Before we can enact the Citizens Amendment, we must first test the Wisdom Council in various settings. As described in Chapter 6 — The Wisdom Council and Whole-system Resonance, it has twelve essential ingredients.
1. The Wisdom Council is chartered by the people.
2. It is a microcosm of randomly selected people.
3. It is empowered to select and frame the issues it addresses.
4. The members are chosen in a ceremony: a lottery.
5. It is non-coercive.
6. It operates in a fishbowl.
7. It is dynamically facilitated.
8. It generates unanimous statements.
9. The results are presented in a ceremony.
10. Small group dialogues are convened.
11. The process is ongoing.
12. The process operates in parallel with normal governance structures.
As of this writing, there has been only one Wisdom Council that employed all twelve ingredients. It was established by the employees of AgAmerica/Western Farm Credit Banks and was described in Chapter 13 — Choosing to BE. Although wildly successful, it ended prematurely through a merger. There have also been a number of other Wisdom Council experiments using most, but not all of the twelve ingredients. In all cases, the process worked more effectively than imagined.
Some of the experiments are described below, along with lessons they teach and questions they raise. From reading about them, you will gain more understanding of the Wisdom Council, especially how it might work for you. I hope you will feel motivated to pursue implementing one in your organization or locality. Doing so would not only be serving that group, but would also spread awareness of these concepts and help transform society.
Background
When I first started proposing the Citizens Amendment to people, I was fairly certain that something like it must have been tried before. I found two examples that deserve attention.
Citizens Juries were mentioned earlier. Here, an organization like the League of Women Voters, defines an issue, such as evaluating available healthcare proposals and choosing the best one. Then, a stratified random sample from the larger population is conducted to assemble a group of twenty-four to reflect certain aspects of the community from which they are drawn, e.g. same age, gender, education, etc. Then this group visits with experts on all sides of the issue, discusses the options, and eventually votes.
One of the exciting lessons to be learned from this work is how responsible these groups of randomly selected people are and how readily transformational dialogue arises in these settings. That is, in tobe-like settings, ordinary Americans do rise to the occasion. They do care. They are good-hearted, and competent, and work toward what is best for all.
William Raspberry (The Washington Post, January 23, 1993) reports about one: "These men and women were a microcosm of America, representing the whole range of class, age and regional imperatives that make fair budgeting so difficult. But when they undertook a responsibility that went beyond their individual group interests—when they informed themselves and tried to deal rationally with the national interest—they managed a surprising degree of consensus. There are lessons in that—including the obvious one that this Citizen Jury has done what the Founding Fathers intended Congress to do."
Another approximation of the Wisdom Council was conducted in July 1991 by the editors of the Canadian magazine, Macleans. They hired a polling firm to interview and carefully select twelve citizens, one from each of twelve carefully identified patterns of thought. These people were gathered at a resort for three days to create a vision of "The Future of Canada." Roger Fisher, co-author of the popular book Getting to Yes was brought in to facilitate, along with other members of the Harvard Negotiation Project.
Over a long weekend, this panel negotiated with one another to reach agreement on a set of conclusions. The story of that weekend and its results were then presented in a television show and written up in a 39-page section of the magazine. The experiment demonstrated, once again, that diverse people can come together and generate unanimity in a remarkably short time.
In this case, those selected were chosen because they represented particular viewpoints, so the eventual results had the flavor of a negotiated contract. Nevertheless, they reached unanimity on specific points aimed at individual Canadians, schoolteachers, non-governmental agencies, provincial governments, the federal government, and the media. The group made recommendations on the economy and suggested changes to the Canadian Constitution. In general, they sought better representation, fairer administration of social programs, and an overall reassessment of how decisions should get made.
In the end, each participant was deeply moved by the experience, and the process generated interest from other Canadians. Hopefully, some national magazine, television network, or philanthropic foundation in the United States will similarly sponsor a national experiment with the Wisdom Council that is ongoing.
Early Experiments
The first experiments with the Wisdom Council happened with employee teams in the sawmill of Simpson Timber Company (Korbel, CA). These meetings, described earlier in Chapter 12 — "Turning On" Our System, were instrumental in transforming the management style of the mill over a three year period.
The next experiments with the Wisdom Council were within the Dynamic Facilitation Skills seminars. Rather than just organizing participants into small groups to identify issues and practice Dynamic Facilitation, I asked them to pretend they were randomly selected groups charged with creating unanimous statements for the people of the United States.
These simulations uncovered a crucial learning—that Wisdom Councils should focus on solving problems rather than creating statements. Choice-creating is key. If groups focus on rearranging the words of sentences, their creativity is muted and they get into decision-making rather than Choice-creating. But if they devote their energy to tackling real issues and seeking breakthroughs, they are more likely to generate rapid consensus, to build empowerment, and to gain whole-system resonance.
A High School Experiment
One experiment was organized by my son, Dan, as a senior project in his high school. Attendance cards for all students were mixed into one pile and sixteen names were drawn. The sixteen were then invited to participate in three two-hour meetings during one week at an off-campus location. At the end of the third meeting, the mayor, the principal, and the superintendent came for a presentation. The event was covered by the local newspaper.
The sessions began with the facilitator asking, "What are some of the issues we might address?" The students selected their most important one: "School is boring."
Once they started talking and each person had provided his or her purge solution, a breakthrough in awareness occurred. They discovered that there are two kinds of boring: 1) because things go too slowly, and 2) because things go too fast. After this realization, the tone of the conversation changed dramatically. The students started asking questions, learning more about the problem from one another, and seeking answers that would help.
At the end of the three sessions, they reached consensus that class sizes should be smaller; that there needed to be more emphasis on creative learning; that there needed to be a more respectful school environment for both teachers and students; and, that students should take on more responsibility and have more choice in what they learn, and particularly in deciding their own schedules.
All along, the students knew that, immediately following their last meeting, they would make a presentation. Of course, they should’ve been presenting their results to the whole student body, but that wasn’t possible to arrange in this situation. Nevertheless, the scheduled presentation was a powerful motivator to the group.
They organized themselves, with each student presenting one portion of the results. Their recommendations were unanimous, so as each student spoke, he or she felt supported by the whole group and spoke with confidence. They told the story of where they started, how their thinking changed, and where they finally ended up. When they finished, the principal and superintendent enthusiastically exclaimed, "This is great! We’ve got to keep these kids together!" Their response was gratifying to hear, but it missed the point. It’s not that this particular group was so special, but that, with a Wisdom Council process in place, all kids could similarly demonstrate their specialness.
This experiment was missing important elements. There was little official involvement by the rest of the school in deciding to try the process, in selecting Wisdom Council members, or in hearing the results, and there was no official opportunity for whole-system dialogue. But even without these, the process generated interest from all sectors of the student body. Even the cynical kids who gather off campus to smoke and make fun of those who participate in student council and other programs were interested. One of them had been selected for the Wisdom Council, so this group was drawn into talking about the same topics as the rest of the campus.
The big learning was to glimpse the immense potential of the Wisdom Council process within high schools. It offers a new way to involve the whole student body, faculty, and community in the education process. It offers a new way to overcome cliques and the threat of school violence. It offers the potential for transforming the education process from a bureaucratic exercise, driven by rigid curricula and standardized testing, to being driven by the students’ natural curiosity and passion for learning.
Strategic Leadership Forum Roundtable
In May 1999, another Wisdom Council experiment was arranged within a professional organization, the Strategic Leadership Forum. The organizer of the event was Marilyn Norris, editor of the journal Strategy and Leadership.
The plan was to invite a random group of association members to meet just prior to the annual conference and report their findings to the conference. However, the finances of the association were perilous, so the scope of the project was scaled back at the last minute.
In the end, a select group of members was assembled from a cross-section of industries. They met the day before the conference to discuss the role of business in the twenty-first century. They reached consensus statements and their results were published in the magazine.
Consensus was reached on many issues including, the increasing pace of change and a concern about lack of jobs in the future; the globalization of business and the need to account for an expanding set of stakeholders; a conflict between Industrial Age values and the new Knowledge Age values, which is affecting how decisions get made and how people are managed. They determined that business must adopt a new role, one where global, social, and environmental issues are just as important as profits. (See Strategy and Leadership, Volume 27, July/Aug/September 1999.)
The experiment showed that the Wisdom Council process can work within associations and membership organizations. The group reached thoughtful consensus in the available time, but key factors were missing that limited whole-system involvement—especially the formal presentation and follow-up dialogue opportunities. Unfortunately, before the magazine story had time to have its impact, the association folded for lack of funds.
Televised Experiment in a City
During this period, I was trying to interest my town’s City Council to endorse a two-year trial of the Wisdom Council. I arranged a demonstration event where eight citizens were randomly selected for a two-hour meeting on local access television. The City Council proposed the hottest local issue to this group: Whether or not chain stores should be allowed to locate in town.
The point of the demonstration was to show: 1) that randomly selected people would choose to participate; 2) that they are generally knowledgeable; 3) that a high quality of conversation (Choice-creating) can be assured; 4) that some form of consensus can be reached in a short time; and 5) that the final consensus will be "wise."
The experiment worked. Those selected did choose to come, they did choose the hot topic which the city council proposed, and the group did reach wise consensus rapidly. They said:
1) That the town should preserve its desirable, special qualities and articulate a vision of that specialness.
2) From this vision, clear standards should be set for businesses to ensure the realization of the vision, and to grow it forward. In particular, the historic district of the town should be carefully protected.
3) We should emphasize to townspeople that, just by how they spend money, they vote on which businesses they want to keep in town. But, at the same time, the Wisdom Council pointed out, that those with low or fixed income may not feel so free to exercise this choice.
4) Finally, the Wisdom Council acknowledged that these three steps may not be enough to preserve the unique qualities of the town. They also tossed out other ideas but did not have time to consider them adequately, such as separately chartering businesses, holding polls to clarify citizen perspectives, enacting special tariffs, or spending tax dollars to support desired businesses.
The event taught some important lessons. Although participants and many in the television audience were excited and enthused about the demonstration, there were others in the audience who found the show difficult to watch. They were not used to Choice-creating. Having the facilitator follow and encourage the energy and passion of the participants made it seem "out of control" to them, especially when people with "wrong" views got to express them and be heard.
After it worked so well, I was expecting the City Council to be pleased, but found to my surprise that they felt threatened. One of its members stated strongly, "We are the Wisdom Council!" The lesson for me was an old one: this is a Breakthrough. It takes some time for people to get comfortable with the idea.
Low Income People’s Wisdom Council
One concern that many people raise about a Wisdom Council of randomly selected people is, what happens when you get someone who is ignorant, someone on drugs, an alcoholic, or someone mentally unstable? This point is well taken because much of the testing of Choice-creating and Dynamic Facilitation has been in companies or organizations with people who have jobs. How well would it work with those who have difficulty holding jobs, for instance?
One experiment with the Wisdom Council was set up by Adin Rogovin in Eugene, Oregon. The concept was to randomly select people from a pool of welfare recipients in Lane County (Oregon) and gather them for a weekend meeting. They would be dynamically facilitated to create unanimous statements that would be presented to mainstream taxpayers.
The seventeen people who were selected were diverse and mostly didn’t know each other, but they were not from the mainstream of society. One participant was a man living in his car. Another was living in a shack that was painted with the words "God Saves" all over the front. There was a woman who had been the successful founder of a non-profit agency, until an earlier abuse began to show up in her dreams and unravel her life. Another woman had been beaten as a child, by her father, using a Bible; she felt physical revulsion when anyone promoted the Christian faith to her.
For their participation, each of these people were provided only with bus tokens for travel, and lunch on both days. Some of the people didn’t stay for the whole meeting. Some were incapable of sitting and focusing for any length of time. Others balked at expressing themselves. Three left but returned later to watch from the back of the room.
The group wasn’t an easy one to facilitate. Each had a story to tell and needed to be heard. But in the final analysis, they responded like anyone else. They looked at the issue sincerely and reached a clear and powerful consensus. They all agreed that they wanted to be self-sufficient. But they also said to mainstream America, "We are different from you. We are damaged in some way that you find hard to understand and accept. The welfare system you’ve designed is well suited to helping mainstream people get back on their feet, but it does not serve us. In fact, it does the opposite—it holds us down. We need a different kind of help, provided by people who understand this." Once determining this, they spontaneously started planning other meetings to arrange better help for others like themselves.
The most important lesson from this weekend was that, even in a case where most all the people were suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, chemical abuse, or immense stress in their lives, the group could achieve Choice-creating dialogue and reach wise consensus. The difficult facilitation challenge in this situation was to recognize that people were being hurt by statements that didn’t seem hurtful. The woman who had been beaten with the Bible, for instance, couldn’t be fully protected from the pain she suffered each time someone promoted his or her religious conviction to the group. But the overall result was that, even in this difficult setting, the process worked.
It’s Your Turn
Obviously, experiments with Wisdom Councils are just now getting underway. If you "get" the potential of this approach, and particularly if you see how important the Citizens Amendment is, I suggest you help awaken other people to it by talking to them, and by proposing a Wisdom Council in your city, company, professional society, union, church, etc. With the help of author and consultant, Nancy Rosanoff, the town council of Pleasantville, N.Y. began one in the fall of 2001; the Department of Agriculture in Washington State is beginning one in 2002; and Wisdom Council committees are forming in a few large cities. (For more current information see The Center for Wise Democracy at www.wisedemocracy.org.)
Each time a Wisdom Council is adopted, everyone in the organization will grow in understanding about Choice-creating, the competence of ordinary people, knowledge about Wisdom Councils, and the potential benefits of the Citizens Amendment. They also grow in their understanding of particular issues, about personal empowerment, and in their capacity for change.
The suggested strategy is:
1) Talk with friends and neighbors about the concepts in this book. You might gather people for a series of meetings where each chapter of the book is a separate topic.
2) Contact your national and state representatives about the value of the Wisdom Council and the Citizens Amendment. Make sure they know about it, and that you support it.
3) Propose a Wisdom Council in the organizations and systems of which you are a part. For help, contact the Center for Wise Democratic Processes at their web site: www.wisedemocracy.org.
When you talk about this idea with others, you may encounter emotional resistance. That’s understandable. The idea is quite safe, but it challenges some closely held assumptions about life that many of us hold dear—like the need to have someone or something be in charge, the supremacy of the rule of law, the idea that life is a competition, the elitist dogma that only special people are capable of leading, the reassuring idea that the Founders were better than we are, and the notion that change must be controlled.
The psychological discomfort of challenging these ideas is nothing in comparison to the risk we face by not going ahead with the Citizens Amendment. Key to helping people overcome their resistance to it is to help them remember an issue they care about deeply, one that is particularly important to them. It’s why I led off this book with the question, "What is fundamentally the most important issue we face as a society?" Once they identify a high-care issue and realize that there is little hope of resolving it in the present system, they naturally become more open to new ideas. In the end, this idea is not just a "nice to have," or some interesting improvement to our system. It is essential. We must transform our system so that it becomes sustainable. The Amendment offers us a way to do this and more—to make our lives and our children’s lives safer, more productive, and more fulfilling.