EMPOWERING INFORMED CIVIC LEADERSHIP; the art of civilised dissent

Tāmaki Makaurau placemaking, Auckland, New Zealand

The time has come for powerful citizen leadership. When governments don’t deliver what we want, it’s time for citizens to get up and get cracking!

Australia’s cities are our home to almost 90% of us but city-planning has come to a stalemate, with the emphasis on ‘stale.’ Witnessing as we do the daily warfare of contemporary political life – from actual wars to the so-called culture wars to the unthinking hostilities of social media – you might easily form the view that humans are irredeemably combative. We are trapped in a NIMBY-YIMBY war that oversimplifies the problem and makes solving it impossible.

So we end up making a world of soulless tower blocks and motorways: a world that pleases no-one, worsens climate change and is increasingly unfair – on the young, the poor, the disabled, the hard-working, the creative.

Yet communities contain vast, largely untapped reservoirs of talent, energy and good-heartedness that can help solve complex urban issues and sidestep the impossible politics.

The Citizen Jury is a radical proposal to enable precisely this. Designed to give real people a real say, it tips the normal ‘engagement’ process of city planning on its head. Not only does it put citizens at the front end of the planning process, it also ensures that the consensus reached is empowered by genuine knowledge.

This is the deliberation in deliberative democracy. It means that the Citizen Jury, once selected, must be given the time and resources to deliberate fully and move from an array of different view to a consensus.

Of course, we all have different views. That’s the point. To reach a genuine and wise consensus is a journey from difference to agreement. This journey is a process of education and empowerment. Too many people think they don’t know enough to engage properly in making their own city. To change this, to inform and empower ourselves, we must rediscover the art of civilised dissent. As US journalist Bret Stephens wrote in 2017:

“to say the words, “I agree”— whether it’s agreeing to join an organization, or submit to political authority, or subscribe to a religious faith — may be the basis of every community. But to say, I disagree; I refuse; you’re wrong; — these are the words that define our individuality, give us our freedom, enjoin our tolerance, enlarge our perspectives, seize our attention, energize our progress, make our democracies real, and give hope and courage to oppressed people everywhere. Galileo and Darwin; Mandela, Havel, and Liu Xiaobo; Rosa Parks and Natan Sharansky — such are the ranks of those who disagree.”

This fits with Jurgen Habermas’ idea of “communicative rationality” – the idea that communication itself, undertaken in a spirit of authenticity, can generate a practical morality and reason – what we commonly know as common sense. It is a quality much lacking in our current planning debate.

How would it work? Unlike orthodox ‘consultation’ which asks people what they personally want – or personally oppose – the citizen jury begins with a question about the kind of city we envisage. That begins the process of education – hearing from a broad array of experts, thinkers and practitioners – and of deliberation.

Deliberation involves the 40 or 50 jurors discussing in-depth the evidence they have heard and working towards a decision or recommendation, depending on their remit. Final decisions are made collectively, either through consensus or through some form of voting. The majority needed may vary; it may require a supermajority (generally, 70%+), as with the Geelong citizens’ jury and can even include a minority report, such as the South Australian citizen jury on nuclear fuel storage - which presented a two-thirds majority report (opposing the fuel storage facility) and a minority report from the remaining third who wanted more discussion.

A Jury will usually produce a final report detailing their recommendations. The report may be drafted by participants collaboratively on the final day of the jury or written by a sub-group. The final draft is presented to decision makers, often by jurors themselves, and made public.

Surely citizen-led design is worth a try?

Citizen-led design and build, Geelong