How to create a government that’s truly for the people, by the people

From direct engagement on budget decisions to online forums on new laws, governments are learning that success comes with more public input.

Thestar.com
May 12, 2016
By Allan Woods

We know Brazil for its sandy beaches and soccer mastery, not as a trend-setting democracy.

Yet the country that impeached its president amid a widening corruption scandal is the birthplace of one of the boldest and elegantly simplest experiments in citizen engagement: since 1989, the southern city of Porto Alegre has let the public decide how to spend a portion of the city budget.

Partly a reaction to the country’s 20-year dictatorship, which ended in 1985, the public-budgeting process has led to the construction of public housing and schools, increases to health and education budgets and desperately needed connections to the city’s sewer and water system, according to the World Bank.

But the more fundamental success is surely in giving tens of thousands of people a voice, turning a population on to politics and scoring a point for open and inclusive government.

Emulated around the world, participatory budgeting resulted in 50,000 New York City residents deciding to spend $32 million (U.S.) last year on things like security cameras, handicapped bathrooms and pagers for volunteer firefighters.

Toronto also dipped a toe into the waters of public budget making in 2015, when 1,200 people in three wards voted on how to spend a modest $435,000 worth of city money.

Plans to install additional lighting in Oakridge Park, bike lockers at the Don Mills subway and a shaded area at the Maple Leaf Park playground may seem like small steps for residents, but they are a potentially large leap for democracy.

There are more differences than similarities between post-junta Brazil and modern-day Canada, but most elected officials now accept that approachable and receptive government is the best way to treat a diseased democracy marked by cynicism and distrust.

“You get the legitimacy that comes by ensuring that policy represents what people actually think and want and feel,” said Amanda Clarke, an assistant professor at Carleton University’s School of Public Policy and Administration in Ottawa.

“There’s also recognition - and this is increasingly something that governments themselves will admit to - that they don’t have all the answers, that we need to work with other people and we need to find out what they think because we can’t solve this problem alone.”

Federally, Stephen Harper’s former Conservative government signed Canada up to the multinational Open Government Partnership in 2012 and drafted the first two national plans to ensure transparency, access to information and public engagement. But University of Ottawa law professor Michael Geist knocked the Tory attempts to bring the public into the policy-making process in a 2014 Star column as “consultation theatre.”

In an email last week, he characterized public engagement under the Tories as a corrosive “validation exercise” designed to inoculate preordained Conservative policy decisions.

“The risk to public confidence in the consultation is significant. People aren’t stupid and can easily see if their contributions were widely ignored,” Geist wrote.

Former Conservative treasury board president Tony Clement, who led the open government file for the Tories, was unavailable for an interview.

The current Liberal government was elected last fall on a platform of open and more consultative government, but there is a desperate shortage of details.

The party seems to agree with experts that technology is key to tapping into the sentiment of the citizenry and promised $11.5 million over five years in the recent federal budget for open government initiatives. But apart from Twitter town halls, Google Hangouts and the odd Facebook chat, Ottawa hasn’t yet come up with a systematic way of calling upon the collective wisdom of Canadians.

A range of different methods have been tried and tested, including challenging the public or business and hosting online brainstorms that can bring large numbers of people to bear on the issues.

Who’s doing it best so far? Most people the Star consulted say the Ontario government is at the forefront. The province is working on a digital action plan to be released later this year and the 2016 Ontario budget revealed the province is looking for a chief digital officer whose mandate, in part, includes engaging Ontarians online.

The province’s advances are mostly due to a head start.

In 2011, three Ontario government ministries brought together 200 business and community leaders to discuss social innovation - everything from poverty reduction, environmental consciousness, cultural promotion and the economy.

Note takers listened in on the conversations. Their notes about the problems and solutions were then posted online in an editable wiki format for public input. The end result, after editing and revision by bureaucrats, was the province’s official Social Innovation Strategy.

“It was not just for bureaucrats and ministers or the insiders in the non-profit community ... The idea was to get people to help draft this policy white paper on social innovation in Ontario,” said Anthony Williams, the president and co-founder of the Centre for Digital Entrepreneurship and Economic Performance, who led the initiative.

More recently, the power of the public was harnessed to rewrite Ontario’s outdated Condominium Act, a law that acts as a constitution for the province’s 1.2 million condo dwellers.

It was a daunting task, touching on everything from financial management of condominium corporations to the rights and responsibilities of owners to how condo boards run elections and set rules. The process lasted 18 months and involved a core group of about 50 people, including owners, directors, managers, builders and lawyers.

“They all have very strong views on various aspects of how this law should be and they couldn’t agree on anything. It was looking like a disaster to try and create this new law,” said Don Lenihan, a senior associate in charge of policy and engagement with Canada 2020 who was the Ontario government’s principal adviser for the public consultation.

The traditional model whereby a government committee holds limited public hearings before drafting a law behind closed doors would likely have resulted in criticism from all sides, Lenihan said. Instead, the stakeholders worked together, compromised, gave way on some issues and stood their ground on others. Eventually, they came up with 40 pages of recommended changes and additions that formed the basis for a law adopted several months ago.

“The only way you can get big decisions made in a bunch of areas now is by taking the time to bring people onside that don’t have to listen to you and have views of their own,” Lenihan said.

“If you don’t engage them in this kind of discussion and give their views due process ... you can make the decision that you want, but you won’t be able to deliver it. Somebody’s going to knock you off your game.”