom they will have the change to consult throughout the process that differs dramatically from dialogues among self-selected members of the public and officials or conventional opinion polling.

The deliberative poll is being organized by the New America Foundation, California Forward, the Public Policy Institute of California, the Nicolas Berggruen Institute, Pepperdine University’s Davenport Institute, California Common Cause, and the Bill Lane Center for the American West. It is being managed by the Center for Deliberative Democracy at Stanford and PBS’s MacNeil-Lehrer Productions. The weekend will be moderated by Judy Woodruff of the PBS Newshour and videotaped for a documentary to be broadcast on PBS stations in California and elsewhere.

More information about “What’s Next California” can be found at nextca.org.

I’m delighted to be able to attend and have gladly accepted the invitation. I plan to be there for the kick-off on Friday night as well as for parts of either Saturday or Sunday.

As an observer, some of the obvious things to look at might include the following:

• Event logistics and setup
• General mood and attitudes among the participants
• Quality of the dialogue
• Use of information resources (evidence)
• Decision-making processes
• Overall process facilitation

Given what you know about this project, what else would you like the observers to keep in mind or watch out for during the event? What would you monitor if you could be there in person?

Though I may or may not be able to do extensive live reporting during the event, I will definitely share my impressions afterwards. If you have any suggestions or recommendations for this observer, please share them in the comments below, and I’ll be your eyes and ears. Thank you!

Now here‘s an interesting project, scheduled to happen in California next month (via). From the press release: Coalition of Reformers, Academics and Foundations to Conduct California’s First-Ever Statewide Deliberative Poll

SAN FRANCISCO, CA — A coalition of non-partisan reform organizations, academics and journalists today announced that they will partner with Stanford University’s Center for Deliberative Democracy to conduct California’s first-ever deliberative poll. This weekend event, called “What’s Next California?” will bring a randomly selected sample of the state’s registered voters together in Torrance for representative and thoughtful deliberation on a wide range of governance, finance and constitutional issues.

Unlike standard public opinion polls conducted via telephone, this “poll with a human face” allows participants to educate themselves on key issues, talk in small groups, question experts with competing perspectives and give reasoned answers to complex policy questions. The participant’s views will be recorded in identical before-and-after surveys.

“This event will give hundreds of everyday Californians who do not usually have the chance to weigh in on policy to make their voices heard on issues that affect each of us every day,” said Lenny Mendonca, an event organizer with California Forward and the New America Foundation. “We sincerely hope that the valuable data we glean will be taken seriously by lawmakers and reform organizations as they move forward.”

The Center for Deliberative Democracy at Stanford University describes the basic process as follows:

Deliberative Polling®: Executive Summary

The Problem

Citizens are often uninformed about key public issues. Conventional polls represent the public’s surface impressions of sound bites and headlines. The public, subject to what social scientists have called “rational ignorance,” has little reason to confront trade-offs or invest time and effort in acquiring information or coming to a considered judgment.

The Process

Deliberative Polling® is an attempt to use television and public opinion research in a new and constructive way. A random, representative sample is first polled on the targeted issues. After this baseline poll, members of the sample are invited to gather at a single place for a weekend in order to discuss the issues. Carefully balanced briefing materials are sent to the participants and are also made publicly available. The participants engage in dialogue with competing experts and political leaders based on questions they develop in small group discussions with trained moderators. Parts of the weekend events are broadcast on television, either live or in taped and edited form. After the deliberations, the sample is again asked the original questions. The resulting changes in opinion represent the conclusions the public would reach, if people had opportunity to become more informed and more engaged by the issues.

I just took a first quick look, but here are a couple of things to keep an eye on:

• Quality of information materials — The website states that participants will be provided with “balanced background materials” or “good information”. Complete and unbiased information is indeed an important requirement for public participation. However, sometimes participants don’t trust the briefing materials despite the convener’s best efforts, and this project context might well carry that risk. In order to be successful, the project will have to deliver a learning experience that earns the trust of the participants.
• Impact — Based on the press release, there does not seem to be any commitment yet by California lawmakers to hear the results, let alone incorporate any of the recommendations or other outcomes the process may produce. Over the past few years, several of the organizations behind this project have tried to move this issue forward — with mixed success. If the decision makers aren’t on board from the get-go this may prove to be yet another uphill battle that, in the end, can’t be won.

According to the about page, the project will include “digital participation” on their website (nextca.org), on Facebook and on Twitter (#NextCA).

Sandy Heierbacher, Director of the National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation (NCDD), gives a nice two-paragraph summary this morning of what her organization’s work is all about:

[...] Our most urgent problems seem even more unsolvable because of our inability to come together civilly and discuss issues and potential solutions in depth with all “sides.”

I work in a field that is trying to change that. We work to bring people together across political, ethnic, generational, economic and ideological divides — sometimes political leaders, sometimes everyday citizens, sometimes both. The idea is that if we can truly hear each other’s stories, and learn why they hold the values and opinions they do (we call this “dialogue”), that we’ll be better able to consider differing opinions on how our most challenging problems should be handled (“deliberation”) — weighing the trade-offs that are inherent in every decision that could be made.

It’s about sitting down and working together, like grown ups, to accomplish something we can only accomplish together, united. It’s not rocket science, and it can sound a bit fluffy and idealist. But actually, it’s just how we learn to deal with all the things that make us human — emotions, pride, values, opinions, perspectives, science, media, facts — and still get things done. In politics, it’s the best way to make lasting decisions and policies (rather than policies the other side overturns as soon as they’re able to), because you create buy-in and trust for policies that don’t compromise people’s core values.

Very well put.

You can read her full post here: How can we remain United?

Another project worth mentioning that’s very much related to the ROI discussions that are happening elsewhere is the Making the Case campaign by the Canadian Community for Dialogue and Deliberation (C2D2). It must have launched shortly after I last wrote about their efforts back in November of last year.

From the site:

Dialogue and deliberation (D&D) is making a real difference to Canadian community life, public policy making, responding to major problems such as climate change and homelessness, and how governments interact with their citizens. These contributions need to be heard and celebrated more widely.

A number of success stories have already been submitted, with more to be published later this year.

A couple of fellow IAP2 USA members and I are interested in doing something similar for the field of public participation here in the US. We’re still in the early stages, but it would be great to have produced a first round of insights by the end of this year. Let me know if you’d like to contribute.

In my previous post, I mentioned that wiki-based policy crafting has been tried before. Well, I thought what better opportunity to reach deep into the archives and dig up a few related examples from around 2007/2008 (including some that tried to tackle slightly different problems, such as issue or debate mapping, but still all fairly similar).

Campaigns Wikia

“[I]t’s time for politics to become more intelligent, and for democracy to really involve the people. Broadcast media tells you what to think and doesn’t let you get involved. It’s time to focus on what you need, what you care about, and the messages you want to get out.” And: “This website, Campaigns Wikia, has the goal of bringing together people from diverse political perspectives who may not share much else, but who share the idea that they would rather see democratic politics be about engaging with the serious ideas of intelligent opponents, about activating and motivating ordinary people to get involved and really care about politics beyond the television soundbites.”

http://campaigns.wikia.com

Debatepedia

“Debatepedia is the free wiki encyclopedia of A-to-Z debates and pro and con arguments. It is the home and future of sound reasoning. Debatepedia is a project of the International Debate Education Association’s (IDEA) and Debatemedia, Inc. Debatepedia enables anyone (you included) to click “edit” and engage in a collective endeavor of documenting and structuring unique pro and con arguments on any topic, even topics that you initiate. Debatepedia is quickly becoming an indispensable resource for debaters, students, citizens, and even politicians to uncover salient arguments in important public debates and develop rational positions and perspectives. At its highest level, Debatepedia will help improve the quality of decision-making itself.”

http://debatepedia.com

Future Melbourne Wiki

“Future Melbourne has been developed using a transparent and collaborative process. [...] When the formal public consultation period arrived, the wiki was a perfect fit for the project as it enables wide-scale collaboration unrestricted by time or geographical constraints.”

http://www.futuremelbourne.com.au

More Perfect

“Imagine an entirely new approach to democracy where everyone is able to participate. Imagine a way to enable more direct public involvement and participation, creating a marketplace of ideas where the public can collaborate with each other on the matters that affect their daily lives. Fundamentally change the way policy makers and citizens approach the creation of laws today. That’s our vision.”

http://www.moreperfect.org

Politicopia

“Politicopia gives people a solid handle on the Utah Legislature. Users create summaries of bills, pro and con arguments, comments, links, and more.  [...] This is an experiment in open democracy.”

http://www.politicopia.com

* * *

Note that several of these sites are either inactive and spam-ridden (Campaigns Wiki), defunct (More Perfect) or have changed considerably over the last few years (Politicopia). If you’re that interested, Archive.org’s most awesome Wayback Machine may still remember what things looked like back in the day.

Any other examples worth mentioning, successful or otherwise? Please, by all means, add them in the comments before they become  completely forgotten. Thanks!

Over the weekend, I learned about LexPop, a new wiki-based site that invites participants to collaboratively craft public policy on any issue (see their current project: Policy Drive: MA Net Neutrality). From the about page (emphasis theirs):

Just as pamphlets were once the most efficient and effective means for distributing ideas, so too was this type of democracy the best solution at one point. But that moment is long since passed. A legitimate twenty-first century democracy will invite the public into meaningful collaboration.

And that’s the theory behind LexPop. The idea is that we (the People) can do a better job. The idea is that by introducing more voices, the policies that win out won’t be limited to the best-funded.

The project is ambitious, but something similar is already working in Brazil. The Federal Government is experimenting with collaboration through ExpertNet and Peer-to-Patent. Yet neither of these projects opens the gates to policy making by the people. LexPop is a start that, and while imperfect, it will help bring public participation into public policy.

A recent blog post provides more background:

The notion that participants can create real policy is bold. But it’s no more so than the idea that users (in their spare time) could collaboratively create the world’s best encyclopedia, improve the US Patent and Trademark Office, and, well, develop Linux and Firefox.

I’m aware of a few attempts at wiki-based policy making, but as far as I can tell the results have been rather mixed. A big fan and regular user of wikis myself, I certainly find the idea intriguing. However, the analogies (Wikipedia, Peer-to-Patent or the development of certain open source software) don’t really apply to the policy making process. For example:

• Wikipedia and Peer-to-Patent both deal with facts, whereas policy always involves a combination of positive and normative issues. The process of collaboratively collecting facts is quite different from a policy argument or deliberation, and it has to be managed differently.
• Wikipedia as well as most open source projects are open-ended, whereas policy creation is very much a time-bound process. You can always make another edit on Wikipedia, but you need to agree on a final version of a policy draft in order for it to move forward and through the legislative process.
• Wikipedia and Peer-to-Patent both benefit from large numbers of small, independent edits and contributions. However, editing a policy document without at least some level of understanding of the whole usually does more harm than good.

Here is the comment I left back in December, when someone on ExpertNet raised questions about the wiki process (mainly what kind of edits are appropriate where, when, by whom etc.):

In order to engage a large group of participants in the review or co-creation of a policy document such as this one, I suggest the following iterative process:

1. Participants discuss draft language in the discussion forums (for example, they can ask clarifying questions, raise issues or suggest improved language)
2. A small team of dedicated editors (usually on the convener side, but might include a few volunteer participants) revises draft based on participants’ input AND communicates which changes were made and why
3. Rinse, lather, repeat.

To date, this is the most efficient process I’ve seen to do this kind of co-creation of policy. Making meaningful edits to a complex policy document requires a lot of mental overhead, which most participants have neither the bandwidth nor subject matter expertise to commit to.

Trying to wordsmith while the document basics (general scope, outline, key points etc.) are still in flux is usually a terrible waste of energy for everyone involved.

And as I’ve argued before, quality participation doesn’t waste participants’ time.

A great example of the process outlined above was the highly collaborative effort across multiple organizations in 2009 to create the Core Principles for Public Engagement (see earlier posts here, here) led by NCDD and others (strictly speaking, the online collaboration relied on a discussion forum, not a wiki, but the same lessons apply).

A key success factor was the fact that the team of core editors was made up of highly qualified people who dedicated a lot of time working on the document. They were trusted members of the community, and they communicated very well with the larger group of several dozen participants. The total number of comments in the forum wasn’t particularly high, but still it took a handful of iterations to arrive at the final document.

The LexPop project will follow a simple three-phased process (research, deliberation, drafting). I’m not sure that’s enough structure to make it work, though it’s already a lot better than most other examples I’ve seen. Worth watching!

In case you haven’t seen, there’s a very interesting event coming up this week. The Deliberative Democracy Workshop “Connecting Research and Practice” will take place February 3-5, 2011 in Sydney, Australia. An invited workshop, it will bring together some of the leading researchers and practitioners in this field from around the world.

The expected key outcomes as listed on the site:

• Set the context for deliberative democracy in theory and practice
• Build mutual understanding between researchers and public participation practitioners
• Experience different deliberative techniques
• Establish and promote the potential of deliberative democracy and public participation (especially to contribute to the resolution of complex challenges of our time)
• Determine priorities for further research and recommend proposals for funding.

The workshop organizers are putting in a lot of effort to allow the larger community to follow the event remotely (via their event blog, Twitter and occasional polls). Check their website for details.

I look forward to checking in regularly over the coming days (note that for people on Pacific Time the event starts Wednesday afternoon). Now that we have a product, we can finally make good on our pledge to be accessible to outside research and to share back any findings liberally.

Back in December, Tom Atlee shared some interesting thoughts over on the NCDD listserv about what he refers to as Creative Participation. He recently joined the growing list of NCDD guest bloggers and today shared his post on the NCDD blog: Creative Deliberation

The article brings up some good points that highlight the need for better learning design in deliberative processes. Here’s the comment I left today (also a re-posting of my reply in December):

This comment appeared first on the NCDD listserv on December 6, 2010 in reply to Tom’s original post there. I am reposting it here with a few minor edits.

Hi Tom,

Great to see your writing here!

I find the information piece particularly challenging (and a more iterative approach like the one you outline seems helpful).

Most issues that warrant deliberation are so hugely complex to the average participant that they require extensive education efforts. Meaningful participation is impossible as long as participants lack a basic understanding of the issues at hand. Traditionally, there seem to be at least three problems:

1) Inadequate learning design

Rarely is learning ever adequately designed into the process (it takes more than just “briefing materials”).

2) Lack of trust

While conveners are under an obligation to provide “complete and unbiased information” (see post), they aren’t always trusted as a neutral source. Participants who for whatever reason don’t trust the information they are being given can cause a lot of friction (see the recent “Our Budget, Our Economy” project).

3) Top-down approach

The process of informing the participants is usually a one-way street. It assumes that the convener alone can provide the best possible participant briefing (both in terms of content and process). There is little to no opportunity for participants to improve, customize or otherwise take ownership of their learning experience.

Learning should play a key role in citizen deliberations. And participants should be enabled to take on the role of researcher, interviewer, fact checker, curator, editor etc. (see post) in collaborative ways that help educate the group as a whole (something your steps #2, #4 and #6 hint at). This doesn’t replace the need for subject matter experts nor does it diminish the convener’s overall responsibility to provide the best information possible.

Your approach is multi-day, but that may still be fairly limited. At every deliberative event I’ve attended or observed, a lot of time was spent on activities that could have well been handled prior to meeting face-to-face (particularly education/learning). That’s why I strongly encourage the use of (online) technology to complement any in-person activities.

Cheers,
Tim

Anyone already doing interesting work in this area? Anyone creating great learning experiences as a building block for successful deliberation?

Over on Facebook, the Kettering Foundation asks with regard to the Times’ Budget Puzzle:

What do you think: are budgeting exercises like these what we would call “deliberative choice work”? If not, how are they related?

For a definition of what Kettering means by choice work, we turn to the ever-competent NCDD resource center and their quick reference glossary:

Choice Work

“Choice work” is a term used by the Kettering Foundation and ViewpointLearning to refer to the weighing of costs and consequences of various courses of action in a group deliberation process in order for participants to make sound decisions about critical issues. Citizens have an undelegable responsibility to make choices about how to solve problems because government alone cannot solve them all. Highly deliberative, choice work emphasizes the need to do the hard work of recognizing that a choice has to be made, that consequences have to be weighed and trade-offs balanced.

So is the Budget Puzzle in its current form deliberative? Hardly. The countless budgets participants have been busy sharing on Twitter and Facebook over the past three days may have triggered an occasional back and forth, a short exchange here, a reply there. But the key challenge of integrating competing viewpoints in the face of tough choices — and using highly-structured deliberative processes as a means to do so — does not yet get addressed by this application.

The core task of balancing the budget by selecting from a list of deficit-reducing measure is an activity that participants do independently, by themselves, not as a team or a group. And in this case, with an issue as complex and polarized as the federal budget, the former is infinitely easier than the latter.

I’d describe the current application as a kind of online choicebook, focused on engaging the participants and educate them about the issue (see related projects on ParticipateDB: here, here).

Last week, I attended a conference call hosted by the Public Health Agency of Canada as part of the ongoing D&D Evaluation Project by the Canadian Community for Dialogue and Deliberation (C2D2).

On their resources page, C2D2 states:

The C2D2 community asks, “How do we know – what is the evidence to demonstrate – that using dialogue and deliberation makes a difference?”

Public participation is facing the same question.

Previously, these eight draft principles have been proposed (download PDF with notes from their August 17, 2010 call):

1. Evaluation is a process, not a tactic.
2. Good practice means considering and incorporating evaluation from the beginning of the project.
3. Quantitative and qualitative methods are equally valued.
4. Evaluation should include a learning focus (but whose learning?).
5. Evaluation includes consideration of the context and of the model of action/change the deliberation and dialogue process is embedded in.
6. Evaluation is not values-free.
7. Evaluation should uphold the principles of D&D in its design and implementation.
8. Evaluation should be responsive to needs of project sponsors, as well as the advance of the field.

A project worth watching, for sure.

At the PACE conference in Peoria, AZ last week, a lot of anecdotal evidence was shared that shows how high-quality public participation can help find optimal solutions, save costs, keep complex large-scale development projects on time and on budget, reduce the risk of litigation, build community buy-in etc. What’s missing is a systematic effort to collect these stories and document the lessons learned.

More and more, I am convinced that The ROI of Public Participation would make for a sweet conference.

Over the past few weeks, Melbourne, Australia-based Ron Lubensky has written an series of posts explaining the concept of a Citizens’ Assembly and defending it against unfounded criticism:

• July 23, 2010: Open letter to Julia Gillard, Prime Minister
• July 26, 2010: Assembled citizens make sense
• July 26, 2010: Another good op-ed supporting Citizens’ Assembly about climate policy
• July 26, 2010: What I think the Citizens’ Assembly should do…
• July 27, 2010: On collaborative learning and online deliberation…
• August 14, 2010: Labor MPs avoiding Citizens’ Assembly pitch
• August 27, 2010: The public appetite for public engagement

There’s a lot of advice in there! Take these recommendations to heart, and you should be ready to design your own citizens’ assembly in no time (well, almost).

For anyone interested in learning more, Participedia has an in-depth case study available about the 2004 British Columbia Citizens’ Assembly on Electoral Reform as well as one on the 2009 Australian Citizens’ Parliament, which Ron worked on at the time.

This is a short review of “Beginning with the End in Mind: A Call for Goal-driven Deliberative Practice” by Martín Carcasson, PhD (CAPE Occasional Paper / No 2 / 2009 — PDF)

Carcasson‘s essay on deliberative practice presents, in his words, “a conceptual framework to help practitioners more systematically consider both the short-term and long-term strategies that inform and guide their efforts.” It is actually more than what this humble introduction might suggest, as it is a very carefully crafted fundamental essay on the ins and outs of deliberation, not just a check list of dos and don’ts for implementers – even though it can serve as a very good check list in that respect as well. His goal is to present a guideline for practitioners to “increase the tangible impact their events have on the communities in which they work”, but instead of giving a run-down of case studies and best practices he takes a good step back and presents a framework that outlines six goals for practitioners to target in deliberative processes in general, which he organizes in three broad groups.

The first-order goals are issue learning, improved democratic attitudes and improved democratic skills. The second-order goals are individual/community action and improved institutional decision making. The third-order goal is improved community problem solving. Each of these goals (as illustrated in his graphical representation above, taken from the article) are interrelated and somewhat build upon each other. He frames each discussion by analysing the current state of affairs and then goes into what he believes potential impacts are of “well-planned, high-quality deliberation related to each goal in order to lay out a potential path for practitioners.” This classification alone points toward a clear focus on capacity-building, for lasting impact in communities and among stakeholders. Taking action towards problems is only the following step, and even there the emphasis is on mechanisms that ensure lasting impact. Carcasson takes good inventory of the present state of affairs, and despite all problems, he sounds fairly optimistic, emphasizing the yet untapped potentials and steps already taken.

So what is his main point? Unless we carefully frame high-quality individual events and projects we will not be able to achieve broader ends. And without considering the long-term goals we want to achieve and carefully mapping out what we want to actually achieve with individual projects, all we do is “deliberation for the sake of deliberation (while likely enjoyable and perhaps moderately impacting, will not be enough to carry this movement forward).” He fears two things. One is the danger of brushing over crucial initial steps and problem-solving in “the rush to make an impact”, the other is getting caught up in the “daily grind of running individual events” or micro-management and thus not making the broad impact necessary for capacity-building and real change.

Overall this is an excellent and fundamental essay that examines the necessary elements of a deliberation process in a comprehensible way and should be required reading for practitioners (chronologically before even thinking about tenders, implementation, and so forth). The essay was published at www.publicagenda.org/publicengagement (direct link to PDF).

The National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation (NCDD), which has a blog post on Carcasson’s article here, did a confab call last week with Martín Carcasson about his work and the paper, which is available on their website as embedded audio or download.

Session notes and related resources from the “No Better Time” conference at the University of New Hampshire back in July are now available for download on their resources page.

Measuring and metrics was a hot topic that was discussed at the following learning exchanges:

• Embedding Deliberative Practices in Local Democracy (session notes, PDF):
  This would need some further digging into, but lots of interesting tidbits and potential starting points for assessing impact and ROI, various ways to measure “embeddedness” over time etc.
• Making the Case for this Work: Improving the Way We Collect, Report, and Explain Outcomes (session notes, PDF):
  The goals of this session were “to a) Identify where the field/participants are with regard to evaluation; b) Identify where the field/participants want to be with regard to evaluation; and c) Identify strategies to get the field/participants to that place (how are going to get there?)”
• New Frontiers for Assessment and Measurement
  No session notes available, but check out “Impacts and Outcomes of Participatory Processes in Brazil and Canada” (download, PDF)
• Renewing the Research Agenda (session notes, PDF)
  Only a brief outline here (“Assessment was the main theme. One view was that questions about what works, under what conditions, and why can be broken down into researchable parts and studied (quantitatively or qualitatively), with the gold standard being a randomized experiment.”), would be nice if someone could add some detail.
• The “Downside” of Deliberative Democracy (session notes, PDF)
  Very little detail, except “doing ‘diagnostics’ and ‘assessment’ before planning a deliberative project” was discussed, apparently.

Please leave a comment if you have additional notes or comments you can share. Thanks!

I’ll be taking the red-eye to Boston tonight on my way to what looks like a great conference: No Better Time: Promising Opportunities in Deliberative Democracy for Educators and Practitioners

The conference is hosted by The Democracy Imperative and the Deliberative Democracy Consortium.

From their website:

What are the conference’s objectives?

Deliberative democracy has reached a critical point in its development. Over the last fifteen years, shifts in citizen capacities and attitudes have led to a dramatic proliferation of citizen participation and deliberative practices, and in 2008 they helped to produce an historic presidential election. On the heels of these changes, new opportunities for educators and practitioners are emerging in communities, in government, and on campuses. The primary goal of “No Better Time” is to take stock of these developments and to consider future directions for educators and practitioners in teaching, research, and in citizen‐centered initiatives.

We know what we want to happen: colleges and universities will make democracy central to their academic, governance, and public missions; researchers, practitioners, and other leaders will learn together better in order to improve the practice of deliberative democracy on the ground; educators will ensure that all graduates understand and know their responsibilities in a just, free, equitable society; students will become skilled in the arts of dialogue, deliberation and public reason, conflict management, and collaborative decision and policy making; the gap will close between researchers and practitioners and theory and practice…

We don’t know all that needs to happen to make these aspirations a reality. And we think that by bringing together a lot of smart, dedicated, and experienced people, we can figure it out. Convening people who care about deliberative democracy, learning from each other about what works, mapping out and prioritizing activities, and providing the space for innovation and collaboration; these are the objectives of this conference.

About 250 people are attending.

Below are some of the sessions I’m looking at (many run in parallel, so sadly I won’t be able to attend them all):

• The “downside” of deliberative democracy (Alice Siu, Stanford University; Mary Jacksteit, Public Conversations Project)
• Deliberative democracy in federal agencies (Roger Bernier, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; Leanne Nurse, Environmental Protection Agency)
• Embedding deliberative practices in local democracy (Terry Amsler, Collaborative Governance Initiative, League of California Cities; Will Friedman, Public Agenda; BongHwan Kim, Department of Neighborhood Empowerment, City of Los Angeles)
• Funding and fostering democracy: What have foundations learned about the field, and what do they want to know? (Stuart Comstock-Gay, Vermont Community Foundation: John Esterle, Whitman Institute; Chris Gates, Philanthropy for Active Civic Engagement; Dick Ober, New Hampshire Foundation)
• Renewing the research agenda (Jim Fishkin, Stanford University; Archon Fung, Harvard University; Peter Levine, CIRCLE)
• A tech-savvy citizenry: New media for public participation, policy deliberation, and social change (Joe Peters, Ascentum; Brad Rourke, blog.bradrourke.com)
• Embedding deliberative practices in national democracy (Carolyn Lukensmeyer, AmericaSpeaks; Pete Peterson, Pepperdine University and Common Sense California)
• Making the case for this work: Improving the way we collect, report, and explain outcomes (Tina Nabatchi, Syracuse University; Kristen Cambell, National Conference on Citizenship)
• Choosing, combining, and adapting deliberation models and methods (Martin Carcasson, Colorado State University; Jim Fishkin, Stanford University; Sandy Heierbacher, National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation; Joe Peters, Ascentum)
• Participatory budgeting in local government (Malka Kopell, Community Focus; Harris Sokoloff, University of Pennsylvania)

Quite the line-up, eh?

A lot of pre-conference reading material is publicly available on the conference wiki.

For those wanting to follow the conference from a distance, the tag for this conference is nbt09 (or #nbt09 on Twitter).

In their FAQ, The Deliberative Democracy Consortium defines deliberation and deliberative democracy as follows:

What is “deliberation”?

Deliberation is an approach to decision-making in which citizens consider relevant facts from multiple points of view, converse with one another to think critically about options before them and enlarge their perspectives, opinions, and understandings.

What is “deliberative democracy”?

Deliberative democracy strengthens citizen voices in governance by including people of all races, classes, ages and geographies in deliberations that directly affect public decisions. As a result, citizens influence–and can see the result of their influence on–the policy and resource decisions that impact their daily lives and their future.

See also these previous posts:

• Dialogue and Deliberation
• Quick Comparison: Debate and Deliberation

NCDD’s Learning Exchange lists a few more definitions and notes that deliberation “can be used to solve problems, make decisions, produce recommendations, identify choices, and develop action plans.”