Citizen input matters in the fight against COVID-19

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Britt Lake at FeedbackLabs: “When the Ebola crisis hit West Africa in 2015, one of the first responses was to build large field hospitals to treat the rapidly growing number of Ebola patients. As Paul Richards explains, “These were seen as the safest option. But they were shunned by families, because so few patients came out alive.” Aid workers vocally opposed local customs like burial rituals that contributed to the spread of the virus, which caused tension with communities. Ebola-affected communities insisted that some of their methods had proven effective in lowering case numbers before outside help arrived. When government and aid agencies came in and delivered their own messages, locals felt that their expertise had been ignored. Distrust spread, as did a sense that the response pitted local knowledge against global experts. And the virus continued to spread. 

The same is true now. Today there are more than 1 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 worldwide. The virus has spread to every country and territory in the world, leaving virtually no one unaffected. The pandemic is exacerbating inequities in employment, education, access to healthcare and food, and workers’ rights even as it raises new challenges. Everyone is looking for answers to address their needs and anxieties while also collectively realizing that this pandemic and our responses to it will irrevocably shape the future.

It would be easy for us in the public sector to turn inwards for solutions on how to respond effectively to the pandemic and its aftermath. It’s comfortable to focus on perspectives from our own teams when we feel a heightened sense of urgency, and decisions must be made on a dime. However, it would be a mistake not to consider input from the communities we serve – alongside expert knowledge – when determining how we support them through this crisis. 

COVID-19 affects everyone on earth, and it won’t be possible to craft equitable responses that meet people’s needs around the globe unless we listen to what would work best to address those challenges and support homegrown solutions that are already working. Effective communication of public health information, for instance, is central to controlling the spread of COVID-19. By listening to communities, we can better understand what communication methods work for them and can do a better job getting those messages across in a way that resonates with diverse communities. And to face the looming economic crisis that COVID-19 is precipitating, we will need to engage in real dialogue with people about their priorities and the way they want to see society rebuilt….(More)”.

Deliberative Mini-Publics as a Response to Populist Democratic Backsliding

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Chapter by Oran Doyle and Rachael Walsh: “Populisms come in different forms, but all involve a political rhetoric that invokes the will of a unitary people to combat perceived constraints, whether economic, legal, or technocratic. In this chapter, our focus is democratic backsliding aided by populist rhetoric. Some have suggested deliberative democracy as a means to combat this form of populism. Deliberative democracy encourages and facilitates both consultation and contestation, emphasizing plurality of voices, the legitimacy of disagreement, and the imperative of reasoned persuasion. Its participatory and inclusive character has the potential to undermine the credibility of populists’ claims to speak for a unitary people. Ireland has been widely referenced in constitutionalism’s deliberative turn, given its recent integration of deliberative mini-publics into the constitutional amendment process.

Reviewing the Irish experience, we suggest that deliberative mini-publics are unlikely to reverse democratic backsliding. Populist rhetoric is fueled by the very measures intended to combat democratic backsliding: enhanced constitutional constraints merely illustrate how the will of the people is being thwarted. The virtues of Ireland’s experiment in deliberative democracy — citizen participation, integration with representative democracy, deliberation, balanced information, expertise — have all been criticized in ways that are at least consistent with populist narratives. The failure of such narratives to take hold in Ireland, we suggest, may be due to a political system that is already resistant to populist rhetoric, as well as a tradition of participatory constitutionalism. The experiment with deliberative mini-publics may have strengthened Ireland’s constitutional culture by reinforcing anti-populist features. But it cannot be assumed that this experience would be replicated in larger countries polarized along political, ethnic, or religious lines….(More)”.

COVID-19 is creating a democratic deficit – here’s how to reduce it

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Matt Ryan: “As parliaments around the country move to scale down operations and defer sittings as part of containing COVID-19 people are beginning to ring the accountability alarm bells….

The good news is that we can learn from those parliaments and politicians around the world who have already been trialling new ways of working that go beyond traditional sittings. Leveraging simple and widely available technologies, they are involving more people with more diverse backgrounds in their processes with less reliance on those people being physically present.

Select Committees in the UK Parliament, for example, have used online “evidence checks” to scrutinise the basis for policy. These one-month exercises use targeted outreach and social media strategies to invite comments from knowledgeable stakeholders and members of the public about the rigour of evidence on which a government department’s policy is based. Evidence for departmental policy is summarised in a two-page document and comments publicly displayed in a web forum that resembles a readers’ comments section in an online news article.

In Taiwan, a participatory governance process pioneered by civic rights activists at the behest of a government minister combines large-scale online participation with smaller in-person gatherings to build a “rough consensus” on legislative proposals related to the digital economy before they are introduced. Known as vTaiwan, the process has led to 26 pieces of national legislation dealing with issues such as Uber, telemedicine and online alcohol sales, and has involved 200,000 people.

The government of Mexico City has raised the stakes even higher, involving more than 400,000 people in a process to draft a new constitution. It included a novel partnership between Change.org and the city mayor that enabled residents to create petition-backed proposals which, once they reached a certain threshold of support, bound the mayor to include them in the draft he submitted to a special constitutional assembly.

Processes like these can also offer relief for politicians and parliamentary officials managing the strain of examining an ever-increasing number of issues of greater complexity with limited personnel and budget. Evidence checks provide access to a wider pool of experts who can bolster existing research capacity. vTaiwan helps to find workable ways forward in industries being rapidly transformed by digital technologies. By “crowdsourcing” the city’s constitution, Mexico City’s mayor retained the trust of residents while undertaking reform at a grand scale….(More)”.

Why resilience to online disinformation varies between countries

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Edda Humprecht at the Democratic Audit: “The massive spread of online disinformation, understood as content intentionally produced to mislead others, has been widely discussed in the context of the UK Brexit referendum and the US general election in 2016. However, in many other countries online disinformation seems to be less prevalent. It seems certain countries are better equipped to face the problems of the digital era, demonstrating a resilience to manipulation attempts. In other words, citizens in these countries are better able to adapt to overcome challenges such as the massive spread of online disinformation and their exposure to it. So, do structural conditions render countries more or less resilient towards online disinformation?

As a first step to answering this question, in new research with Frank Esser and Peter Van Aelst, we identified the structural conditions that are theoretically linked to resilience to online disinformation, which relate to different political, media and economic environments. To test these expectations, we then identified quantifiable indicators for these theoretical conditions, which allowed us to measure their significance for 18 Western democracies. A cluster analysis then yielded three country groups: one group with high resilience to online disinformation (including the Northern European countries) and two country groups with low resilience (including Southern European countries and the US).

Conditions for resilience: political, media and economic environments

In polarised political environments, citizens are confronted with different deviating representations of reality and therefore it becomes increasingly difficult for them to distinguish between false and correct information. Thus, societal polarisation is likely to decrease resilience to online disinformation. Moreover, research has shown that both populism and partisan disinformation share a binary Manichaeanworldview, comprising anti-elitism, mistrust of expert knowledge and a belief in conspiracy theories. As a consequence of these combined influences, citizens can obtain inaccurate perceptions of reality. Thus, in environments with high levels of populist communication, online users are exposed to more disinformation.

Another condition that has been linked to resilience to online disinformation in previous research is trust in news media. Previous research has shown that in environments in which distrust in news media is higher, people are less likely to be exposed to a variety of sources of political information and to critically evaluate those. In this vein,the level of knowledge that people gain is likely to play an important role when confronted with online disinformation. Research has shown that in countries with wide-reaching public service media, citizens’ knowledge about public affairs is higher compared to countries with marginalised public service media. Therefore, it can be assumed that environments with weak public broadcasting services (PBS) are less resilient to online disinformation….

Looking at the economic environment, false social media content is often produced in pursuit of advertising revenue, as was the case with the Macedonian ‘fake news factories’ during the 2016 US presidential election. It is especially appealing for producers to publish this kind of content if the potential readership is large. Thus, large-size advertising markets with a high number of potential users are less resistant to disinformation than smaller-size markets….(More)”.

Disinformation is particularly prevalent on social media and in countries with very many social media users, it is easier for rumour-spreaders to build partisan follower networks. Moreover, it has been found that a media diet mainly consisting of news from social media limits political learning and leads to less knowledge of public affairs compared to other media source. From this, societies with a high rate of social media users are more vulnerable to online disinformation spreading rapidly than other societies…(More)”.

Using Technology to ‘Co-Create’ EU Policies

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Paper by Gianluca Sgueo: “What will European Union (EU) decision-making look like in the next decade and beyond? Is technological progress promoting more transparent, inclusive and participatory decision-making at EU level?

Technology has dramatically changed both the number and quality of connections between citizens and public administrations. With technological progress, citizens have gained improved access to public authorities through new digital communication channels. Innovative, tech-based, approaches to policy-making have become the subject of a growing debate between academics and politicians. Theoretical approaches such as ‘CrowdLaw’, ‘Policy-Making 3.0’, ‘liquid’, ‘do-it- yourself’ or ‘technical’ democracy and ‘democratic innovations’ share the positive outlook towards technology; and technology is seen as the medium through which policies can be ‘co-created’ by decision-makers and stakeholders. Co-creation is mutually beneficial. Decision-makers gain legitimacy by incorporating the skills, knowledge and expertise of citizens, who in turn have the opportunity to shape new policies according to their needs and expectations.

EU institutions are at the forefront of experimentation with technologically innovative approaches to make decision-making more transparent and accessible to stakeholders. Efforts in modernising EU participatory channels through technology have evolved over time: from redressing criticism on democratic deficits, through fostering digital interactions with stakeholders, up to current attempts at designing policy-making in a friendly and participative manner.

While technological innovation holds the promise of making EU policy-making even more participatory, it is not without challenges. To begin with, technology is resource consuming. There are legal challenges associated with both over- and under-regulation of the use of technology in policy-making. Furthermore, technological innovation raises ethical concerns. It may increase inequality, for instance, or infringe personal privacy… (More)“.

Why no one is reading your coronavirus emails

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Opinion by Todd Rogers: “…As a behavioral scientist, I study how people make decisions and process information, and I develop communications to change behavior for the better. And if there’s one lesson all the coronavirus email writers should take, it’s this: Messages should be as easy to understand as possible. This is difficult in normal times — and is no doubt much more so with facts on the ground changing as rapidly as they are….

As an illustration of how potent simplifying messaging can be, Carly Robinson at Harvard, Jessica Lasky-Fink of the University of California, Berkeley, Hedy Chang of Attendance Works and I conducted an experiment with a large school district, in which we rewrote a state-required notification about attendance.All schools in California are required to send a truancy notification to families after a student is late or absent three times. The state legislature offered recommended language for the notice that was written at a college-reading level and contained 342 words in seven-point font. We rewrote the letter at a 5th grade reading level, in 14-point font and with half as many words. We then randomly assigned 131,312 families to either receive the state-recommended language or a version of our simplified letter.The best version of our simplified letters was an estimated 40% more effective at reducing absences during the subsequent 30 days than the state-recommended language. Writing with an understanding of how humans work turns out to be more effective than writing with the sole goal of complying with the delivery of mandatory written information.So, what can be done to make coronavirus messages, so critical to the functioning of our country right now, easier to understand — and more likely to be read?

  • Write in the most accessible way possible. Use the Flesch-Kincaid readability test (built into Microsoft Word and Google Docs) to test the reading-level complexity of your writing.
  • Use as few words as possible. Shorter messages are more likely to be read (see the long email in your inbox from three months ago that you still have not read).
  • Write in a larger font. This makes long messages look ridiculous and makes it easier to read for recipients with eyesight issues. It also reduces the chance of the accidental — but way too common — occurrence of emails appearing in inboxes with absurdly small font.
  • Eliminate gratuitous borders and images. These can often distract from the message you are trying to send.
  • Use a clear structure. People skim, so help them. As opposed to a multi-paragraph email written in normal prose, consider categorizing information under headings like, “What we want you to know” (or just “KNOW”) and “what we would like you to do” (or, concisely, “DO”). Consider putting content within each category in bullet points….(More)”

Partisan responses to democracy promotion – Estimating the causal effect of a civic information portal

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Paper by Peter John and Fredrik M. Sjoberg: “Citizens respond to information about democracy according to whether they are electoral winners or losers. This difference occurs both at the national and constituency level. Democratic interventions that seek to promote accountability and transparency might therefore impact citizens differentially depending on the political party that people support. In a placebo-controlled experimental design, carried out in Kenya, we find that democracy promotion boosts the external efficacy and political participation of ruling party partisans, but leaves those from the opposition unaffected. These responses—based on national incumbency—are further conditioned by the partisanship of the MP of the constituency where the voter resides. These findings throw new light on the impact of civic interventions, such as Get Out the Vote (GOTV) and civic education, common in Africa as well as elsewhere, as we show their benefits accrue to the electoral winners rather than to the losers…(More)”.

Civic Engagement Frameworks and Strategic Leadership Practices for Organization Development

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Book by Susheel Chhabra: “In recent years, the engagement of stakeholders has become imperative for the overall success of an organization. As the global business landscape continues to evolve, promoting modern leadership techniques and engagement with the community have become two key tactics for organizations to remain competitive in the current market. Understanding and implementing these methodologies is pivotal for professionals and researchers around the globe.

Civic Engagement Frameworks and Strategic Leadership Practices for Organization Development is a critical reference source that provides vital research on the implementation of strategic leadership techniques for promoting civic engagement and sustaining organizational success. While highlighting topics such as social media strategies, analytical tools, and ethical interventions, this book is ideally designed for managers, executives, politicians, researchers, business specialists, government professionals, consultants, academicians, and students seeking current research on the use of civic engagement and strategic leadership initiatives for the overall development of organizations….(More)”.

France asks its citizens how to meet its climate-change targets

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

The Economist on “An experiment in consultative democracy”: “A nurse, a roofer, an electrician, a former fireman, a lycée pupil, a photographer, a teacher, a marketing manager, an entrepreneur and a civil servant. Sitting on red velvet benches in a domed art-deco amphitheatre in Paris, they and 140 colleagues are part of an unusual democratic experiment in a famously centralised country. Their mission: to draw up measures to reduce French greenhouse-gas emissions by at least 40% by 2030, in line with an eu target that is otherwise in danger of being missed (and which the European Commission now wants to tighten). Six months ago, none of them had met. Now, they have just one month left to show that they can reinvent the French democratic process—and help save the planet. “It’s our moment,” Sylvain, one of the delegates, tells his colleagues from the podium. “We have the chance to propose something historic.”

On March 6th the “citizens’ climate convention” was due to begin its penultimate three-day sitting, the sixth since it began work last October. The convention is made up of a representative sample of the French population, selected by randomly generated telephone numbers. President Emmanuel Macron devised it in an attempt to calm the country after the gilets jaunes (yellow jackets) crisis of 2018. In response to the demand for less top-down decision-making, he first launched what he grandly called a “great national debate”, which took place a year ago. He also pledged the creation of a citizens’ assembly. It is designed to focus on precisely the conundrum that provoked the original protests against a rise in the carbon tax on motor fuel: how to make green policy palatable, efficient and fair.Already signed up?…(More)”.

Reimagining Democracy: Lessons in Deliberative Democracy from the Irish Front Line

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Open Access Book: “The Lawrence and Lynne Brown Democracy Medal, presented by the McCourtney Institute for Democracy at Penn State, recognizes outstanding individuals, groups, and organizations that produce innovations to further democracy in the United States or around the world.

2019 Brown Democracy Medal winners David M. Farrell and Jane Suiter are co-leads on the Irish Citizens’ Assembly Project, which has transformed Irish politics over the past decade. The project started in 2011 and led to a series of significant policy decisions, including successful referenda on abortion and marriage equality….(More)”.