Author Archives: Andy Fluke

Will Friedman Interview from NCDD Seattle

Posted on by
Reply

At the 2012 NCDD national conference in Seattle, NCDD member and filmmaker Jeffrey Abelson sat down with over a dozen leaders in our community to ask them about their work and their hopes and concerns for our field and for democratic governance in our country.

Today we’re featuring the interview with Will Friedman, president of Public Agenda, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that helps diverse leaders and citizens navigate complex, divisive issues and work together to find solutions. A leading organization in our field, Public Agenda is a long-time organizational member and friend of NCDD. Public Agenda sponsored NCDD Seattle at the partner level last year.

Keep an eye on the blog over the next couple of months for more videos from NCDD Seattle, which brought together 400 leaders and innovators in our field.  You can also check out Jeffrey Abelson’s Song of a Citizen YouTube channel and in our NCDD 2012 Seattle playlist on YouTube.

John Gastil Interview from NCDD Seattle

Posted on by
Reply

At the 2012 NCDD national conference in Seattle, NCDD member and filmmaker Jeffrey Abelson sat down with over a dozen leaders in our community to ask them about their work and their hopes and concerns for our field and for democratic governance in our country.

Today we’re featuring the interview with John Gastil, Head of the Department of Communication Arts and Sciences at Penn State University.  A long time member, friend and supporter of NCDD, John is one of our field’s most respected researchers. Many of you will remember John as our co-emcee at NCDD Seattle (with Susanna Haas Lyons). He has authored many books on deliberation, including Democracy in Motion: Evaluating the Practice and Impact of Deliberative Civic Engagement (with NCDD members Tina Nabatchi and Matt Leighninger), The Deliberative Democracy Handbook (with NCDD member Peter Levine), and Democracy in Small Groups — to name just a few!

Watch the blog over the next month or so for more videos from NCDD Seattle, which brought together 400 leaders and innovators in our field.  You can also check out Jeffrey Abelson’s Song of a Citizen YouTube channel and in our NCDD 2012 Seattle playlist on YouTube.

Awesome Interviews from NCDD’s 2012 Conference

Posted on by
Reply

looking_back_badgeDuring the 2012 NCDD national conference in Seattle, NCDD member and filmmaker Jeffrey Abelson sat down with over a dozen leaders in our community to ask them about their work, their hopes and concerns for our field and for democratic governance in our country, and their ideas about how we might effectively combine forces to make a greater impact — questions that were very much aligned with our conference themes.

The result was a series of wonderfully rich videos focusing on the current state of public engagement in the U.S., all currently available here on Jeffrey’s Song of a Citizen YouTube channel and in our NCDD 2012 Seattle playlist on YouTube.

Over the next month or so we’ll be looking back at our fantastic event in Seattle, which brought together 400 leaders and innovators in our field. In a series of blog posts, we’ll be featuring Jeffrey’s videos along with other items from the conference. We’ll also be looking ahead to the 2014 conference, and asking you to engage with us about our next event!

This compilation video will give you a taste of the interviews and presentations that we’ll be featuring in the coming weeks…

Catalyst Awards Update at IAP2 Conference Next Week

Posted on by
Reply

Catalyst AwardsAttendees of the IAP2 national conference being held in Salt Lake City, UT next week will have the opportunity to learn more about the progress of both NCDD 2012 Catalyst Award projects.  Project representatives, John Spady (National Dialogue Network) and Tim Bonnemann (Real Dialogues), will be hosting the session “Bridge Building and Other Civic Infrastructures — Status of NCDD Catalyst Award Efforts” on Monday from 1:30pm to 3:00pm. Below is the session summary.

Presenters will describe their independent and collaborative efforts since receiving grants from the National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation at the beginning of 2013. Tim Bonnemann will present the “Real Dialogues” project, an experiment in using Google Hangouts to create mass media content for promoting public engagement opportunities to the general public. John Spady will use materials developed for a national audience and lead participants through face to face conversations on the broad topic of “Poverty/Wealth in America.” At the end of the conversations participants will answer the current national survey. If time permits, feedback collected during the session will be analyzed and reported back to the group so they can experience the next phase of the national project: public analysis.

The National Dialogue Network project officially launched this week, sharing news of its program and offering a Conversation Kit for participants. Learn how to get involved here, www.nationaldialoguenetwork.org/get-involved.  Tim Bonnemann will be sharing a Real Dialogues status report at the IAP2 event, and we’ll have additional updates on the NCDD news blog soon.

The IAP2 conference is being held next week, from September 22-24 in Salt Lake City at the Radisson Downtown.  You can learn more at the event’s website,  www.iap2usa.org/conference.

Immigration in America: How Do We Fix a System in Crisis? (NIF Issue Guide)

Posted on by
Reply

One of the National Issues Forums Institute’s issue guides, Immigration in America: How Do We Fix a System in Crisis? (updated edition, 2013), outlines this public issue and several choices or approaches to addressing the issue. National Issues Forums do not advocate a specific solution or point of view, but provide citizens the opportunity to consider a broad range of choices, weigh the pros and cons of those options, and meet with each other in a public dialogue to identify the concerns they hold in common.

The following excerpt is taken from the issue guide. The 12-page issue guide presents three options for deliberation.

The costs and benefits of immigration have always been debated. But as we work our way out of a tough economic recession, some wonder whether newcomers, especially those arriving illegally, are compromising our quality of life, taking jobs away from those already here, and threatening our security and sovereignty as a nation…

The question facing Americans today is how to create a system that meets our diverse needs–a system that values the role immigrants play in society, takes heed of today’s economic and legal responsibilities, and keeps us strong and competitive in the future.

To promote deliberation about immigration reform, this guide presents three options, each built on a framework of ideas and information drawn from studies, speeches, interviews, books, and public policy proposals.

Option One: Welcome New Arrivals
A rich combination of diverse cultures is what defines us as a people. We must preserve our heritage as a nation of immigrants by shoring up our existing system while also providing an acceptable way for the millions of undocumented immigrants currently living here to earn the right to citizenship.

Option Two: Protect Our Borders
Failure to stem the tide of illegal immigration undermines our national security, stiffens competition for scarce jobs, and strains the public purse. We need tighter control of our borders, tougher enforcement of our immigration laws, and stricter limits on the number of immigrants legally accepted into the country.

Option Three: Promote Economic Prosperity
To remain competitive in the 21st-century global economy, we need to acknowledge the key role that immigrants play in keeping the US economy dynamic and robust. This option favors a range of flexible measures, such as annual adjustments to immigration quotas, that put a priority on our economic needs.

More about NIF issue guides…

NIFI’s issue guides introduce participants to several choices or approaches to consider. Rather than conforming to any single public proposal, each choice reflects widely held concerns and principles. Panels of experts review manuscripts to make sure the choices are presented accurately and fairly. By intention, issue guides do not identify individuals or organizations with partisan labels, such as Democratic, Republican, conservative, or liberal. The goal is to present ideas in a fresh way that encourages readers to judge them on their merit.

NIFI offers various materials for each of the issues it produces issue guides on. The moderator guide or “guide to the forums” for each issue is available as a free download. Discussion guides (or “issue guides”) for participants are generally available in print or PDF download for a small fee ($2 to $4). DVD’s can also be purchased for some issues for just $6, for use at the beginning of your forums to introduce the topic and approaches.

All NIF issue guides and associated tools can be accessed at www.nifi.org/issue_books/.

Resource Link: www.nifi.org/issue_books/detail.aspx?catID=14&itemID=20619

Audio from August Confab Call with Rich Harwood

Posted on by
Reply

We had a great confab call on Wednesday (August 7, 2013) with special guest Rich Harwood of The Harwood Institute for Public Innovation. The call was facilitated skillfully by Marla Crockett, NCDD’s Board chair and a close colleague of Rich’s.

Earlier this year, Rich was asked to facilitate a series of meetings in Newtown, CT to help the grieving city decide what to do with Sandy Hook Elementary School, site of the horrific mass murder of children and school personnel last December. We asked Rich to talk to NCDD members about his work in Newtown, and the broader work he and his colleagues are doing at the highly regarded Harwood Institute.

Confab bubble imageUse the links below to listen to the audio recording of the call and check out other call-related material.

We had over 120 participants this week, with about half active the call’s collaborative doc at Hackpad.com, where they took great notes, introduced themselves, posed questions and shared links.  One of our participants even mind-mapped the confab conversation, and that link is on the Hackpad as well!

Through community conversations, constant innovation, and nationwide research, The Harwood Institute has developed an approach that’s helped cities, organizations, and individuals “Turn Outward” and build on public aspirations to get things done for the common good. Rich has worked in struggling communities such as Newark, Detroit, and Flint, Michigan and has created a group of “Beacon Communities” to develop a critical mass of public innovators. He’s partnered with influential organizations like United Way Worldwide, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and the American Library Association in order to enhance their relevance and impact in the communities they serve.

His latest book, The Work of Hope, asserts that fixing our politics shouldn’t be our top priority. “The central task in our society is to restore belief in ourselves and one another that we can get things done, together.” It was that philosophy which guided Rich’s work in Newtown and brought about an emotional, yet harmonious, decision.