What Does it Mean to Transform Governance?

Posted on March 14, 2016 by Roshan Bliss

Back in February, NCDD member and Public Agenda staffer Matt Leighninger penned the article below on his trip to a democracy conference in Manila, and we wanted to share it here. In it, Matt shares some great insights on what it means to “transform governance” and improve democracy that really get at the heart of what many in our field are seeking to do. We encourage you to read his article from the PA blog below or find the original post here.

One Week in Manila: Democracy, Development, and “Transforming Governance”

This week, I will join a group of people from around the world meeting in Manila to talk about how to make democracy work in newer, better ways. Convened by Making All Voices Count, a collaborative of the Omidyar Network, the US Agency for International Development, the UK Department for International Development and the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency, the group will include Asian and African democracy advocates, civic technologists and researchers.

In the Manila meeting, the participants will be using the term “transforming governance” to describe the changes they seek. The central question of the gathering is: If we want to ensure that citizens have meaningful roles in shaping public decisions and solving public problems, can technologies play a role in helping them do so?

They are asking a very old question, but with new hypotheses, new tools and new principles in mind. It is increasingly clear that the older democracies of the Global North do not have all the answers: citizens of those countries have increasingly lost faith in their political institutions. Northerners cherish their human rights and free elections, but are clearly looking for something more. Meanwhile, in the Global South, new regimes based on a similar formula of rights and elections have proven fragile and difficult to sustain. And in Brazil, India and other Southern countries, participatory budgeting and other democratic innovations have emerged.

How can our democratic formulas be adjusted so that they are more sustainable, powerful, fulfilling – and, well, democratic? Some of the new answers come from the development of online tools and platforms that help people to engage with their governments, with organizations and institutions, and with each other. Often referred to collectively as “civic technology,” these tools can help us map public problems, help citizens generate solutions, gather input for government, coordinate volunteer efforts and help neighbors remain connected.

Despite the rapid growth of these forums and tools around the world, in most cases they are not fully satisfying expectations. One reason is that they are usually disconnected from one another, and from other civic engagement opportunities, so are not reaching their full civic potential. Another is that some are designed mainly to gather small scraps of feedback from citizens on a government service, with no guarantee that government will be willing or able to use the input, so they only have limited civic potential.

But while it is unfair to expect any new technology to automatically change our systems of governance, we should certainly have these tools in mind – along with the many processes for productive public engagement that do not rely on technology – when we think about how to redesign democratic systems.

In that conversation, “transforming governance” can be a helpful term because it urges us to think more broadly about democracy, and about the power of democratic systems to improve our lives. There are at least three ways in which these positive transformations can occur:

Changing how people think and act in democracies, by giving them the information they need, the chance to connect with other citizens, the opportunity to provide ideas and recommendations to public officials and public employees, the confidence that government is accountable to citizens’ needs and desires, and the encouragement to devote some of their own time and energy to improving their communities.
Changing how governments work, so that public officials and employees can interact effectively with large numbers of people, bridge divides between different groups of citizens, provide information that people can use, gather and use public input, and support citizens to become better public problem-solvers.
Changing how civil society organizations (‘intermediaries’) and information mediators (‘info-mediaries’) work, so that they are better able to facilitate the interaction between citizens and government, monitor and report on how decisions are being made and problems are being solved, and provide training and support to new leaders.

These changes can add up, in many different combinations, to democracies that are more participatory, energetic, efficient and equitable. In Manila and elsewhere, we should face the old questions with new tools, new visions and new hope.

You can find the original version of this Public Agenda piece at www.publicagenda.org/blogs/one-week-in-manila-democracy-development-and-transforming-governance#sthash.OzbfQ9g9.dpuf.

Registration Open for 4th Int’l PB Conference, May 20-22

Posted on March 10, 2016 by Roshan Bliss

This year is going to be a great year for conferences! Of course we want our NCDD members to join us at our 2016 National Conference for Dialogue & Deliberation, but we also want to encourage our members to consider registering for the 4th International Conference on Participatory Budgeting in North America this May 20th-22nd in Boston, MA.

This year’s PB conference is especially exciting because it will coincide with the voting phase of the City of Boston’s award-winning youth participatory budgeting process, which adds an extra focus on young people’s participation in deliberative processes to the gathering. Regular registration is only $225 before the early-bird deadline on April 8th, but registration fees operate on a sliding scale that you can learn more about at www.pbconference.org.

Here is how PBP describes the conference:

The 4th International Conference on Participatory Budgeting in North America, organized by the Participatory Budgeting Project (PBP), will take place in Boston, Massachusetts, USA during the voting phase of their award-winning, city-wide, youth PB process.

The conference is a space for participants and organizers of PB processes to share and reflect on their experiences so far, alongside interested activists, practitioners, scholars, elected officials, and civic designers.

The PB Conference will be organized around three themes this year:

Youth power through PB: PB in schools, youth-only processes, and nearly every other PB process in North America uniquely gives real power to young people – as young as 11! What can we do to encourage even more youth leadership with PB?
PB in practice: What is working well? What has been less successful? What improvements can be made in the way the process is implemented? How can we do better and be more effective with existing PB processes and how can we put more processes in place across North America and around the world.
Measuring impact: How do we define a good PB process? What are the best ways to define success in this context? What are innovative, effective tools and methods we can use to assess the impact of processes that are currently underway as well as to shape new PB processes.

Conference participants will also have the chance to take advantage of a full-day introductory or advanced training on participatory budgeting before the conference May 20th from 9:30am-4pm. The regular registration rate for the trainings is $250, which is separate from conference registration.

The PB Conference promises to be a great gathering to learn more about one of the fastest-growing methodologies in our field, and we hope to see some of our NCDD members there! You can learn more and register for the conference at www.pbconference.org.

Register for March Confab with Participatory Budgeting Project

Posted on March 8, 2016 by Courtney Breese

Join us on Wednesday, March 23rd for NCDD’s next “Confab Call.” We’ll be featuring NCDD organizational member the Participatory Budgeting Project and learning more about their exciting work with a rapidly expanding process. The confab will take place from 2-3pm Eastern (11am-12pm Pacific). Register today to secure your spot!

Participatory Budgeting Project (PBP) is a non-profit organization that empowers people to decide together how to spend public money, primarily in the US and Canada. PBP creates and supports participatory budgeting processes that deepen democracy, build stronger communities, and make public budgets more equitable and effective. Launched in 2009 and incorporated as a non-profit organization in the state of New York in October 2011, PBP now has offices in New York, Chicago and Oakland and has worked to bring participatory budgeting to numerous cities including Boston, San Jose, St Louis, and more!

On this Confab, we will hear from PBP’s Communications Director David Beasley about participatory budgeting, and PBP’s work to bring this approach to managing public money to cities, districts and schools. He’ll talk with us about the successes PBP has had working across the country and the challenges they face. We’ll also talk about PBP’s current PB Squared initiative (PB^2) which calls for ideas for how to make participatory budgeting better, and their upcoming Participatory Budgeting Conference in Boston. We’ll also be joined by Allison Rizzolo from Public Agenda, who will speak to their current work evaluating participatory budgeting. Come ready to learn more about this exciting work and to contribute your ideas about how to improve it further!

David is responsible for the strategic development and management of PBP’s communications, fundraising through individual giving, and their conference. He has trained dozens of advocates to be spokespeople for their movements and supported them through print and broadcast media engagements with organizations that include Safe Horizon, Scenarios USA, Hollaback!, and the Pop-Up Museum of Queer History, among others. David believes that telling better stories build movements that change culture.

As the Director of Communications at Public Agenda, Allison Rizzolo develops and executes communications strategies to broaden the impact of Public Agenda’s research and engagement work. A former teacher, Allison is also the co-author of Everyone at the Table: Engaging Teachers in Evaluation Reform.

For updates on about PB and best practices for empowering communities to decide together, sign up for PBP’s newsletter.

NCDD’s confabs (interactive conference calls) are free and open to all members and potential members. Register today if you’d like to join us!

About NCDD’s Confab Calls…

NCDD’s Confab Calls are opportunities for members (and potential members) of NCDD to talk with and hear from innovators in our field about the work they’re doing, and to connect with fellow members around shared interests. Membership in NCDD is encouraged but not required for participation. Register today if you’d like to join us.

Good Engagement Can Be “Preventative Civic Health Care”

Posted on March 7, 2016 by Roshan Bliss

Long-time NCDD supporting member Larry Schooler penned a wonderful piece for the Challenges to Democracy blog run by the Ash Center for Democratic Governance & Innovation – an NCDD member organization – and it was too good not to share. In it, he points to the opportunity presented in the President’s recent call for more engagement and aptly compares our work to preventative health care for our democracy. We encourage you to read Larry’s piece below or find the original here.

Is The President’s Call For More Public Participation Within Reach?

This is America. We want to make it easier for people to participate.

Beyond the partisan divides around some of President Obama’s policy proposals lies a compelling thought: regardless of the policy outcome, give ordinary people safer access to the process. That is an achievable goal – as demonstrated by the many governments who have made it so.

For too long, government has made unrealistic demands of citizens when it comes to their participation. Initially, whole segments of the population could not vote or faced significant obstacles to registration – still an issue in some states. Meanwhile, the only choice many citizens 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 and befuddlement from her elected officials.

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 the President put it.

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 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, after all, that those affected by a public policy decision can affect that decision. That’s not the case now in much of our country.

A multi-organizational coalition that included the American Bar Association, the National League of Cities, and the International City County Managers Association produced a set of tools to help make the President’s Dream a reality. Called Making Public Participation Legal, it sought to replace archaic regulations that drive governments to host public hearings rather than facilitate dialogue.

In cities across the country, governments have either replaced or complemented 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, focus on understanding rather than persuasion, and suspend judgment. Moderators even manage to get thousands of people into civil dialogue online through forums set up by local governments to discuss policy challenges.

Some communities even empower ordinary citizens to be the change they want to see in our process – by training them to host dialogue. In Portsmouth, New Hampshire, citizen hosts from Portsmouth Listens held small conversations in people’s homes and resolved major political conflicts through constructive and structured dialogue.

Rather than expecting elected officials both to hold a point of view and to stay neutral among competing interests, many cities have empowered teams of citizen volunteers to facilitate policy discussions at cafes, schools, and houses of worship.

Perhaps most importantly, governments where these changes in public participation have taken hold have laid a solid foundation for change through guiding principles and, in many cases, dedicated personnel. Several organizations, including the International Association for Public Participation, have given governments templates for public participation principles, and more and more cities have community engagement coordinators, offices of neighborhood engagement, and the like.

Ultimately, this paradigm 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 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 will require all of us – and is well within our reach.

You can find the original version of this piece on the Challenges to Democracy blog at www.challengestodemocracy.us/home/is-the-presidents-call-for-more-public-participation-within-reach/#sthash.jWbgAiMZ.dpuf.

2016 Taylor Willingham Legacy Award Winner Announced

Posted on March 4, 2016 by Roshan Bliss

NCDD would like to join our organizational member the National Issues Forums Institute and the rest of the field in congratulating the winner of the 2016 Taylor L. Willingham Legacy Award – Edward W. “Chipps” Taylor III.

Here’s a bit of what NIFI wrote about the granting of the award:

The National Issues Forums Institute has announced that Edward W. “Chipps” Tayor III is the 2016 recipient of the Taylor L. Willingham Legacy Fund Award. This fund was created to support individuals who are becoming involved in the deliberative democracy movement for the first time and who have the passion, vision and commitment to create opportunities for deliberative dialogue in their organizations and communities….

Elder Chipps Taylor has been “pursuing liberty in the face of injustice” for the NAACP for more than 28 years, and he is not tired yet. It all started in Arizona, in 1987, when all the states except Arizona were celebrating Martin Luther King’s birthday. Governor Evan Mecham rescinded MLK Day as his first act in office, setting off boycotts of the state. That was when Elder Taylor got on the battlefield for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). He was also a member of the MLK Committee, which protested for 13 years until it became a state holiday…

You can read more about the Willingham Award and Edward Taylor’s accomplishments in NIFI’s blog post about the award by visiting www.nifi.org/en/groups/winner-2016-taylor-l-willingham-legacy-award-edward-w-chipps-taylor-iii.

Technology & Democracy Video Project Seeks Submissions

Posted on March 2, 2016 by Roshan Bliss

Here’s a fun-but-relevant thing happening out there: the collaborative team at hitRECord is partnering with the ACLU to crowd source a series of short films on the theme of how technology has impacted democracy. They’re asking folks to submit videos of themselves speaking on the subject, and we know many of our NCDD members have great thoughts to share on the topic! Read more about the project below or find hitRECord’s original post along with their introductory video by clicking here.

Are you there, Democracy? It’s me, the Internet.

Today’s technology is changing pretty much every facet of our lives – even things as important as our Democracy. And especially with this being an election year here in the US, I think these changes are really worth having a conversation about, and making art about.

So, I wanna hear what you think. Record yourself (or interview someone else) on camera answering these three questions:

Is today’s technology good or bad for Democracy?
How might the technology of the future be BAD for Democracy?
How might the technology of the future be GOOD for Democracy?

Once we have lots of footage of different people answering these questions, we’ll use that footage to produce a bunch of short films. We could make a stylized documentary, we could dramatize somebody’s personal point of view, we could do animation, a song, who knows.

And now, I’m very pleased to announce that for this project, hitRECord will be partnering with the ACLU. The ACLU is a 100-year-old, non-profit, legal organization who is right at the forefront of figuring out how today’s laws should or shouldn’t adapt to today’s technology.

And, although this project isn’t about the money, as with every hitRECord production, if one of your contributions is used in one of the final short films, you will get paid. I just finished shooting a movie where I play Edward Snowden, which really got me thinking about all of this. And so I’ve decided to donate my acting fee from that movie to facilitate this conversation about technology and democracy. Some of that money will go to this production, and the rest will go to the ACLU.

That’s about it. I really look forward to hearing how you answer the three questions and seeing what kinds of short films we can make out of it.

You can find the original version of this hitRECord post at www.hitrecord.org/projects/2650089.

New Initiative Seeks to Reconnect Higher Ed & Democracy

Posted on March 1, 2016 by Roshan Bliss

Last year, the Kettering Foundation – one of our NCDD organizational members – convened several university presidents that inaugurated an important effort to help higher education reclaim its roots and role in supporting democracy throughout our society. The effort is being chronicled in a new KF blog series, and we wanted to share the first of the series here. We encourage you to read more about this great initiative below or find the original post here.

Template for Campus Conversations on Democracy

Kettering has recently begun working with college presidents to move beyond their administrative and fundraising roles and provide new leadership for civic engagement. Beginning with a meeting with a small group of college presidents in July 2015, we found that these presidents were indeed eager to take leadership on themes of democracy and civic engagement on their campuses and with their stakeholders. This blog series, College Presidents on Higher Education and Its Civic Purposes, offers a space to gather and present their thoughts.

For inquiries related to Kettering’s research on college presidents and the civic purposes of higher education, please contact barker[at]kettering[dot]org.

Based on initial conversations at Kettering, Paul Pribbenow, president of Augsburg College, and Adam Weinberg, president of Denison University, working with public intellectual, political theorist, and civic organizer Harry Boyte, also of Augsburg College, have drafted a brief overview of how higher education leaders can initiate these conversations. Campus Compact, as part of its activities in recognition of its 30th anniversary, and Imagining America’s Presidents Council, have already expressed interest in sharing the document with leaders in their networks.

In this inaugural post, Pribbenow describes the purpose of the document and offers an initial draft for comments and feedback.

Letter from Paul Pribbenow

Dear Colleagues,

In July 2015, the Kettering Foundation convened a meeting of presidents on how we, as leaders of our institutions, can more intentionally become public philosophers of education and democracy, in a time of deep unrest in our society as well as on campuses.

The group commissioned Adam Weinberg, president of Denison University, and myself, working with Harry Boyte from Augsburg’s Sabo Center for Democracy and Citizenship, to develop a Leadership Template on the topic. The template offers a few suggested focus areas and resources for presidents and higher education leaders to initiate campus discussions about democracy and citizenship.

We are eager for you to offer your thoughts about the diverse ways in which this template can be used. We aim to help spark a broad discussion on campuses and beyond about how we can strengthen democracy as a “way of life,” with higher education playing vital roles. I don’t have to explain why we need such a discussion.

This effort is undertaken in cooperation with Campus Compact’s 30th anniversary and Imagining America’s Presidential Council, which also has been discussing the democratic purposes of higher education.

Yours in service of our democracy,
Paul Pribbenow, President, Augsburg College

Leading Democracy Colleges and Universities: The Public Roles of Presidents
Drafted by Paul Pribbenow and Adam Weinberg, with Harry Boyte, January 2016

“The first and most essential charge upon higher education is that… it shall be the carrier of democratic values, ideals and processes.” – Truman Commission on Higher Education, 1947

“Our institutions need to be citizens of a place, not on the sidelines studying it.” – Nancy Cantor, Chancellor of Rutgers-Newark, 2015

The Truman Commission drew from a large and inspiring view of “democracy as a way of life” widespread early in the 20th century. As John Dewey put it, “Whether this educative process is carried on in a predominantly democratic or non-democratic way becomes a question of transcendent importance not only for education itself but for the democratic way of life.”

This view once infused higher education – land grant and public universities, liberal arts colleges, historically black colleges and universities, normal schools, state universities, and community colleges. “Most of the American institutions of higher education are filled with the democratic spirit,” said Harvard president Charles Eliot, conveying a large conception of democracy.

Today, though many colleges and universities invoke “democracy” or “democratic engagement,” it is rare to have public discussions that reflect on the actual meaning of democracy, just as it is easy to miss the deep challenge to cultures of detachment in Nancy Cantor’s call for colleges and universities to be “citizens of a place, not on the sidelines studying it.” In a time of threats to democracy at home and abroad, the meaning of “democracy” has shrunk along with the purposes of higher education. Democracy often means simply free and fair elections, as the US Agency for International Development defines it (see page 37 of the USAID Strategy on Democracy, Human Rights, and Governance). For many, colleges are a ticket to individual success.

Yet there are signs of renewed concern for the public purposes and work of colleges and universities, reviving higher education’s democratic roles. In this view, colleges and universities are centers of knowledge making and leadership formation, responsible not only for creating and dispensing information but also for addressing local issues and stimulating public exploration of great questions: What does it mean to have a “democratic way of life”? How can higher education, working with communities, help get us there?

This template on leading democracy colleges and universities responds to a request from a group of presidents brought together in July 2015 by the Kettering Foundation on “College Presidents and the Civic Purposes of Higher Education.” Like two efforts by National Issues Forums to organize deliberative dialogues on the purpose of higher education, Shaping Our Future and The Changing World of Work, and the Imagining America Democracy’s College discussion among a group of colleges and universities, it grows from the American Commonwealth Partnership invited by the White House to mark the anniversary of land grant colleges, a coalition to strengthen the public purposes and work of higher education. This effort also builds from efforts like the Carnegie Classification on Community Engagement and the President’s Honor Roll for Community Service that push back against narrow views of “excellence,” like the rankings of US News and World Report.

This statement aims to help spark a broad discussion, on campuses and beyond, about what it means for college and university presidents to lead a public conversation about democracy as a “way of life” with higher education playing vital roles. There is evidence that the nation may be ready for such a discussion. To launch this process, we suggest five focus areas for conversation and action:

Democracy Saga/Public Narrative: This focus area emphasizes an intentional campus and community-wide effort, working with students to recover, discuss, and engage the “saga” or “public narrative” of each unique educational community (for example, see Paul Pribbenow, “Lessons on Vocation and Location: The Saga of Augsburg College as Urban Settlement”).

Democratic Excellence through Diversity: This area of focus revitalizes the conviction, buttressed by research, that a mix of students with diverse backgrounds and talents, interacting in learning cultures of high expectation which develop their unique gifts, can achieve both individual and cooperative excellence, which no focus on winnowing out the stars can achieve (see “Lani Guinier Redefines Diversity, Re-evaluates Merit,” New York Times).

Preparation for Citizen Professional Leadership: This area of focus involves professional programs, disciplinary fields, and learning outside the classroom that recall the democratic values of scientific and other fields and instill democratic skills and habits of public work in students, as well as faculty and staff, to prepare students to be empowering civic leaders and change agents (see citizen professionals at Augsburg).

Free and Public Spaces: This area of focus develops intentional plans to create diverse free spaces and public spaces where students and others learn the skills of surfacing tensions and conflicts constructively, while working with others who are different (see Project for Public Spaces, “Campuses” and Adam Weinberg, “6 Tips for Getting the Most from a Liberal Arts College”). (See also the National Issues Forums issue guides and other resources for engaging campuses in deliberative dialogues on controversial issues.)

Citizens of Places: Colleges and universities as “stewards of place” and “anchor institutions” contributing to the civic and economic health of communities are spreading rapidly. These include a variety of practices, from college purchasing power used to support local businesses and partnerships in creating public spaces to collaboration on local school improvement and support for staff involvement in civic life (see the Anchor Institutions Task Force).

Presidents who act as “public philosophers of democracy and education” are key players in recovering a vision of democracy as a way of life. We encourage presidents to consider their roles in the context of the 2016 Campus Compact Civic Action planning process, which will commence in early 2016, in conjunction with the Compact’s 30th anniversary. Future meetings of college and university presidents, under the auspices of the Kettering Foundation, will offer opportunities to refine and grow this emerging understanding of the public roles of presidents in our democracy.

Other resources: “Democracy University” WNYC Radio show with Harry Boyte and Tim Eatman on the new book collection, Democracy’s Education: Public Work, Citizenship, and the Future of Colleges and Universities (Vanderbilt University Press, 2015). Research on concepts and practices of higher education civic engagement can also be found in several Kettering Foundation publications.

You can find the original version of this Kettering Foundation blog post at www.kettering.org/blogs/template-campus-conversations.

NCDD Members Get 30% Off New Transpartisan Book

Posted on February 29, 2016 by Roshan Bliss

We are pleased to share the announcement below from the Bridge Alliance – one of our NCDD organizational members – about the release of its co-founder and NCDD member Mark Gerzon‘s new book, The Reunited States of America, on March 1st. Mark’s book is highly relevant for D&D practitioners, so he and Bridge Alliance are offering a 30% discount for NCDD members with the code “NCDD”. Read more about the book in the announcement below, or find Mark’s book here.

Reunited States of America

We have an exciting offer for you that you won’t want to miss!

Mark Gerzon is releasing his new book March 1st and we want you to be some of the first people with this timely and important tool in hand! That is why we are offering.30% off of the book when you pre-order as a member of NCDD.

Here are 5 reasons why you want to take advantage of this offer and order your copy of The Reunited States of America TODAY:

This book puts the spotlight on dozens of individuals and organizations that comprise a new narrative for Democracy 2.0. It is a manifesto for a movement that includes the NCDD field – and highlights the importance of what those of us in this field are all trying to do.
It describes problem solving on some of the most difficult and divisive issues, such as: abortion, gun control, sex education, defense spending, criminal justice reform and more!
Gerzon invites us into a movement to reunite our nation and put country before party! This book doesn’t ask party members to forfeit their values, but celebrates the beauty of all diverse voices that grow out of love for your country.
The Reunited States of America explains what you can do starting now to strengthen our nation’s sense of unity while honoring the vital role of conflicting points of view.
While we all know that not one book, one person nor one organization has the power to change the course of American politics. But this new narrative, with your help, can rise up above the barrage of attack ads and spread a message about dialogue, deliberation and real democracy!

Although we come from opposite ends of the political spectrum, we believe our country needs to come together. “The Reunited States of America” will help us do that. It reconnects us to our country’s motto – “out of many, one” – and helps us meet the challenge of reuniting the country that we all love.

– Grover Norquist, president, Americans for Tax Reform & Joan Blades, co-founder MoveOn.org and LivingRoomConversations.org

For 30% off of your copy of this book click here and use the discount code: NCDD

You bought the book, now what? Here are some easy ways to get the word out and unite America starting today!

Davenport Launches Tool for Evaluating Gov’t Engagement

Posted on February 22, 2016 by Roshan Bliss

We were excited to hear the news last week that the team at the Davenport Institute – one of our NCDD member organizations – is launching a powerful new platform for government agencies to evaluate their own public engagement efforts and compare them to other cities or agencies. We commend the Davenport team on creating this needed tool. You can learn more about the tool’s launch in the press release below that we found on Business Wire, or read the original here.

The Davenport Institute Launches New Public Engagement Evaluation Platform

The Davenport Institute for Public Engagement and Civic Leadership at the Pepperdine University School of Public Policy is pleased to announce the launch of a new tool to help cities and other local public agencies evaluate their public engagement efforts, the “How are WE Doing? Public Engagement Evaluation Platform.”

In a 2012 survey of California public sector officials regarding their views of public engagement, 85 percent of respondents said their “views on public engagement have changed since their careers began,” and 77 percent were “interested in hearing more about public engagement practices that have worked in other places.”

For almost a decade, The Davenport Institute has been researching, training, and consulting with public officials to improve the ways in which governments involve their residents in making tough policy decisions. This work has taken Institute leadership throughout California and across the country, learning about and teaching the latest techniques in effective participatory governance.

With a growing awareness of what constitutes effective public engagement, we continue to hear from many public leaders seeking a way to take a “30,000 foot view” of their government’s practices in this area. The “How are WE Doing? Public Engagement Evaluation Platform” is the product of these conversations, and of the committed participation of an esteemed group of California leaders.

It is designed to offer governments a lens through which they can evaluate their agencies public processes, and to give them the opportunity to apply for recognition of successful engagement. Cities, counties, special districts, agencies, and departments can apply for recognition at one of three levels of engagement:

Silver Engagement – the government is making genuine efforts to improve its engagement with residents and successfully meets at least 12 of the 20 criteria listed.
Gold Engagement – the government has successfully institutionalized resident engagement as part of its operational culture, meeting at least 15 of the 20 criteria listed.
Platinum Engagement – the government is a leader in the engagement field, earning this designation by meeting at least 17 of the criteria listed.

“How are WE Doing?” also offers a way of gathering data on how governments across the state, and eventually around the country, are doing collectively in their attempts to involve residents, data the Institute will make available to all participants in the platform.

The Davenport Institute would like to thank the following Advisory Council members who devoted their time and expertise to developing this platform:

Artie Fields, City Manager, City of Inglewood
Rod Gould, City Manager, City of Santa Monica
Ken Hampian, City Manager, City of San Luis Obispo
Dennis Donohue, former Mayor, City of Salinas.

To learn more about “How are WE Doing? Public Engagement Evaluation Platform” visit the homepage here or view the platform here.

For more information about The Davenport Institute for Public Engagement and Civic Leadership at Pepperdine University, visit http://publicpolicy.pepperdine.edu/davenport-institute.

You can see the original version of this announcement on Business Wire at www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160215005664/en/Davenport-Institute-Launches-Public-Engagement-Evaluation-Platform.

Register for “Trusting the Public” Talk featuring CIR, Feb. 25

Posted on February 19, 2016 by Roshan Bliss

The New America Foundation is hosting a talk called “Rebuilding the Public’s Trust Starts with Trusting the Public,” this Thursday, February 25th from 10-11am Eastern, and we want to encourage our NCDD members to consider participating.

The event will focus on democratic innovations that changing the way citizens participate in government, featuring a presentation on the Citizens’ Initiative Review (CIR) process from long-time NCDD member John Gastil who will be on a panel with Carolyn Lukensmeyer, another long-time NCDD member, and author Hollie Russon-Gilman.

Here’s how New America describes the event:

Rebuilding the Public’s Trust Begins with Trusting the Public

From the ascent of Trump to armed protest and the tragedy of Flint, we have reason to worry about the future of our democracy. On Thursday, February 25, from 10-11am New America will host a talk that brings more encouraging news about real democratic reforms happening in the United States.

Penn State political communication professor John Gastil will share his insights on a reform that helps voters make smarter decisions in initiative elections. This innovation, called the Citizens’ Initiative Review, began in Oregon in 2009 and is appearing this year in Massachusetts. New America fellow Hollie Russon-Gilman will also share reflections from her brand new book, Democracy Reinvented: Participatory Budgeting and Civic Innovation in America.

This talk will be taking place in downtown Washington, DC and we hope lots of our DC-based members can make it. For the rest of us, the talk will be streamed live via webcast. Either way, we encourage you to RSVP here today to make sure to save your spot!

You can learn more about this event and New America by visiting www.newamerica.org/political-reform/rebuilding-the-publics-trust-begins-with-trusting-the-public.

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