The National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation (NCDD) just announced a series of regional one-day events for later this Fall. The Bay Area event is scheduled for Friday, October 29, 2010 at De Anza College in Cupertino, CA. From the website:

The events will build on what we learned in the past year and a half from our involvement in the White House’s Open Government Initiative, and through efforts like the creation of the Core Principles for Public Engagement. With the increase in national and local attention to open government and public engagement, members of the dialogue and deliberation community are focusing in on three priorities:

• Learning how to use online tools and technology more effectively, to help people discuss contentious issues and have a greater impact on policy decisions.
• Engaging and working with public officials, and working within government structures in more effective and sustainable ways.
• Educating more public managers about what constitutes quality public engagement and how to connect with public engagement organizations and practitioners.

Our fall one-day events will connect practitioners, researchers, and public managers locally around these three priorities. NCDD feels that building knowledge and capacity in these three areas will better position members of our professional community to successfully navigate new opportunities that are emerging in open government and online engagement so they can make a greater impact in their communities.

This will be a great opportunity to meet fellow NCDD members from up and down the West Coast. Intellitics will be there.

Gütersloh, Germany-based Bertelsmann Stiftung, one of Germany’s largest foundations, just launched vitalizing-democracy.org, the theme site for their 2011 Reinhard Mohn Prize.

From the welcome post: Welcome to our platform!

On 23 June 2010, the Bertelsmann Stiftung launched this website in order to search for prize-worthy projects for the Reinhard Mohn Prize 2011.

With the forthcoming prize in 2011, the Bertelsmann Stiftung will focus on the crucial issue of ‘Vitalizing Democracy through Participation’. The prize will be awarded to a governmental institution – possibly in cooperation with a non-governmental actor – which has initiated successful projects (or programs) to vitalize democracy, to integrate underrepresented citizens and to establish new forms of democratic problem-solving capacities through participation. [...]

The about page has more details:

The Focus of the Reinhard Mohn-Prize 2011

Democracy is the core of our modern society. It forms the basis for peaceful and self-determined cohabitation and places emphasis on human needs. Strengthening and preserving democracy is one of the most important priorities of our time. During the past decades, our democratic systems have continuously evolved and adapted to new conditions. Growing complexity, heterogeneity and rapid social developments place new demands on democracies. The following three challenges are the most crucial aspects of this development:

• Growing demands for problem-solving capacities – social developments are complex, heterogeneous and rapid, making it hard to react timely and appropriately to implement reforms effectively and to inform the public successfully about current political issues.
• New expectations for political participation – classical forms of political participation such as elections, membership of political parties and political associations no longer meet the needs and demands of modern societies. People increasingly prefer issue-based and more direct forms of participation. Therefore, more and more citizens are alienated by the existing political system.
• Under-representation of disadvantaged groups – migration and the growing gap between rich and poor lead to fewer people being able to participate in political decisions and represent their interests.

The site will be open for applications through August 22, 2010. Registered users will be able to rate and comment on the projects that have been submitted. A jury will pick the winners.

I don’t see it being mentioned specifically, but one would hope that the innovative use of information and communication technology (e.g. the internet) will play at least some role in this contest.

Towards the end of last week’s Open Gov West conference/unconference in Seattle, WA a series of follow-up meetings on the West Coast was announced, the first of which is scheduled to happen in San Francisco, CA the week after next:

San Francisco OGW Meetup: April 12th 6-8 PM

We’re continuing the conversations from the Open Gov West conference by taking them on the road to meetups across the West Coast.

Open Gov West brought together a diverse range of government folks, electeds, nonprofits, citizens, and technologists on March 26th & 27th. Recomendations on open gov funding, standards, and policy were made, partnerships were launched, open gov ideas were formed.

Hear from San Francisco-based attendees of Open Gov West and hear their reports back from OGW, engaging local open government folks in the conversations and ideas that came out of the conference. Reportbacks start at 6:30 PM and finish at 7 PM. Doors open at 6.

Network with others involved with “gov 2.0″ and “open gov.” Explore ideas for applying lessons from OGW in San Francisco and meet great people to partner with on open gov projects.

This might be a good opportunity to discuss a potential Bay Area event of the same caliber. A bunch of people and I have already been tossing around ideas for doing something later this year with a special focus on participation.  Since neither IAP2 nor NCDD will be doing any major conferences this year there may be room for a sizable local/regional event.

I would like to see an open government event that includes participation as the core component that it is and not as an afterthought (though Open Gov West was certainly the best I’ve seen so far in that regard).

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.

About a couple of weeks ago, the National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation (NCDD) — in collaboration with a few other organizations in this field — launched the Public Engagement Principles project, an effort to craft a recommendation for the Obama administration as they work on the Open Government Directive. From the NCDD website:

Get involved in the Public Engagement Principles project, a collaborative effort to see if our broad field can present a united front to the Obama administration. We are starting by developing and describing a set of core principles or criteria for quality public engagement that are broad enough yet meaningful enough that we can all endorse. Help us get there!

Here’s how Sandy Heierbacher, NCDD’s director, introduced the project:

We are facing an unprecedented opportunity in the fields of public engagement, conflict resolution and collaboration. President Obama has demonstrated his commitment to participation, transparency and openness in his administration in numerous ways we’ve all taken note of

There are a number of established associations and organizations in the U.S. that unite professionals and promote the practice and principles of consensus, dialogue, participation, collaboration, conflict resolution and other means of achieving largely the same end.

We suspect that many of these groups will try to communicate with the administration about how to best move forward, but we are concerned about the fact that although most of us speak the same basic language to describe this work, we tend to use many different dialects. This could weaken each of our cases, and overwhelm members of the administration rather than support them.

Rather than each of us contacting the administration separately with mixed messages and various levels of success, we believe we could make a greater impact working together. Can we collaborate or unify to present a collective source of principles, practices, talent and resources that this administration and nation will need in the next four years?

The discussion forum has quickly become a treasure trove for anyone interested in making public engagement work. The list of over a dozen tried and tested sets of principles from around the world as well as the conversations about which pieces are generally applicable or how they should be framed in the context of a guideline or recommendation to the administration is a valuable asset in and by itself and I hope NCDD will preserve the results.

Here’s the latest revision of the public engagement principles:

CRITERIA FOR PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT

The following principles describe high quality public engagement in public conversation on public issues.  While each is distinct, they overlap considerably and reinforce each other in practice.  They serve both as ideals to pursue and as criteria for judging quality.  Their proper use is to generate authentic engagement in public problem-solving, collective creativity, and social healing.  They are not designed to promote partisan agendas.

1. Preparation – Consciously plan, design, convene and arrange the engagement to serve its purpose and people.
2. Inclusion – Incorporate diverse people and ideas to lay the groundwork for quality outcomes and democratic legitimacy.
3. Collaboration –  Support organizers, participants, and those engaged in follow-up to work well together for the common good.
4. Learning – Help participants listen, explore and learn without predetermined outcomes — and evaluate events for lessons.
5. Transparency – Promote openness and provide a public record of the people, resources, and events involved.
6. Impact – Engage official and public attention and follow up — in context — so that each participatory effort actually makes a difference.
7. Participatory Culture – Promote programs and institutions that sustain quality public engagement and advance democratic principles and competence.

Tom Atlee did a lot of the integration and synthesis work on this.

I want to start a conversation about how these principles can best be applied to online participation efforts and tools.

A few days after the launch of the new WhiteHouse.gov website, President Obama issued a memorandum on Transparency and Open Government, which announced that the new administration

… is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government.  We will work together to ensure the public trust and establish a system of transparency, public participation, and collaboration. Openness will strengthen our democracy and promote efficiency and effectiveness in Government.

It also directs the yet-to-be-named Chief Technology Officer (emphasis mine):

… to coordinate the development by appropriate executive departments and agencies, within 120 days, of recommendations for an Open Government Directive, to be issued by the Director of OMB, that instructs executive departments and agencies to take specific actions implementing the principles set forth in this memorandum. The independent agencies should comply with the Open Government Directive.

Here’s what the memorandum had to say about public participation:

Government should be participatory. Public engagement enhances the Government’s effectiveness and improves the quality of its decisions. Knowledge is widely dispersed in society, and public officials benefit from having access to that dispersed knowledge. Executive departments and agencies should offer Americans increased opportunities to participate in policymaking and to provide their Government with the benefits of their collective expertise and information. Executive departments and agencies should also solicit public input on how we can increase and improve opportunities for public participation in Government.

Today, Washington DC-based Sunlight Foundation rolled out Our Open Government List (OOGL), a new microsite that allows the public to make suggestions as to what should be included in the Open Government Directive:

Shortly after President Obama’s inauguration, he issued a memo on transparency directing his top officials to develop plans for an Open Government Directive to promote transparency, participation, and collaboration. The Sunlight Foundation has created this page in order to add a public element to the crafting of this Open Government Directive that is itself transparent, participatory, and collaborative.

We encourage you to submit ideas for what the Directive should address, and to vote for your favorite submissions below.

While a lot of the discussions lately seem to focus solely on the aspects of transparency and open government data, I thought it was appropriate to point out that  the International Association for Public Participation (IAP2) has developed a list of seven Core Values for the Practice of Public Participation that could be tremendously helpful in guiding government efforts in this area:

1. Public participation is based on the belief that those who are affected by a decision have a right to be involved in the decision-making process.
2. Public participation includes the promise that the public’s contribution will influence the decision.
3. Public participation promotes sustainable decisions by recognizing and communicating the needs and interests of all participants, including decision makers.
4. Public participation seeks out and facilitates the involvement of those potentially affected by or interested in a decision.
5. Public participation seeks input from participants in designing how they participate.
6. Public participation provides participants with the information they need to participate in a meaningful way.
7. Public participation communicates to participants how their input affected the decision.

I’ve added them to OOGL here under Public Participation Principles (feel free to vote).

Intellitics will attend this year’s National Conference on Dialogue and Deliberation, October 3-5, 2008 in Austin, Texas.

Here’s a quote from the NCDD email newsletter from today that gives you the details:

1.  Latest on the 2008 National Conference on Dialogue & Deliberation: Creating Cultures of Collaboration

We know your budget is tight this year, but if you are only able to attend one conference in 2008, we think it should be this one. Many people have told us our conferences are the best they’ve ever experienced. I just got an email from Larry Dressler saying the last NCDD conference (his first) was “probably the most innovatively designed meeting of this kind that I’ve ever attended.”

Our conferences are highly participatory (no keynotes and no traditional, dry panels), highly innovative (we try new things each year that are often imitated) and highly accessible (regular registration is only $375, which is about half of what comparable events cost). But the best thing about our conferences, by far, is the people. NCDD events draw the most intelligent, kind-hearted, positive, and thoughtful people I’ve ever encountered, and they’re what make our gatherings great.

So here’s what’s new…

a. The preliminary conference schedule is up at www.thataway.org/events/?page_id=113 – it’s shaping up to be our best conference yet. Confirmed workshops will be added shortly.

b. Our featured speakers are pictured and described at www.thataway.org/events/?page_id=156 – the stellar line-up includes D&D stars Carolyn Lukensmeyer, Bill Isaacs, Frances Moore Lappe, David Campt, Jim Fishkin and Hans-Peter Meister.

c.  At NCDD Austin, we’ll be tackling 5 of the main challenges facing our field. Check them out at www.thataway.org/events/?p=106

NCDD 2008 is co-sponsored by the Institute for Civic Discourse and Democracy at Kansas State University, the Global Facilitator Service Corps, the Forum Foundation, the Democracy Imperative, the Bluebonnet Hills Christian Church, the LBJ Presidential Library, and Regis University’s Institute on the Common Good, and Everyday Democracy and Hal Saunders are Partners of the conference.

Learn more about the 2008 NCDD conference, which will take place October 3-5 in Austin, Texas, at www.thataway.org/events – or register at www.thataway.org/events/?page_id=136 .  Hope to see you there!

Their 2006 conference was held in San Francisco and a truly spectecular event, in terms of both content and people.

If you’re interested in doing something at or around the conference that focuses on the online component to dialogue, deliberation, or public participation, make sure to drop me a line or simply leave a comment.

The following are a few Facebook groups we watch that deal with various aspects of dialogue, deliberation, public participation, e-government or e-democracy (membership numbers as of today):

• C2D2 – Canadian Community for Dialogue and Deliberation (18 members)
  Community of interest on dialogue and deliberation. Conference held every two years.
• Conversation Cafe (308 members)
  Conversation Cafes promote community, democracy and wisdom world-wide through generating millions of open, respectful public conversations.
• e-democracy (346 members)
  For those interested in e-democracy, especially the efforts of E-Democracy.Org.
• E-Demokratie.org (in German, 12 members)
  E-Government oder E-Verwaltung beschreiben die Darstellung von Regierungs- und Verwaltungshandeln. E-Government wird aber auch häufig synonym mit dem Begriff E-Demokratie (eDemocracy) verwendet. Im Detail muss dabei jedoch stark differenziert werden: so geht es bei E-Demokratie nicht nur um elektronisch gestütztes Regieren. Es geht um viel mehr, es geht um Legitimation, Partizipation und Öffentlichkeit.
• ePractice.eu (97 members)
  epractice.eu is a good practice exchange scheme with a web portal, weekly newsletter, country factsheets, online library, practitioner profiles, events calendar and monthly workshops created by the European Commission for the professional community in eGovernment, e-Inclusion and eHealth. epractice.eu involves practitioners from all 27 Member States, EU-member candidate states and EFTA countries but others are welcome to join. The portal combines online activities with frequent offline exchanges: workshops, face-to-face meetings and public presentations. A large knowledge base of real-life case studies submitted by portal members is freely available. The Facebook extension is provided in order to bridge the gap between Facebook’s social and epractice.eu’s professional touch.
• Everyday Democracy (53 members)
  Everyday Democracy (formerly the Study Circles Resource Center) is a national organization that helps local communities find ways for all kinds of people to think, talk and work together to solve problems. We work with neighborhoods, cities and towns, regions, and states, helping them pay particular attention to how racism and ethnic differences affect the problems they address.
• Government 2.0 (205 members)
  A new governance construct is possible… Create it
• I support participatory democracy! (395 members)
  This group is for people who believe that democracy only becomes meaningful when it involves its people in participatory decisionmaking processes.
• ICT4Democracy (192 members)
  Gathering of citizens from across the world believing that Information and Communication Technologies can help in providing us with more and better democracy and are willing to do something about it … in their lifetime …
• International Association for Public Participation (IAP2) (20 members)
  IAP2 is an association of members who seek to promote and improve the practice of public participation in relation to individuals, governments, institutions, and other entities that affect the public interest in nations throughout the world.
• National Coalition for Dialogue & Deliberation (NCDD) (348 members)
  A group for those dedicated to solving tough problems with honest talk, quality thinking and collaborative action. Join us if you agree with Einstein, that the problems we have cannot be solved at the same level of thinking with which we created them.
• Participatory Budgeting (158 members)
  Participatory Budgeting (PB) can be broadly defined as the participation of citizens in the decision-making process of budget allocation and monitoring public spending. Participation may take various forms, from effective decision-making power in the allocation of resources to more modest initiatives that confer voice during the development of the budget. This is a group for exchange of information among those interested in practices of participatory budgeting.
• POLITECH INSTITUTE (European Center of Political Technologies) (112 members)
  POLITECH INSTITUTE is a not-for-profit international association (AISBL) and a European Center of Political Technologies located in Brussels, Capital of Europe, bridging public institutions, international institutions, governments, regional and local authorities, universities, research centers, think tanks, civil society and political leaders with technology actors for a better use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) towards the advancement of modern public governance and democracy.
• The World Cafe (249 members)
  A group for practitioners of/people interested in the TWC.

Needless to say, most of these organizations maintain resource-heavy websites of their own.

It’s by no means an exhaustive list, but should give you a head start if you want to connect with people in this community via Facebook. If you happen to know of any additional Facebook groups in this area, feel free to leave a comment.

These are the slightly modified slides from a quick presentation I gave last night at Web Monday Silicon Valley in San Francisco. It’s a first high-level introduction to our first product, a web application for problem solving and decision making in large groups.

| View | Upload your own

We hope to have the initial pieces of an alpha version in place some time over the coming weeks.

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).