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HowCitizensCanHaveaGenuineVoiceinPolicymaking.pdf
Infrastructure Transportation Urban Issues Water Security Special: Civic Engagement
There's a lot that our governments could do beyond giving people three
minutes at a public-hearing podium.
January 29, 2016 • Larry Schooler
"This is America. We want to make it easier for people to participate." So said
President Obama in his final State of the Union address. Beyond the partisan
divides around some of the president's policy proposals lies a compelling
thought: Regardless of the policy outcome, give ordinary people genuine,
effective access to the process. That is an achievable goal -- as demonstrated by
the many local governments that have taken positive steps to make it so.
For too long, government has made unrealistic demands of citizens when it
comes to their participation in the process. The only choice many citizens have
had was to speak for no more than three minutes at a podium -- often on live
television, after hours of waiting, minutes before a vote. At one city council
meeting in Texas, a speaker at a public hearing asked, in a nearly empty chamber
at 11 o'clock at night, "Will there be an opportunity to weigh in on this issue? "I
believe you're doing so now," replied the mayor. "With any power?" she asked, to
applause from fellow citizens.
At work, we don't limit input to those who can make a speech right before we
make a decision, and we shouldn't impose that limit on the American people
either; that helps "the most extreme voices get all the attention," as Obama put it.
VOICES OF THE GOVERNING INSTITUTE
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What do we expect when we ask citizens to sit as they would in church, court or a
college lecture, listening to elected officials opine from a dais on high? Only the
bravest would openly and brazenly challenge a pastor, a judge or a professor in
those settings.
The changes in attitude the president describes may be hard for government to
achieve, but that doesn't prevent changes in the process that would help produce
rational, constructive debates, enabling us to listen to more than those who agree
with us and to give the average person more of a say. We should strive to ensure,
above all, that those affected by a public-policy decision can affect that decision.
That's not the case now in much of our country, but there is much that could be
done. In 2013, a multi-organizational coalition that included the American Bar
Association, the National League of Cities and the International City/County
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Management Association produced a set of tools called "Making Public
Participation Legal." It seeks to replace archaic regulations that drive
governments to allow public participation only through scripted, frustrating
public hearings rather than by facilitating genuine dialogue. Several other
organizations, including the International Association for Public Participation,
provide templates for improving the public-participation process.
Some cities have taken these ideas to heart, either replacing or complementing
hearings with conversations. Neutral facilitators help smaller groups of citizens
with differing points of view talk to each other respectfully, with discussion
guidelines that encourage people to respect points of view other than one's own,
to focus on understanding rather than persuasion, and to suspend judgment.
Moderators even manage to get thousands of people into online civil-dialogue
forums.
Some communities go so far as to empower ordinary citizens to host dialogues. In
Portsmouth, N.H., for example, citizen hosts from Portsmouth Listens have held
small conversations in people's homes and resolved major political conflicts
through constructive and structured dialogue. A similar program called
Conversation Corps has taken hold in Austin, Texas. Many cities have empowered
teams of citizen volunteers to facilitate policy discussions at cafés, schools and
houses of worship. And more and more cities have community engagement
coordinators, offices of neighborhood engagement and the like.
Ultimately, this shift can yield more than just warmer feelings among Americans.
Governments often spend millions dealing with the consequences of poor public
participation -- holding off-cycle recall elections, defending against lawsuits filed
by aggrieved policy opponents, or even policing protestors. In an age when we
are trying to focus on preventive, ongoing health care rather than the much more
expensive emergency room, shouldn't we do the same for our politics?
Perhaps when Americans demand that their elected officials, from Congress to
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city council, give them chances to converse rather than contend, we will achieve
the president's vision. Our civic health is ailing; most Americans don't vote, let
alone stay active in public life away from the ballot box, and many young adults
are not leaving home with a firm understanding of civics or with the tools needed
to engage in meaningful civic dialogue. The cure is well within our reach.
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A public-engagement consultant and researcher
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