The G1000 was a large-scale citizen's conference that took place in Belgium in 2011. 1000 citizens participated in a 3-stage event to discuss various issues facing the country and draft a list of proposed solutions. The event's organizers were well-versed in Deliberative Democratic theory and implemented many of the aspects discussed by the researchers and theoreticians.
Contents
Background
Belgian Parliamentary Crisis
In 2011, a parliamentary impasse left Belgium with no functioning government for over 500 days. The political crisis left the country on edge with tensions between the two linguistic groups (the Dutch-speaking Flemish community and the French-speaking Walloons). In addition, there was a general feeling of powerlessness due to the impasse and dysfunctional government.
A number of Belgian citizens decided to organize a platform for the citizens to participate and become more involved in politics. They believed that elected officials – due to their preoccupation with their political survival and careers – are quite conservative and lack the courage to make tough decisions as well as compromises. Rather, it is the ‘ordinary’ citizens who have more liberty to attempt innovative solutions. The organizers believed that they could utilize the internet to develop a project that would “breathe new life” into the Belgian democracy. The organizers sought not to create an alternative to the elected government and parliament, but rather to develop a new citizen platform to complement the existing political structures.
Preparations and Planning
Recruitment
After the first stage of deciding the agenda, the organizers began the recruitment process to gather participants for the Group Dynamic. The plan called for 1000 participants to gather around 30 tables for deliberation on the three chosen issues. The G1000 team decided that diversity, as opposed to representativeness, would be the central principle behind the recruitment process. The way to achieve this diversity was through randomization. Random Digit Dialing was used to reach out to the potential participants (with a penetration rate of 99% of the populace). The random recruitment was checked versus demographic quotas was found to be quite reflective of the general Belgian public with regards to age and gender quotas. In addition, the organizers allotted 10% of the recruitment for targeted recruitment of difficult to reach groups (such as the homeless, or immigrants). (In the end, there was a drop-out rate of about 30% - however this was expected by the organizers.)
Deliberation
First Stage
Public Agenda Setting During this first phase, all citizens were invited to submit issues of public concern to an online database. A list of the top 25 issues submitted was then compiled by the organizers. The public was then invited again to vote on these 25 issues to decide which were of the prime importance to discuss and solve. With the votes counted, the top three issues were: social security, immigration and the redistribution of wealth . These three issues would form the public agenda for the initiative.
Second Stage
Group Dynamic In this stage, over 700 participants were gathered into many small groups to begin group deliberation on the three selected issues. The organizers understood that managing the group dynamics was “crucial for success” and therefore developed a highly-structured program with specially trained mediators. The deliberative program would have to maximize inclusion – to make sure every participant could contribute (both for the initiative legitimacy as well as adhering to the goal of a diversity of opinions). A script was developed with a variety of activities so as to “minimize the social thresholds for fully participating in the discussions”. This was meant to adhere as close as possibly to the ‘ideal deliberative procedure’ with equality among participants as well as freedom from external influences. The deliberation began with a short introductory round followed by lectures by ‘experts’ to help educate the citizens about the issues and define the problems at hand. This continued deliberation took the form of various exercises and different modes of discussions (different interaction styles, differing group sizes) to attempt to mitigate any “cognitive diversity” among the participants. Throughout the deliberative process, stages of “concrete inputs” were included to give a tangible structure (with results) for the participants to remain motivated and connected.
Third Stage
Citizen's Panel After completing the Group Dynamic stage, a further 32 participants were randomly selected from the original 700 to take part in the third stage: the Citizen’s Panel (32 was considered a number “large enough to ensure both maximal diversity and optimal group dynamics”). At this stage, the participants met together over three weekends to develop policy recommendations based on the group deliberations. The final question the participants decided to handle was ‘how to adress [sic] labour issues and unemployment in our society’. A comprehensive policy paper was formulated with a list of recommendations for the government (which had – by then – been formed). However, the recommendations were simply that – non-binding advice that the government could choose to read and implement.