We often hear councillors and staff saying they don’t need to involve the community in deliberation as it is the role of councillors, or any elected official, to deliberate on an issue and make decisions.
With the new Victorian Local Government Act requiring deliberative practices for the development of the Community Vision, Council Plan, the Financial Plan and the Asset Plan, it is important to think about the role of the community in decision making alongside councillors.
It is important to note that deliberative engagement does not supersede or dismiss the role of councillors in making decisions. They are elected to do this and it is hoped that they as a group of councillors deliberate well together when making decisions.
Deliberation involving community members should not be seen as a threat but instead as a valuable resource providing increased evidence for councillors in in making hard decisions.
There are five main ways that deliberation can help decision makers and add value, rather than take away their decision-making powers:
1) Supported Decisions
Deliberation allows councillors to hear from and know what their residents really think. Councils and councillors often only hear from the articulate, the passionate and the disaffected. These voices are important, but they do not represent the full range of views in any municipality.
The random, stratified recruitment approach used in a deliberative process - to match the demographics of the municipality - ensures councils are hearing from a cross-section of their community. These are people they are unlikely to have ever heard from before; people who are more likely to be representative of the breadth of perspectives.
As a result, councillors can be more confident that their decisions will reflect community sentiment, and be more widely supported - even if some individuals or interest groups don’t get the outcome they prefer.
2) ‘Unsticking’ a difficult issue
There are some issues on which councils never make a decision, because they will come under fire from vested interests no matter what decision they make. Examples might relate to regulations about dogs on beaches, closure of swimming pools or libraries, removing car spaces in shopping strips and on and on. Councils put some big issues on hold for decades (and maybe forever) because it’s a ‘no-win’ situation or because interest groups block progress and hamper resolution.
A deliberative process can ’unstick’ the decision making process by gaining the advice of well informed representative people - those who have no vested interest in the outcome - while also involving committed and activated people in a more productive role.
Deliberation brings in diverse people from all walks of life. These people become well-informed and consider all sides of an issue before determining a way forward. Our Canberra Brickworks case study is a demonstration of this.
3) building trust
As with all engagement approaches, token efforts, processes without influence, or outputs that are not accepted or implemented, result in a decline in trust. If undertaken genuinely, and if deliberative principles are followed, deliberation can lead to an increase in trust between an organisation and its community.
Truly deliberative approaches have integrity and are highly transparent. They engender trust in outcomes, because your community can see the decision was influenced by ‘people like me’.
4) Election mandates are not for everything
When officials are elected by the people they do gain some imprimatur to follow-through on promises and commitments made during their campaign. But these commitments are not on or for every issue.
Assuming that an election win mandates officials to make decisions on all matters for the next 4 years - without additional informed input from those affected by the decision - is short-sighted and can lead to problems down the track. It is clear in our western society today that elected officials need further evidence to support or decline ideas for the future.
5) better results
The diversity of experience of many Councillors may not fully reflect the many different experiences of those in the community. By tapping into a bigger group, you can expand the understanding on the issue and build a better set of solutions to tricky problems.
MosaicLab is providing training on deliberation and facilitation over the next three months. Click here for more information.
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