Dear Kerry, good idea, but I doubt, that Gabrielas software or a similar format can deal with more than 50 participants and/or 20 passions/themes. What do you think Gabriela?
Greetings from Maputo/Mosambik, where I have actually an assignment in the context of the Public Sector Reform, unfortunately they are still far from accepting OST, which I do meanwhile quite a lot in participatory District Development Bernd (hopefully back again after a long time of "no time" or only lurking rapidly ;-) ----- [email protected], on 12.12.2003 at 21:10:34 (GMT/UT + 02:00) Bernd Weber, Organization Development and Change Management Consultancy "DEVELOP YOUR CAPACITIES - MATERIALIZE YOUR VISION" ---- MOZAMBIQUE fone: (+258-3) 31 11 91, cellfone:(+258)-82-38 00 77 AUSTRIA fone: (+43 1) 596 86 57, cellfone: +43 (0)664 7667872 ---- On Fri, 12 Dec 2003 16:55:27 +0000, kerry napuk wrote: Harrison Thanks for raising the possibility of open space in politics. As the process is one of the closest things we will ever see to participatory democracy, it should have a natural application to politics. However, there are a few big barriers to such an application - politicians and politics. Politicos love to play power games and are driven by monster egos, not exactly prerequisites for sharing. Moreover, politics have become media perception (and huge spend) exercises that negate personal involvement and rely on manipulation, often promoting fear. We were approached by a minority party in Scotland to do an open space on issues in constituencies around the country. It occurred to me that it would be more productive to have a national event, rather than a series of smaller ones where convergence of priorities might be awkward and time consuming and mitigate against a critical mass talking in real time. So, I suggested why not let ALL the party members come together in open space and create the party's Manifesto (what you call the Platform in America)? If members created the party's position on key issues, what it really stood for, participants would have commitment and ownership at point of participation and would go out and work to get their people elected. So, why not propose a virtual open space national event to create Dean's platform? I believe Gabrielle Ender has the software to do the exercise. Another variation might be to have individual Meet-up Groups propose their issues, actions and priorities and report into the virtual event, allowing convergence around majority positions. Letting voters decide for once what their party and candidate really stand for sounds pretty novel to me. Hey, this could be exciting and fun! Cheers Kerry Open Futures Edinburgh -- * * ========================================================== [email protected] ------------------------------ To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of [email protected], Visit: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html
