Blogging Ideas : Pakistani Spectator

A -kind of- festive post for you before the holiday season kicks off for real… I read a few international blogs through the excellent global voices and one of the active ones is the Pakistani Spectator. Ghazala Khan does a regular series of interviews with bloggers from all over the place and it was my turn last week: 

Would you please tell us something about you and your site?

I write about public involvement in decision making. This is actually takes in quite a wide range of different issues, from the tension between different modes of governance and electoral systems to how individuals collaborate on decision making in their own communities, both locally and online. I blog here.

    Do you feel that you continue to grow in your writing the longer you write? Why is that important to you?

I think everyone learns as they write more frequently – it forces you to order your thoughts in a structured format and to try and imagine how others might understand your meaning. Having said that, I feel that the most important thing is to get out from behind the keyboard and monitor and to speak with a whole range of different people to gain inspiration whenever possible. That’s where you find opportunities to grow as an individual and as a member of several wider communities.

    I’m wondering what some of your memorable experiences are with blogging?

My favourite recent post was an interview with an Obama supporter on London bridge – I took a quick photo of him with my camera phone and it came out so well – really capturing the enthusiasm and spirit of the moment. I was affected by the belief of an individual that genuine change can come from those at the top rather than the cynicism that is often expressed towards decision makers in the UK.

    What do you do in order to keep up your communication with other bloggers?

I use RSS feeds to keep up to date – attempt to keep my netvibes page which pulls all of those feeds together in good order. Then of course, I read and comment when I have some spare time.

    What do you think is the most exciting or most innovative use of technology in politics right now?

In politics, it has to be the Obama campaign in terms of excitement and the interplay between online connection and offline action. This was a very powerful mix and am very glad to see this strong emphasis on online tools continuing. See obamacto for an interesting take on what should happen next!

    Do you think that these new technologies are effective in making people more responsive?

I do think that new technology can make people feel more personally connected than ever before, and more able to respond quickly and easily to causes or issues that they are interested in. Not only this, I think that it can supplement our existing networks in new ways which are only just beginning to be realised.

    What do you think sets Your site apart from others?

It focuses on public participation and involvement from a personal perspective. I work for an organistion called www.involve.org.uk which is based in the UK – this enables me to look at public engagement and participation from a more analytical viewpoint during the day – then my blog covers the aspect I feel is often not covered so well – what do these ideas and projects mean for real people in their working and home lives?

    If you could choose one characteristic you have that brought you success in life, what would it be?

Critical optimism!

What was the happiest and gloomiest moment of your life?

I’m not sure on this one – life is a journey and I’m usually looking forwards not back!

    If you could pick a travel destination, anywhere in the world, with no worries about how it’s paid for – what would your top 3 choices be?

I like this question – I’d go to Tierra del Fuego to see lava pouring into the sea, then drop by Venezuela to see the Angel Falls, and then maybe to Dongtan to see the eco city… in a year or two.

   What is your favorite book and why?

I don’t have a favourite – I love reading and lots of books have strong meaning for me – one would be ….read the rest here

Enjoy the holidays! 

(Yes, I know the life is a journey line is a bit Forest Gump –  is tough not to be able to edit your words after you write them…!)

Us Now: Ebbsfleet and Ed Miliband

I went to see Us Now at the RSA last night… a documentary by Ivo Gormley and Banyak film that looks at web collaboration type stuff through some real stories about online/offline communities, and a few interviews. It got me thinking:

People right across the world are connecting in all kinds of ways on the web right now without any great institution or medium to support this in a traditional top-down sense. What is more, they are then getting things done – whether that’s about big online projects that use collective wisdom like Wikipedia or Linux, or whether its facilitating personal meetings and connections like mumsnet coffee mornings or couchsurfing.

This is useful, and interaction with a larger whole means something to individuals who take part. Big-little, global-local, public-personal. This is an important landscape feature of online collaboration.

Wikipedia is now my first point of reference when I want to know something, its part of my personal web toolkit, and through it I’m tapping into the  thoughts and knowledge of people from across the world who feel confident enough and who have time to contribute to building that vast resource for free. A wise collective.

The couchsurfer’s story in UsNow illustrated a more personal side of connectedness – for the surfer, the experience served to put a friendly face onto a blank and unknown cityscape, a way of providing a connection through shared affirmation and a sense of trust induced in part through online reputational systems. Basically, a guy he’d never met cooked him dinner and let him sleep on the couch – and this was all OK.

We know this right? But then, the film takes us to the story of Ebbsfleet football club, and into the world of Ed Miliband and this is where it gets interesting. At Ebbsfleet we see the story of players being picked online by fans, photos are dropped into position online by various enthusiastic supporters. The manager, the expert, then has to pick the team that the fans choose for him. In the film – Ebbsfleet wins the match – they’re all going to Wembley – and fans speak of being part of that victory – ‘we’ did it, ‘we’re going to Wembley etc. But Ebbsfleet don’t do this anymore – they’ve gone back to being expert-controlled with the manager, the expert, taking the decisions for the good of the team and the fans.

Then we see an image of Ed Miliband’s head being gently dropped onto a ‘pick your cabinet’ webpage…hmmmm. Not a great way to construct a cabinet I think… This is followed by a wicked moment of confusion captured on the film that shows a much more human side of an MP – for once, the ‘answers’ aren’t all there… but of course, this was then followed up with an official statement of ’solution’. I’d much rather it wasn’t.*

When those with traditional expertise don’t know what to do, when a public mandate for change is required, when decisions are at stake that can be based on the real, lived experience of people who know the area, service, attitudes best – those kind of situations are crying out for a more participatory approach. This is going to happen with or without government going along with it – but it would be so much better to have radical system change happen willingly and with optimism rather than reluctantly, through backlash and disenchantment, cynicism, loss of trust in decision makers etc.

Ed’s head in hands moment of bewilderment illustrates the institutional tensions and personal, inner conflict that go to work when we start transposing user generated participatory ideas onto existing, top down ‘representative’ (failing) democratic systems. Yes, there will be leading participatory disruptors that impact on the way government takes decisions, but the question is whether it would be better to transform and decentralise current systems of governance to enable a more equitable distribution of power. I reckon that more votes were made on disgruntled feelings, hairstyle and humour in the London mayoral elections than on policy issues. There’s potential to make a bad system worse…

In Us Now Paul Miller points that there is a misconception that decision makers and those with power make – that people are thick, therefore they shouldn’t be involved in making decision on important things. This problem of perception works at a number levels – decision makers don’t give enough credit to public wisdom and intelligence, the press consistently portray the public as being respondent, passive and powerless rather than active and influential, and people themselves do not feel able to influence decisions in their communities. These three have worked together to ensure that many citizens remain as passive consumers. Now, take the mass media image out of the picture, and instead put in place a new kind of reflection of a citizen - that seen through web 2.0 collaboration and connectedness – a far more attractive and empowering form of citizenship emerges, and its one that does not fit with current outmoded democratic systems.

It is clear that there is a place for two broad based kinds of expertise in this participatory future and for Ebbsfleet as much as Parliament. One form of which taps into public wisdom, one which uses the skills of learned specialist individuals. We need to work out how the two interconnect – where the system needs to change, (pretty much everywhere, especially in terms of repersentative politics), where power ought to lie, and what people everywhere will do for themselves next.

Now, I’m not sure how that’ll all pan out – so might go and ask someone else what they think…

 *see comment below

**Update: Check out what someone else thought at confusedofcalcutta where JP Rangaswami, who chaired the event writes it up.

Reading List: Morgan Inquiry, MORI:Impact of Empowerment, Carnegie UK

This is what I’ve been reading over the last day or so with some brief info and initial thoughts on each:

1) Morgan Inquiry

Report looking at barriers to volunteering for young people aged 18-24.

The inquiry found that:

• volunteering needs to be more flexible- possibly supporting an 8hours/year volunteering allownace with employers
• there needs to be greater clarity in terms of jobseekers’allowance that volunteering is a valid route to employment
• there needs to be better and more centralised information on opportunities available for volunteering
• there needs to be formal recognition of volunteering

Seems to me that the most easily fixed would be the information issue – V are doing good work in this area already, why not support them further to continue and develop this work. Also, could link this promotion to an awreness campaign amongst job centres around clarifying status of volunteer work for jobseekers’allowance claimants.

Also, seems to be something missing around motivations to volunteer in the first place- though I realise this wasn’t exactly in the scope – it is v.significant.

2) Searching for the Impact of Empowerment

Ipsos MORI report using survey data from the New Deal for Communities National Evaluation to look at how involvement in NDC activities, and feelings of ability to influence link to feelings of community, trust and quality of life.

It does well in trying to unpick some of the tricky discussions around subjective and objective empowerment (ie. feeling like you can change stuff for the better, and opportunities to engage with decision making.) It backed up the more small scale qualitative research looking at the impact of empowerment in that there are relationships between involvement in local activities/feelings of abilty to influence – and positivity around general satisfaction with life/community/local area/wellbeing.

BUT – as with all the best reports – more research is required ;)

ie.

• Who wants to be empowered and what does that mean in practice?
• What are we trying to acheive through empowerment?
• What is the best way to measure the good done through empowerment?

3) Carnegie UK Annual Review

Does what it says – a review of Carnegie UK’s activities and outline of future plans.

Building on the work of the futures work Carnegie recently did around civil society – the review highlights some really interesting areas of work across all its programmes.

Random quotes that stood out for me:

“our aim here(in futures work) is to assist citizens working at local, national and international levels to prepare for change and to combine their strengths to try and determine that change.”

“The challenge of sustainability and the threat of climate change is a common theme in public discourse, yet the implications are largely uncertain and potentially devastating. Perhaps this threat presents an opportunity to strengthen civil society and re-engage people in formal politics?”

“What collective action can rural residents take to build resilient communities? We understand the ‘resilient rural community’ to be one which accepts that any status quo is unable to last for long and that the community needs to be constantly learning new ways of self-sufficeiency, collaboration and living errangements. Every dimension of life is up for challenge and creative response”.

Right – am off to read a novel now….

Only Connect

So, I’ve been getting some stick as to what this blog is about exactly -  and would refer you on to the about section…. if you’re too lazy to click, have copied it in below!

—-About—-

Only connect

The more we fill our lives with tasks and objects, the less time we have to connect with one another and with ourselves. 

This blog is all about repairing and renewing our connections – whether that is to yourself and your inner motivations or to friends, family, neighbours, strangers and structures of governance and power. I look at these ideas through the rather blurred spyglass of engagement, personal empowerment, public participation and involvement and aim to focus in on ideas around communities, people and connections in a way that brings it all back to practical outcomes and end results.

In a world where ‘anger and telegrams’ define our urban environments more often than ever – the call for connection has become ever more urgent.

Only connect! That was the whole of her sermon. Only connect the prose and the passion, and both will be exalted, And human love will be seen at its height. Live in fragments no longer. Only connect…

Without it we are meaningless fragments, half monks, half beasts, unconnected arches that have never joined into a man. With it love is born, and alights on the highest curve, glowing against the gray, sober against the fire.

–E.M. Forster, Howards End —

Bla bla blah….etc.

Community power pack : Involve

Check out my colleague Edward Andersson’s blogpost over at Involve on the community power pack we produced for Communities and Local Government.

That was all! Enjoy the ’first’ weekend of summer :)

Catalyst Awards : And the winner is…

Catalyst Awards

 

Am just back from the rather brilliant Catalyst Awards  – designed to encourage innovation around social technology for community benefit. There were some really fantastic projects nominated as finalists including:

 

 Rafi.ki  a global citizenship project which partners schools across the world, facilitating connections through the wonder of social tech.

LocalEyes, which provides a platform for citizen voice from a grass roots level up, and aims to connect people at a very local level. (And which was commended for future potential.)

BigArtMob which simply uses interactive mapping to build up a map of public art across the UK

 Yoosk! - an innovative question answering facility which connects public figures with citizens

EnabledbyDesign - an online community whose ultimate aim is to make independent living more accessible through the use of clever modern design

I just wanted to highlight these few catalyst finalists who didn’t scoop one of the main prizes as I thought they were also brilliant ideas. Check out the award winners here.

The only bad point about the morning was having to climb five floors in high heels cause the lift was being held for ‘a senior cabinet minister’ AKA the PM…. Poor plebian Casey.

However, he made up (a bit) for this great inconvenience by chipping in with a decent speech about the future of social innovation and also mentioned future work focusing on the Criminal Justice System.

It all sounds very positive etc. and am looking forward to the follow up at Chain Reaction later this year.

Hazel Blears Blog

It has arrived…

7 day blog:http://tinyurl.com/6zarqb

7 day twitter feed: http://twitter.com/communitiesuk 

7 points for attention from the white paper:

1. being active in your community
2. access to information
3. having an influence
4. challenge
5. redress
6. standing for office; and
7. ownership and control

 Am feeling strangely biblical all of a sudden… ;)

However, the thing that really stands out for me in the first posting is the sentence:

“We want to make these changes because we believe that local people are capable and willing to take difficult decisions and solve complex problems for themselves. ”

Along with the ever-present challenges around spreading good practice in an accessible way, the challenge of helping local people to believe that they themselves are capable of taking difficult decisions and solving complex problems is absolutely key to making enagement work at community level in the future. The promotion of personal empowerment.

(Also, making sure that the people involved do indeed want to have the responsibility of stepping up and taking control is another major consideration – this links into the co-design/co-production issues that are currently being debated… Institute for Innovation in Public Services recently produced interesting work in this area.)

Crowdsourcing Commuters and Talking on Trains

Tim Davies posted up something that caught my eye a few days ago…

“What if we could find some way of harnessing that cognitive surplus – and providing volunteering/pro-social crowd-sourcing opportunities that commuters could dip into at five-minutes-to-nine, just before they got stuck into their nine-till-five?”

I  love this idea- crowdsourcing commuters…. how could it work…?

If people wanted to participate in the SETI grid or Oxford cancer screensaver idea …as they certainly did… then maybe there’s some mileage in this social idea…

I’ve often thought in the morning on the dreary train journey into Waterloo that it would sometimes be nice to have a social carriage – where people who fancy a bit of a chat could meet up and talk in the 40 mins or whatever it takes you.  It would work better in the mornings when people haven’t woken up enough to be reserved or self-contained… when they’re a little sleepy and therefore haven’t crawled into their commuting shell so entirely as on the way home when they encase themselves in ipods, books, or the temptingly vacuous freesheets.

There could be rules of conduct to avoid the real weirdos* taking over… I’m imagining a volunteer facilitator might be helpful in keeping the peace…

Volunteer Facilitator... cc Darz Mol

And of course, another benefit other than general social good would be a constituent audience for volunteering. After all, commuters are some of the most time-pressed people, and therefore one of the hardest-to-reach groups despite being generally  quite affluent and well-connected. They are time poor and disconnected from their surroundings… this needs to change! Its crazy to have those people who are driven, confident and ambitious to be cooped up on trains for 2 or more hours per day just wasting all that lovely social capital… ;)

The initial group leaders or local voluntary groups could set up discussion spaces in the carriage recruiting for (or actually carrying out using wifi/mobiles) different activities local to the train stations passed through…

However, I’m not sure that model would work so well on the tube! It’s a bit squashed.

Annie Mole : Tube hell

* (For those of you who don’t live in London, just to point out that pretty much all strangers here seem to think you are a dangerous lunatic if you talk to them on public transport. I found this out the hard way, but still persevere. Am beginning to wonder if this does now qualify me as an actual weirdo… hm….)