Detoxing democracy 3: bringing citizen deliberation into government administration

This farce represents a kind of reductio ad absurdum of bureaucracy with over 70 pages of NHMRC guidelines sitting at the apex of the pyramid with bureaucrats very often applying them in ways that privilege risk avoidance for their organisations (generally seen through the prism of media management) over and above other interests, most particularly the discovery of new and important knowledge. A much more human and commonsensical approach would be to convene a citizen’s jury or similar body from among those whose interests ethics guidelines purport to represent. I expect that, had we been able to do so with the evaluation of Family by Family, the group of families in the program would have been amazed that anyone thought there was any potential issue with the people who had shown such care for the families taking children through a questionnaire to help us further optimise a fantastically effective program. Consistent with the whole philosophy of the program, I’m sure we would have appreciated their input on what we were trying to achieve and had their own insights to offer us. And if they had concerns about the ethics of what we were doing I’m sure we’d be able to take that on board and find ways through to their satisfaction.

Similar areas worthy of consideration where citizens jury approaches might help rescue us from bureaucracy and excessive legalism include some adjudications in some areas of privacy and unfair dismissal and perhaps other areas in the administration of awards.

Institutionalising deliberative democracy within government

It’s possible to envisage a situation in which the kinds of mechanisms I’ve outlined here became institutionalised. Just as Yarra Valley Water consulted its community in a way that encouraged their close deliberation on the issues, it is possible to envisage agencies cultivating councils of people reflective of community makeup that might offer some ongoing capacity to reflect community deliberation.

And despite all its promise, the burgeoning of experiments in deliberative democracy has yet to really break into the political and bureaucratic mainstream by crossing the divide between powers to advise and powers to influence policy more directly. As Street et al comment with regard to deliberative democracy in health policy ‘few juries’ rulings were considered by decision-making bodies thereby limiting transfer into policy and practice.’ An overarching citizen’s chamber with no direct constitutional power on its own might nevertheless report regularly to parliament on progress in implementing proposals that enjoy significant super-majorities in citizens’ juries and chambers.

Here it’s worth reminding ourselves of one of the themes of my first article, namely that electoral democracy is naturally divisive in its focus on competition for the consent of the governed with all the polarisation, and disregard for sober and truthful communication that that implies. Deliberative democracy mechanisms, by their nature push the discussion in the opposite direction, towards agreement and collective problem solving if necessary through negotiation. As I’ve argued, at its best the Accord of the 1980s — which formally included the unions and the government, but informally included other social partners such as the business community and the Commonwealth bureaucracy and at a greater distance the welfare and environment lobbies — provided some of this capacity for forward looking collective visioning and negotiation between different parts of our society. Once we cross that threshold it seems to me we will have really brought government closer to the people. Further we will be on our way to ‘naturalising’ deliberation by citizens as a critical part of the repertoire of a sophisticated democracy.