Steven Clift just alerted me to a new report from the IBM Center for The Business of Government: A Manager’s Guide to Evaluating Citizen Participation (PDF), authored by Tina Nabatchi, Syracuse University.

I admit I haven’t fully read it yet, but a couple of issues jumped out that I wanted to point out really quick.

1) Terminology

First off, I like this explanation of the term “citizen participation” (page 6):

What is Citizen Participation?

Citizen participation can be broadly defined as the processes by which public concerns, needs, and values are incorporated into decision-making. Citizen participation happens in many places (e.g., civil society, electoral, legislative, and administrative arenas) and can take many forms (e.g., methods may range from information exchanges to democratic decision-making). [...]

Citizen participation may be indirect or direct:

• Indirect participation, such as voting or supporting advocacy groups, occurs when citizens select or work through representatives who make decisions for them .
• Direct participation occurs when citizens are personally and actively engaged in decisionmaking

It appears that the term “citizen participation” as applied here is more narrow than civic engagement but considerably broader than public participation.

That’s why I don’t quite agree with the statement that “many of the assumptions behind the IAP2 and other organizing principles for citizen participation do not always hold” (page 7), as the side-by-side comparison of “Assumptions and Realities about Citizen Participation” (page seems to slightly confuse the terminology.

For example, the table lists as an assumption that “[p]articipation is focused on decisionmaking and helps direct government allocation of resources” and  contrasts this with the reality that “[p]articipation can be done for reasons other than decisionmaking. Even when focused on decision-making, participation might not (and often need not) address resource allocation issues.”

It’s true that “citizen participation” (as defined above) may not always focus on directly engaging citizens in decision making. “Public participation” as defined by IAP2, on the other hand, is always about decision making and the various levels the public can be directly involved. Furthermore, IAP2′s framework is not limited to resource allocation issues.

For more on this, see our previous posts on terminology (here, here) or browse the dictionary.

2) Mapping tools to IAp2 Spectrum impact levels

On pages 10-12, the report provides a number of examples of online and offline tools as they map to certain levels on the IAP2 Spectrum. This is something I’d love to work on in more detail at some point, especially to help categorize the many online tools out there. It’s been tried several times before but I haven’t quite seen it work.

The challenge, as I see it, is that most group processes or tools don’t map neatly to one level on the Spectrum or another. For example, Deliberative Polling and AmericaSpeaks 21st Century TownMeeting can fall on the Involve or Collaborate part of the Spectrum but only if the decision maker is on board. If, on the other hand, the process is used without a clear link to a decision making process then the Spectrum does not apply.

Both the 2007 CaliforniaSpeaks project (21st Century TownMeeting) and the 2011 What’s Next California project (Deliberative Polling) are examples where either process has been applied for opinion research and advocacy purposes but where the outcomes did not have any concrete impact in terms of decision making.

* * *

At any rate, the main focus of the report is on evaluation and metrics and looks quite useful. Hope to dig in later tonight.

My previous post on micro-participation included a definition of civic engagement that I hadn’t referenced before.

According to Michael X. Delli Carpini, Dean of the Annenberg School of Communication at the University of Pennsylvania, civic engagement can be defined as:

Individual and collective actions designed to identify and address issues of public concern.

I have not been able to pinpoint where it first appeared, but according to last year’s PACE white paper, An Evolving Relationship: Executive Branch Approaches to Civic Engagement and Philanthropy (download PDF, 1.4MB), “[t]his definition, and various versions of it, has become a useful standard.”

This is one of those posts that’s more of a mental note to myself than anything else. Don’t expect to learn anything new if you’re following these conversations already.

Over on GovLoop, the difference between Government 2.0 and Open Government is being discussed (probably not for the first, much less for the last time). I thought I’d pull together a few key points that outline the Gov 2.0 piece. Here’s my comment:

The idea of “Government 2.0″ is pretty well defined:

According to Tim O’Reilly, Government 2.0 is the “idea of the government as platform: how can government design programs to be generative, [...] building frameworks that enable people to build new services of their own?”)

In this Forbes column (August 2009), he phrase this as “the opportunities inherent in harnessing a highly motivated and diverse population not just to help [politicians] get elected, but to help them do a better job.”

And: “Citizens are connected like never before and have the skill sets and passion to solve problems affecting them locally as well as nationally. Government information and services can be provided to citizens where and when they need it. Citizens are empowered to spark the innovation that will result in an improved approach to governance.”

And: “In this model, government is a convener and an enabler–ultimately, it is a vehicle for coordinating the collective action of citizens.”

And: “This is the right way to frame the question of “Government 2.0.” How does government itself become an open platform that allows people inside and outside government to innovate? How do you design a system in which all of the outcomes aren’t specified beforehand, but instead evolve through interactions between the technology provider and its user community?”

That pretty much outlines the core concepts behind Government 2.0.

Gov 2.0 is by no means a prerequisite to achieving a government that is transparent, participatory and collaborative (though there is overlap, obviously). You can still achieve Open Government without buying into the idea of “government as platform”.

So there you have it. Another term neatly defined and added to the dictionary.

Regular readers of this blog are probably well aware that when it comes to describing the process of bringing stakeholders into an organization’s decision-making process with the goal of making better, more sustainable decisions, we prefer the term public participation.

I have previously shared what I consider to be meaningful and well-established definitions (here, here). And while it isn’t quite perfect yet, the current Wikipedia entry on public participation also points in the right direction:

Public participation is a political principle or practice, and may also be recognised as a right (right to public participation). The terms public participation may be used interchangeably with the concept or practice of stakeholder engagement and/or popular participation.

Generally public participation seeks and facilitates the involvement of those potentially affected by or interested in a decision. The principle of public participation holds that those who are affected by a decision have a right to be involved in the decision-making process. Public participation implies that the public’s contribution will influence the decision.

As is often the case with these kinds of terms, there are two basic language challenges:

• Same concept, different terminology: Around the world, a variety of terms are being used that essentially describe the same or very similar concepts. Just take a look at Painting the Landscape: A Cross-Cultural Exploration of Public-Government Decision Making (PDF, 4.5MB), a joint research project of the International Association for Public Participation (IAP2) and the Charles F. Kettering Foundation, which identified a dozen or so different names in their list of “typical public participation terminology”, from “consultation” in South Africa to “public management” in Brazil to “co-management” in Cambodia (page 546).
• Same word, different meanings: To complicate things even further, the reverse is also true. A term like participation will often mean different things to different people.

The challenge of trying to overcome language differences and agree on common terminology has come up before. There really is no right or wrong, for the most part; everyone is free to use the terminology they prefer and that they find most useful. What’s important, in the end, is to understand what we mean by certain terms when we talk  to each other. This is especially true for the term public participation, one of the three pillars of the Open Government Directive.

Based on my observations listening to the discussions around Open Government, the following four aspects of the term public participation tend to get easily and commonly confused:

1. Public participation applies strictly to decision making or (political) problem solving. Many citizen activities that are being referenced in the context of Open Government such as reporting potholes, building mash-ups using open government data, or helping NASA design better ways to lift small satellites into space are not considered public participation, at least not by this definition.
2. Public doesn’t necessarily mean everybody. Public here refers to a public, not the public. A public will usually be made up of those people affected by and those with an interest in a decision, a more or less carefully defined group that can be very large or fairly small. Furthermore, public participation processes can be applied just as well internally, inside organizations, behind closed doors.
3. Public participation comes with a wide range of expected participant impact. This one may be the most counter-intuitive of the four, but there will always be situations when all a decision maker can commit to is to share information or invite limited feedback at best. That’s why IAP2′s Spectrum of Public Participation (PDF) explicitly includes the public participation goals Inform and Consult, neither of which require the decision maker to incorporate any of the participants’ input. At the Consult level of public impact, for example, the convener only promises to “provide feedback on how public input influenced the decision” (technically, that influence may be minimal or zero).
4. Public participation is top-down, not bottom-up. Its success is critically dependent on a decision maker’s willingness and ability to initiate, lead and support a participation process from beginning to end.

And there you have it — four distinctions to keep in mind next time you hear someone talk about public participation.

We already have one very good definition of public participation in the archives, but for comparison’s sake, here’s the official IAP2 definition as per their training material:

IAP2 views public participation as any process that involves the public in problem solving or decision making and uses public input to make decisions.

Public participation includes all aspects of identifying problems and opportunities, developing alternatives and making decisions. It uses tools and techniques that are common to a number of dispute resolution and communications fields.

What do you think? Which one suits you better?

I came across this document from the National Democratic Institute (NDI):

Civic Participation Terminology: A Guide to Frequently Used Terms and Phrases

This Glossary is part of NDI’s growing library of publications that form the basis for the Institute’s efforts to create a new and precise lexicon to convey the concepts central to democracy and governance. Putting some of these principles into practice, the Glossary was developed through a consultative process with NDI’s staff in Lebanon, other field offices throughout the Middle East as well as the Institute’s Citizen Participation team. Special thanks also to NDI’s civic partners in the Citizen Lebanon program, who served as the inspiration for this project and also offered valuable feedback throughout the process of development.

The document is written in both English and Arabic and is available for download (PDF, 4MB).

Here are a few definitions that are relevant to our work (some of which you may recognize from previous entries)

• Citizen Jury – A form of deliberative democracy in which small groups of people are brought together to hear evidence about a policy or legislative issue, debate and determine a judgement based on the evidence received. They are used to inform issue-based advocacy campaigns or public official’s decision making on complex policy matters. Also see Deliberative Democracy and Advocacy.
• Civic Engagement — Involvement in or commitment of citizens and citizen’s organizations into the political or community process as they fulfill their rights and responsibilities.
• Community — State of being shared or held in common. With regard to participation, community can apply to spatial communities (a body of people living and/or working in the same area), which can come together at any spatial scale for the local to the global.
• Community Mapping — A social network assessment tool used to determine stakeholders and power brokers in a particular community. This technique for collecting information is often used by civic organizations in order to determine community needs, identify community assets or resources, identify stakeholders, and design appropriate responses, including advocacy campaigns.
• Consensus — General agreement that involves seeking and taking into account the view of all parties concerned, and reconciling any conflicting arguments. Consensus does not imply unanimity. Consensus is a way of making decisions which aims to include everyone in the process and resolve any objections.
• Deliberative Democracy — Based on the principle that legitimate democracy arises from the public deliberation of citizens. Activities associated with this process include citizen juries, town hall meetings, public debates, and citizen forums.
• Participation — The act of sharing in the actvities of a civil society organization, political party, or political process; the condition of sharing in common with others. Participation is a right and responsibility of citizens in a democracy, through issue-oriented civil society organizations and/or political parties.
• Participatory Budgeting — Process through which a portion of the budget is set aside for citizens to determine how to use it. This process works to increase citizen’s participation in decision-making while improving accountability, community cohesion, and furthering the delivery of cost-effective services.
• Stakeholder — A person or group with a direct interest, involvement, or investment in a particular issue. For example, employees, stockholders, and customers of a business concern.
• Stakeholder Analysis — Research of the problems and interests of members of a certain community which politicians or civic groups may wish to influence or engage. Such an analysis is a common first step in the development of party platforms or advocacy campaigns.
• Town Hall Meeting — Gathering citizens linked by geography or a common interest to meet with public officials to discuss pre-determined issues and express their views.

Solid definitions. Plus, now we know مشاركة (pr. musharaka) means participation in Arabic.

The other day, I mentioned on Twitter how I sometimes wish there were a glossary of the key terms and definitions that guide our conversations around participation.

With the Open Government Directive expected to be released within a few weeks, one challenge remains that people don’t necessarily mean the same thing when they discuss participation and participatory government. While some use the same terms for slightly different concepts, others rely on different terms for essentially the same ideas.

Here’s a list of just a few of the general concepts that seem to be commonly implied in these conversations (in no particular order):

• Participation as general citizen-related activities: this includes voting in elections, attending local city council meetings, writing a letter to the editor etc.
• Participation as general community activities: e.g. volunteering
• Participation as involvement in decision making: giving people meaningful ways to be part of and contribute to a decision-making process, maybe following IAP2′s Spectrum of Public Participation (PDF) or the recently released Public Engagement Principles developed by NCDD and others (our endorsement here)
• Participation as consensus building: getting everyone to agree on something
• Participation as interaction with government data: for example, citizens building applications or mash-ups using open government data

In order to be effective, the Open Government Directive will have to clarify  the concepts it tries to promote. Maybe we can expect some very specific language, who knows?

At any rate, more people using more precise language would be very helpful. Here’s one working definition we prefer.

If there was an award for most-overused term, I’m sure community would be a contender.

For future reference, here is one of the best definitions I’ve come across so far. It’s somewhat hidden in a blog post by Canada-based Myriam Laberge from a while back: Collaboration As A Living Emergent Co-Creative Process

A ‘community’ is created over time around shared purpose, language and meaning, and the development of shared values, reciprocity and mutual trust in the longer term from being and doing together.

Community doesn’t happen overnight. And it certainly doesn’t come out of the box with any online tool you might install.

An interesting relationship to point out is the one between community and participation. In my view:

• Participation often happens within or across existing communities
• Participation done right can have strong community-building effects
• Participation without the slightests levels of (a pre-existing) community fabric is difficult to imagine
• Especially for online participation, a lot of moderation and facilitation activities are often required that are commonly referred to as community management

Myriam will be in San Diego for the 2009 IAP2 annual conference next week, and I hope to get a chance to talk to her in more detail about this important interrelation.

Interesting article on BBC News regarding a list of 200 jargon terms recently “banned” by the UK-based Local Government Association (LGB):

Council leaders have compiled a banned list of the 200 worst uses of jargon, with “predictors of beaconicity” and “taxonomy” among the worst horrors.

The Local Government Association says such words and phrases must be avoided for staff to “communicate effectively”.

Cliches such as “level playing field” and inscrutable terms like “re-baselining” have been prohibited.

LGA chairman Margaret Eaton said: “The public sector must not hide behind impenetrable jargon and phrases.”

Reading through the full list (including suggested replacements) I noticed that quite a few of these terms are frequently used by practitioners in the fields of public particpation, dialogue and civic engagement.

It’s good to use language that’s easy for people to understand. However, I’m not quite sure that simply replacing these terms would always be helpful. There are subtle but important differences in meaning between “stakeholders” and “other organisations,” and sometimes it is important that normal people understand these complexities). Maybe a glossary of key terms is more advisable in these cases.

Whether or not you subscribe to all entries on the list of banned terms, it’s certainly a good reminder to be mindful of the language we use.

One of the categories here on this blog is fittingly named Dictionary. In it, we collect definitions of some of the key terms we use that we have found useful in helping explain the concept behind the jargon.

Via:

• Delib Blog: Banning Jargon
• Common Craft: British Councils Ban Jargon

The latest edition of the European Journal of ePractice is dedicated entirely to the topic of e-participation. One article contained a useful description of the term e-consultation (actual quote taken from the PDF download, 135 KB): E-consultations: New tools for civic engagement or facades for political correctness?

2) Defining e-consultations

E-consultations constitute interactive “tell-us-what-you-think” on-line platforms where ordinary citizens, civic actors, experts, and politicians purposively assemble to provide input, deliberate, inform, and influence policy and decision making. Initiated by political institutions, non-state actors (or jointly), e-consultations vary in approach, goals, selection of target groups, breadth of themes or issue areas, in the use of technical tools and administrative level at which they are launched (Gøtze 2001). They often simultaneously incorporate vertical citizen-to-government as well as horizontal spaces for citizen-to-citizen interactions. The fact that citizens are provided the opportunity to influence policy making processes makes e-consultations distinct from other spaces in the informal virtual public sphere. In informal discursive e-spaces such as virtual communities, topical forums, chat rooms or newsgroups, participants interact as equals and may but do not explicitly seek to wield political influence. The raison d’être of e-consultations is to affect formal (institutional) political and decision making processes.

E-consultations are also more formal and structured than discussions in the informal virtual public sphere. They tend to have a set duration, agenda, employ the use of moderators, with topics for discussion pre-defined by the host. Given that it is government agencies that in most cases initiate e-consultations, relationships among participants are seen to be asymmetric where the actors involved – politicians, policy experts, citizens – differ in their level of authority, expertise and access to decision-making processes. Arguably, as it will be later discussed, these implicit structural dynamics distinctly influence the e-consultation process.

The article goes on to list five types of e-consultations:

1. Question and answer discussion forums
2. Online polls
3. E-petitions
4. E-panels
5. Editorial consultations

The kind of e-consultation we have in mind here at Intellitics is probably a combination of all five.

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.”

I came across a fairly succinct definition of the term e-participation today that I find useful with regard to the things we are working on:

In the context of current project, e-Participation means the use of ICT for enabling and strengthening citizen participation in democratic decision-making processes. Depending on the aspect of democracy being promoted it can employ different techniques (Trechsel et al, 2002):

1. For increasing the transparency of the political process;
2. For enhancing the direct involvement on participation of citizen;
3. For improving the quality of opinion formation by opening new spaces of information and deliberation

Source: UNDP Europe & CIS, Preparation of e-Participation Guide: Searching for interesting case studies and lessons learned (Word document, 60 KB).

Following a recent IAP2 Northern California chapter meeting, I came across this definition of public participation:

What is Public Participation?

Public participation is the process by which an organization consults with interested or affected individuals, organizations, and government entities before making a decision. Public participation is two-way communication and collaborative problem solving with the goal of achieving better and more acceptable decisions. Public participation prevents or minimizes disputes by creating a process for resolving issues before they become polarized. Other terms sometimes used are “public involvement,” “community involvement,” or “stakeholder involvement.”

We are currently working on our first product, a web-based software application for problem solving and decision making in large groups. To some degree, what we have in mind is a public participation engine (at least for those parts of an engagement project that can feasibly be run online).

Sandra S. Hodge, Ph.D. and Program Director Discovering Common Ground: Missouri Communities Deliberate at University of Missouri has a nice comparison chart that looks at the differences between debate and deliberation: Deliberation and Your Community: How to Convene and Moderate Local Public Forums Using Deliberative Decision-Making (training manual) (PDF, 1.1MB). The training manual is part of a resource kit for deliberative decision-making projects.

Debate vs. Deliberation

In debate, you search for weaknesses in another position	In deliberation, you search for strength in another position.
In debate, you search for glaring differences.	Deliberation involves concern for others.
Debate involves countering the other’s position at the expense of the relationship.	Deliberation assumes that many people have pieces of an answer to a workable solution.
Debate calls for investing wholeheartedly in your beliefs.	In deliberation, you temporarily suspend your judgment of other’s beliefs.
Debate is oppositional and seeks to prove the other wrong.	Deliberation is collaborative and seeks common understanding.
The goal of debate is winning – often only for a short-term advantage.	The goal of deliberation is common ground for action, which is the basis for consistent policy.
In debate, you listen to find flaws and counter-arguments.	In deliberation, you listen to understand and find meaning in agreement.
Debate defends assumptions as truth.	Deliberation reveals assumptions for reevaluation.
Debate defends original solutions.	Deliberation opens the possibility of better solutions.
In debate, you submit your best thinking and defend its rightness.	In deliberation, you submit your best thinking in order to improve it.

Interestingly enough, while there have recently been quite a few initiatives that focus on building better tools for online debate the same cannot be said for online deliberation (at least as far as I am aware of).

One reason for that, in my view, is the fact that both dialogue and deliberation require very good listening skills on the part of the participants. And as difficult as listening may seem in real life, it is generally that much harder to do online.

The National Coalition for Dialogue & Deliberation (NCDD) provides a good definition of dialogue and deliberation, and describes how the two relate to each other:

So what are dialogue and deliberation anyway?

Dialogue is a process that allows people, usually in small groups, to share their perspectives and experiences with one another about difficult issues we tend to just debate about or avoid entirely. Issues like racial disparities, youth violence and gay marriage.

Dialogue is not about judging, weighing or making decisions, but about understanding and learning. Dialogue dispels stereotypes, builds trust and enables people to be open to perspectives that are very different from their own. Dialogue can, and often does, lead to both personal and collaborative action.

Deliberation is a closely related process with a different emphasis. Deliberation emphasizes the use of logic and reasoning to make better decisions. Decisions about important public issues like health care and immigration are too often made through the use of power or coercion rather than a sound decision-making process that involves all parties and explores all options.

Dialogue and deliberation processes tend to use skilled facilitators and carefully constructed ground rules or agreements to ensure that all participants are heard and are treated as equals. For groups that want to move from talk to a decision or action, NCDD recommends starting with dialogue and encouraging deliberation after people have had the chance to tell their personal story (in relation to the issue at hand) in a respectful environment.

Dialogue lays the groundwork for the vital work of deliberation. The trust, mutual understanding and relationships that are built during dialogue allow for participants to deliberate more effectively, and to make better decisions.

Dialogue and deliberation are used for a variety of reasons: to resolve conflicts and bridge divides; to build understanding about complex issues; to foster innovative solutions to problems and launch action; and to reach agreement on or recommendations about policy decisions.

At Intellitics, our goal is online dialogue and deliberation.

According to Wikipedia:

Politics is the process by which groups of people make decisions. … Although the term is generally applied to behavior within governments, politics is observed in all human group interactions, including corporate, academic, and religious institutions.

Politics consists of “social relations involving authority or power”. and refers to the regulation of a political unit, and to the methods and tactics used to formulate and apply policy.

At Intellitics, we’re interested in exploring ways how the internet can better support this decision-making process.