:: Deliberative Democracy Consortium ::

Home

About Us

Deliberation

Projects

Resources

Contact Us

Affiliates & Partners

Visit the affiliates page to
learn more about our
collaborators...

blog
Wiki
Journal
eBulletin
practitioners

eBulletin: v.2, no.5

Deliberative Democracy | eBulletin vol.2 no. 5, May 21, 2003

As always, thanks to everyone who contributed. And welcome new subscribers (32). Please continue to share this resource with friends and colleagues. To receive the eBulletin, visit <http://deliberative-democracy.net/about.html>.

PLEASE NOTE: d-d.net is always looking for 1,500-2,000 word “think pieces” that address critical issues facing the field. Features will be published monthly at <http://www.deliberative-democracy.net/cart3.html>.

~ editor

1 | d-d.net Blog: The BBC Builds a Platform for Civic Engagement
--   --------------------------------------------------------------------
The BBC plans to provide citizens in the U.K. with tools to investigate issues, organize and engage in the political process, through a new web site called iCan. On the d-d.net blog, Jed Miller (Web Lab) cites Wired magazine's recent article on iCan and asks if an American media company could maintain its credibility if it declared plans to "to help disenfranchised citizens engage in public life."

Share your views on the possibilities and challenges of the BBC plan. Other recent blog topics include an American/Argentine conference on Deliberative Democracy and the prospects for gaming as a tool in deliberative work. Recent blog commentators include Leif Utne of Utne magazine, Al Smith of Majority Voice and James Knauer of Teaching Democracy.

If you have experiences or opinions to share on these or other issues in the deliberative democracy field, we hope you'll add your comments on the blog at <http://deliberative-democracy.net/mt>.

2 | From the ‘blog: A US-Argentine Conference
--     ------------------------------------------------
Last week, the University of Maryland's Institute for Philosophy & Public Policy and the Fundacion Nueva Generacion Argentina, among others, convened a conference entitled "Deliberative Democracy: Principles and Cases." Essentially, the conference brought together four groups of experts into fruitful dialogue.

To learn more, visit <http://deliberative-democracy.net/mt>

3 | Learning from Reflective Practitioners and Engaged Academics
--     ---------------------------------------------------------------------
A central concern for the field has been knowledge-building between researchers and practitioners. The Democracy Collaborative at the University of Maryland has taken a crack at this problem in a recently published report describing a joint program in partnership with The Advocacy Institute. This program, “brings together scholars of democratic theory and democratic activists so that they learn from one another and work on problem-solving together.” The report is available at <http://www.democracycollaborative.org/programs/training/reflectpractioners.html>.

4 | New Resource at Teaching Democracy
--     ------------------------------------------
The Pennsylvania Center for Civic Life has created an online newsletter for teachers and practitioners of deliberative democracy to share knowledge. To learn more and to subscribe, visit: <http://www.teachingdemocracy.org/newsletter/march>.

TeachingDemocracy.org is web home of the Pennsylvania Center for Civic Life, an online meeting place and resource center for people interested in sharing what they know-or would like to know-about deliberative democracy. The focus of TeachingDemocracy.org is on the teaching and practice of deliberative talk. The folks there, under the guidance of Dr James Knauer, are interested in helping people and institutions share what they have learned-through formal research or practical experience-about how public deliberation affects learning and doing in various settings; classrooms, meeting rooms, in local communities, and in virtual communities on the Internet.

5 | Study Circles Discussion Guide on Student Achievement Available in Spanish
--     -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Study Circles Resource Center has translated its newest education discussion guide into Spanish. C_mo ayundar a tener éxito a todos los estudiantes – Escuelas y comunidades trabajando juntas (Dialogue and Action to Help Every Student Succeed) is available in photocopy at no charge from SCRC or can be downloaded from the web site at <http://www.studycircles.org>

6 | Open Seminar on Online Tools for Deliberative Democracy Offered at Carnegie Mellon
--     -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Experienced practitioners in all aspects of online forums are invited to attend a free two-day seminar titled, "Developing and Using On-line Tools for Deliberative Democracy." The seminar will be held at Carnegie Mellon University on June 20 and 21 with an opening reception the evening of June 19. The seminar is sponsored jointly by the Institute for the Study of Information Technology and Society (InSITeS) and the multi-media lab of the Center for the Advancement of Applied Ethics (CAAE) at Carnegie Mellon University, which are partners in developing software to facilitate on-line citizen deliberation.

For more information, visit: <http://caae.phil.cmu.edu/style/Seminar.html>

7 | Roundtable on Devotion: Declaring Our Intentions in Public Life
--     ----------------------------------------------------------------------
The Harwood Institute invites you to join them for a conversation that asks: What does it mean to be devoted to public life? How can we best declare our intentions and engage? The National Press Club event will be moderated by Richard C. Harwood, President of The Harwood Institute.

Leaders of organizations ranging from youth service groups, arts councils, leadership organizations, and public policy institutions, as well as others, are slated to take part in this discussion. Representatives of the deliberative democracy field, add your voice to the conversation.

Details are:

Friday, May 30, 2003
8:30 am to 10:30 am
The National Press Club
529 14th Street NW, 13th Floor
Continental Breakfast

Space is highly limited. For reservations, call Jessica Benko at The Harwood Institute at (301) 656 3669 or e-mail jbenko@theharwoodinstitute.org.

8 | Prince George’s County, MD Students Discuss Historic Desegregation
--     ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Students at Northwestern High School have created a website about the epic history of school desegregation in Prince George's County, MD, where they live. Visit <http://www.princegeorges.org/history.htm> to see their work so far.

If you have a chance to explore the site, you'll see that the students have created an animated introduction; followed by a timeline; followed by a set of oral history interviews; followed by a deliberative discussion page. The organizers of this project would be delighted if you participated in the online discussion. They also welcome advice and suggestions, as this work is on-going.

9 | Third European Conference on e-Government
--     --------------------------------------------------
There are still some places available at the 3rd European Conference one-Government, which is being held at Trinity College Dublin on 3-4 July this year. The committee are delighted with the range and scope of papers submitted this year with more than 60 contirbutions from some 20 difference count ries around the world. A mini-Track on e-Democracy will be run on the 3 July, chaired by John Mac Namara from the e-Business Certification Institute.

A list of the paper titles to be presented, as well as registration details, can be found at <http://www.mcil.co.uk/2n-eceg2003-abstracts.htm>.

Further information can also be obtained by emailing Professor Dan Remenyion <dan.remenyi@tcd.ie>.

10 | Training and Certification in Public Participation Methods
---     -------------------------------------------------------------
This summer, the International Association for Public Participation (IAP2)will offer three courses leading to the International Association for Public Participation Certificate in Public Participation offered in Los Angeles in June and in the Phoenix area in July.

The IAP2 Certificate Program in Public Participation provides beginning through intermediate practitioners broad-based learning in the foundations of public participation, and useful concepts for advanced practitioners and those who manage public participation programs, based on the IAP2 Public Participation Spectrum. IAP2-designed tools and reference materials are presented in an interactive and experiential learning environment that gives students the opportunity to explore their own public participation challenges with their instructors and peers. Practical tips are used to enliven the basic theory and reinforce skills that participants can put to immediate use.

For more information and to register, visit: <http://www.iap2.org/training/iap2-training.html>

11 | New Book Explores Gap Between Knowledge and Polling
---     ---------------------------------------------------------------
Mark your calendars: “Collective Preferences in Democratic Politics”, a forthcoming book by Scott Althus (Cambridge University Press, September 2003) represents, “the first comprehensive treatment of the relationship between knowledge, representation, and political equality in opinion surveys,” and may suggest some surprising answers. According to the authors, knowledge does matter, and the way it is distributed in society can cause collective preferences to reflect disproportionately the opinions of some groups more than others. In the end, the authors argue, it is the limited degree of knowledge held by ordinary citizens about public affairs which accounts for divergent results.

12 | Citizens Report on Canada’s Future
---     ---------------------------------------
The Canadian Policy Research Network (CPRN) has recently issued the report, “Citizens' Dialogue on Canada's Future: A 21st Century Social Contract (April. 2003), written by Mary Pat MacKinnon, Judith Maxwell, Steven Rosell, and Nandini Saxena. The report provides an in-depth discussion of key findings that emerged from ten day-long dialogue sessions held across Canada last year. Over 400 randomly selected citizens (representative of the population) were asked to develop their vision for Canada ten years from now, and what role individuals, communities, governments and the market should play in bringing it about.

To download the report, visit: <http://www.cprn.org/en/doc.cfm?doc=145>

13 | Can Parliamentarians Re-Engage the Public?
---     -------------------------------------------------
June 9-12 this year, the Wilton Park Conference Center in Sussex, England will host the conference, “How Can Parliamentarians Best Re-Engage with the Public?” at its facility in the South of England. Among the topics for discussion are electronic democracy, consensual politics, and political representation and participation.

Direct enquiries about participation to Ms Alison Jones, Conference Administration, WILTON PARK, Wiston House, Steyning, West Sussex, United Kingdom BN44 3DZ. tel: 44-1903-817714 fax: 44-1903-815244 or e-mail: <alison.jones@wiltonpark.org.uk>. Programme enquiries to Nick Hopkinson. Updates of this preview will be available on <www.wiltonpark.org.uk>

...and finally:

14 | The Rebirth of Urban Democracy
---     -------------------------------------
At a recent National League of Cities conference entitled, “Improving Democratic Local Governance”, conversation--sparked by the work of the Neighborhood Participation Project of the School of Policy, Planning, and Development at the University of Southern California--turned to the Los Angeles experiment in Neighborhood Councils. This kind of work, it was observed, was originally treated in “The Rebirth of Urban Democracy”, a book published in 1993 by the Brookings Institute.

I pulled my paper-clip-laden copy of the shelf, and was again astounded by the breadth, depth and detail of this analysis of participation in cities across America. Covering a range of topics, from structuring participation to empowerment to policy outcomes, this work has the qualities of a classic: it remains instructive today for the robustness of its methodology as for the detail of its case studies and relevance of the authors’ conclusions.

“The Rebirth of Urban Democracy” is available at amazon.com.

RECOMMENDED BOOKS

The Next Form Of Democracy

The Deliberative Democracy Handbook