|

Spotlighting the Backstage Governance of Citizens Assemblies

ByRikki Dean

Most attention on citizens assemblies understandably focuses on what happens on stage. What do the participants discuss and how deliberative are their interactions? But what happens on stage is in large part shaped by what is happening behind the scenes – for example, who decides what the agenda for discussion is, and how? In a new report from the Global Citizens’ Assemblies Network (GloCAN), we examine these backstage governance practices in cases from across the world and ask what they tell us about how to organise a global assembly.

The research was carried out by three teams, one focused on cases in Europe, one on South East Asia, and one in Latin America.

Together we examined 14 cases across these three regions, investigating:

  • how their governance was structured,
  • how key design decisions about elements of the process (such as participant selection, agenda-setting and post event follow-up) were managed;
  • what values drove the governance and how they were implemented.

What we found then informed ten recommendations for organising global assemblies:

  1. Create transparent governance structures.
  2. Open the commissioning process to a range of stakeholders.
  3. Make space for mutual learning between decision-makers.
  4. Govern with sensitivity to the local context.
  5. Use global citizens’ assemblies for deliberative capacity-building.
  6. Transparently communicate the rationale for process design decisions.
  7. Agree on a clear plan for participant involvement.
  8. Develop an impartial system for expert selection.
  9. Plan for impact.
  10. Develop and apply an ethical code of conduct for governing assemblies.

To read the recommendations in full and how we arrived at them, you can download the full report from the GloCAN website.

Similar Posts

|

There is more than one way to involve the public in policy decisions

ByRikki Dean

Imagine you are a civil servant. You have just convinced your somewhat skeptical colleagues that your new policy initiative should incorporate extensive public participation in its design process. You now have some tough choices to make: who is going to participate in the process, for example? You know that if you keep participation open to all, then the process will be criticized within your department for just involving the usual suspects. But if you restrict participation, to a randomly selected group for instance, then you know there are some influential policy NGOs who will be vocal about their exclusion…

| |

Leadership in Transdisciplinary Knowledge Co-production

ByRikki Dean

How can we broaden the range of actors involved in the solving complex problem of generating sustainable urban communities? A new, open access book on Transdisciplinary Knowledge Co-production gives a detailed account of the methods, with a contribution from Catherine Durose, Beth Perry, Liz Richardson and I on leadership in co-production.

|

On embedding participatory governance: A new symposium of Critical Policy Studies

ByRikki Dean

Embeddedness is often invoked as a goal for participatory governance, but it tends to remain vaguely defined. So what does embedding participation mean? And how is it achieved? Sonia Bussu, Adrian Bua, Graham Smith and I convened this symposium in Critical Policy Studies in order to explore these questions through case studies from around the world.

| | | |

What are “Democratic Innovations”?

ByRikki Dean

I was the guest for the June episode of the new podcast from Goethe University, Talk Social Science To Me. The main theme was to discuss new ways of involving citizens in democracy, but the conversation led us to many topics, ranging from the effects of the pandemic on democratic governance to the role of democracies in the climate crisis. The podcast is now available on Spotify, Youtube and other podcast providers.