| Michael Gurstein on Thu, 27 May 1999 10:19:49 +0200 (CEST) |
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| <nettime> From a "A Cathedral" of Public Policy to a Public Policy "Bazaar" |
(This is a draft of a paper that I'm developing that might be of interest in this context. Contents, criticisms, "hacking" is welcomed. Distribution (with attribution) is encouraged.) I'm struck by the convergence that I see in meetings/conferences and on-line discussions around the issue of the linkage between a concerned and informed public and those with the responsibility for the formulation and execution of public policies. What seems to be emerging is a major discontinuity between the expectations and experiences of an Internet "bazaar" i.e. an "open (information) source" enabled "concerned public", and the representatives of the public sector who are attempting to proceed within a more traditional "Cathedral" approach to policy formulation, consultation, and implementation. This discontinuity takes the form on the one hand of: Public consultation processes which consist of the public being invited to send comments on pre-circulated documents to a public Internet forum with no indication of how (or even) whether the comments will be read/responded to /used/integrated and so on. The development by the range of Government Departments of elaborate and sophisticated Internet delivered web-sites with little or no interactive component and no indications of how the degree of interactivity which is allowed will be assimilated or used. The development of elaborate internal (within government) policy Intranets, with formal mechanisms for scanning and assimilating public comment and the broad range of Internet enabled communication but with no interactive linkages (or participation) into any of the forums or on-line policy discussions from which they are drawing sustenance. E-mail addresses included in Government sponsored websites which are either completely unresponsive or which have only a form letter response often by means of a "bot". Publicly supported networks of researchers in a variety of areas of public policy interest as for example "Innovation Systems" and "Regional Development", all evidently developed and funded with a concern by policy makers to have access to the best research and thinking on these issue areas but with no formal linkage or responsibility concerning public policy discussion or evaluation in these sectoral areas and little or no public contribution to the discussion. Policy processes as for example, those concerning areas such as "Smart Communities", "The Canada Health Infoway", and "The Knowledge Based Economy" which are almost completely non-transparent to the broader concerned public and which operate by means of closed groups of "experts" consulting at the discretion of the policy apparatus and with little accountability or even non-formal communication with the broader concerned communities of interest. On the other hand: The development of on-line public forums including web-boards, e-lists, and chat facilities discussing the broad range of public policy issues The participation by many with a very broad range of expert and experience based knowledge and understanding of areas of policy concern, in many cases with considerable expenditures of time and effort in researching and formulating positions and comments often of very high quality. A deepening frustration at the lack of participation, consultation and real engagement on the part of those concerned with public policy either as politicians or as public servants in this dialogue. The development by researchers of publicly funded research networks in areas of considerable public interest concern but with no formal linkages into policy making processes. Where in the current practise of democratic governance is there the degree of: transparency flexibility interactivity immediacy collegiality multi-nodality and network interoperability which leading organizations are increasingly developing with their leading client/supplier/stakeholder groups? While these may be developing in certain parts of government internal communication and in its interactions with certain private sector "stakeholders", little if any of this is emerging as part of government's relationship with it's ultimate "stakeholder", the democratic citizenry. What is of particular interest in the above is how little assimilation there appears to have been into the policy process in Canada of the opportunities for broader interaction and consultation with the interested Canadian public which the Internet interactivity has made possible. Nor has there been any significant attempt to broaden the base of the interested Canadian public in these processes again by means of the new technology. While the policy process takes advantage of the technology to support it's internal operations and development, there appears to have been little effort to utilize the technology to support an extension of the process to include broader involvement and participation by concerned citizens. The process thus functions more as a "Cathedral" with centralized development, hierarchical management and clear boundaries than it does as a bazaar/network with open boundaries, multiple independent contributors, and distributed development and management. I think that it is inevitable that these artificial and scarcity (of the means of communication) derived barriers between the governors and the governed (the Cathedral based clergy and the laity) will break down and very likely sooner rather than later. The modern world and the broad environmental context for policy making is too complex to be "managed" by those responsible without having access to the most encompassing range of expertise and experience available to it.. The alternative, which is the reliance on hired expertise through consultants and researchers and paid informants (lobbyists) is too restrictive and assumes as all Cathedral dwellers must, that within the Cathedral resides the full sum of useful knowledge. Additionally, the breakdown of trust and mutual commitment which is resulting from this discontinuity between the governors and the governed is eroding the commitment to and the efficacy of public institutions in all jurisdictions. Moreover, as we all know, Cathedrals in these days are empty of parishioners as the monopoly on knowledge and truth has so evidently broken down and truth (and credibility) is more likely to be found in the anarchy of the bazaar than in the sanctity of the altar. The "Open Source" paradigm may prove to be a useful one for policy making in a democratic society and certainly more useful than the "command/hierarchical" (Cathedral) model which is it's alternative. An "Open Source" policy model would be one where the "kernel" or core question was publicly distributed and made available for multiple contributions toward a solution. The objective of the policy process would be first to articulate and then to manage an on-going consensus around the "kernel" of shared common values out of which a policy response would be derived. As with the "Open Source" paradigm the policy output would be subject to rapid prototyping and debugging as solutions to the policy issue around the value "kernel" were proposed, commented upon and revised/elaborated in public forums including not only public participants but also those with broader program and implementation responsibility. The accountability for the policy outcomes would still rest with those responsible but the broader public would share responsibility since they had had the opportunity for free participation and consultation within a context of legitimate and legitimized open discussion. The key to the effectiveness and legitimacy (in the public's mind) of the process would be the interactivity and porousity of the linkages between the formal process and the public process to the extent that the boundaries between the two became at least for a time indistinct. Accountability within the policy process thus would no longer be purely internal and bureaucratic but also external and public. The role of the political process is to be the guardian and the affirmer/reaffirmer of the kernel/values and where necessary, the creation of alternative kernels around competing values with these being networks in waitingsubject to the outcomes of future elections for their shift from the role of demonstrations to the position of program implementers. As the use of Internet resources for informal discourse on public policy is becoming increasingly sophisticated those so empowered also are becoming impatient at their inability to engage with the formal policy process. The formal policy process meanwhile is being forced to establish ever more rigid and irrational barriers to a broader public engagement as it's information permeability increases with Internet enabled communication and with government's unwillingness to move beyond it's role as sponsor/patron/consumer of advice but not contributor/co-investigator. The problem may be in fact, generational rather than structural. Public servants engage in public discussion of policy even in speculative mode at their peril. Politicians and particularly Cabinet Members are very jealous of their prerogatives in this area and most were formed and have lived their political lives in the hot house atmosphere of Parliament, safely insulated from the babble of the Internet bazaar. One need only reflect that most of the current crop of politicians in Canada were elected some three years ago in 1996 at the very beginning of the web's dramatic rise to significance and most entered full-time politics at least some seven years ago which would place their detachment from the ebbs and flows of daily family and community life in the early 1990's with senior politicians/Cabinet members being of an even earlier generation. Recognizing that computer generations last some 18 months at most, this would put most of their direct experience up to 5 generations out of date! No wonder that the form of the discussion and not infrequently the content emanating from official political Ottawa seems so remarkably "pre-modern". The creativity and even inevitability of the Internet-enabled policy bazaar presents both risks and opportunities. Risks to effective management and democratic accountability, and opportunities for a new form and quality of citizenship reflecting a real and effective engagement in the substance of governance and not simply with its form. To realize the opportunities and to minimize the risks there is a need to develop new and Internet savvy methods for public management and democratic governance. This task is a formidable but a necessary one and should be engaged in sooner rather than later as the current discontinuities are eroding the credibility of governments world-wide and increasingly government's capacity to undertake its assigned responsibilities in the most effective and efficient means currently available. Mike Gurstein Michael Gurstein, Ph.D. ECBC/NSERC/SSHRC Associate Chair Management of Technological Change Director: Centre for Community and Enterprise Networking (C\CEN) University College of Cape Breton, POBox 5300, Sydney, NS, CANADA B1P 6L2 Tel. 902-563-1369 (o) 902-562-1055 (h) 902-562-0119 (fax) [email protected] http://ccen.uccb.ns.ca ICQ: 7388855 Notes: This paper is based on a re-reading and re-application of the seminal paper by Eric Raymond http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/writings/cathedral-bazaar/cathedral-bazaar.html). and an attempt (sometimes fruitful but always dangerous) to transpose a model developed in one sphere to a radically different domain. For additional readings on the "open source" model http://www.oss.net/ http://www.fsf.org/ http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/ http://www.opensource.org/ http://www.opensource.org/halloween3.html http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/halloween.html http://gwyn.tux.org/ http://www.ispo.cec.be/eif/dns/Welcome.html http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/writings/cathedral-bazaar/cathedral-bazaar.html http://www.opencode.org/h20/ http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/writings/homesteading/ http://www.monde-diplomatique.fr/en/1998/01/12freesoft.html http://www.socio.demon.co.uk/magazine/5/5barbrook.html http://ma.hrc.wmin.ac.uk/ma.theory.4.2.db http://www.w3.org/People/Berners-Lee/1996/ppf.html http://www.w3.org/1998/02/Potential.html http://www.firstmonday.dk/issues/issue3_3/ghosh/index.html http://www.salonmagazine.com/21st/feature/1998/04/cov_14feature.html http://www.netaction.org/articles/freesoft.html --- # distributed via nettime-l : no commercial use without permission # <nettime> is a closed moderated mailinglist for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [email protected] and "info nettime-l" in the msg body # URL: http://www.desk.nl/~nettime/ contact: [email protected]