Or more accurately, is the Spectrum of Participation an intellectual zombie – a model that stays alive despite being functionally useless?
\nFor those of you not familiar with the Spectrum of Participation<\/a>, it\u2019s the central conceptual framework for community consultation in planning, especially in local government. It\u2019s so central to thinking about planning that it\u2019s almost impossible to contemplate community consultation without invoking the Spectrum.
\nBut here\u2019s the problem. I just reviewed a host of contemporary community consultation methods (to make an slide show for a new training workshop<\/a>). No matter how much I bent the definitions, I couldn\u2019t make what we actually DO in community consultation fit the Spectrum.
\nHere, item by item, is the problem:
\nINFORM:\u00a0\u201cTo provide the public with\u2026information\u2026\u201d <\/strong>
\nEr yes, we always communicate. Yet disseminating\u00a0information alone can\u2019t, by definition, be a form of consultation. And communication is, yes, inevitable. So having an INFORM level is kind of superfluous. The only reason for including it in the Spectrum is to make the point that it’s never enough by itself. In that\u00a0case, why is it ON the Spectrum?
\n(There is an amazingly tense and fraught, and ultimately funny, LinkedIn thread where engagement consultant Brett Sangster innocently asked the question \u201cIs \u2018inform a legitimate level of \u2018engagement\u2019?<\/a>\u201d and prompted, so far, 327 comments, revealing a chaos\u00a0of diasagreement on this question amongst engagement professionals.)
\nCONSULT:\u00a0\u201cTo obtain public feedback\u2026\u201d.<\/strong>
\nYes, that sounds exactly like what community consultation does and is. And, despite all sorts of attempts to push the boundaries, that\u2019s where the great majority of community consultation efforts, and platforms, continue to lie. The reason being that\u2019s all most authorities want or have time for. And, mostly, all that the public have time for as well. (Many of the really interesting innovations in community consultation are about mobile-enabled \u20181 minute consultations\u2019, where the effort demanded from the public matches their actual level of interest. Those are definitely on the CONSULT level.)
\nINVOLVE:\u00a0\u201cTo work directly with the public\u2026\u201d<\/strong>
\nAh. This is the level I enjoy. Sitting down with people face-to-face. People can learn, and alter their positions, and relationships can be\u00a0made, creating the possibility of trust. However it\u2019s very hard to initiate this level, for the reason that most planning processes are so conventional, dull and irrelevant that it\u2019s impossible to get citizens\u00a0to give up their time. And fair enough too. If the issue is a \u2018hot\u2019 one, however, it\u2019s easy to fill a workshop, and workshopping is infinitely better than the blood sport of public meetings. I personally think this is an area where we can do with a lot more fun and innovation.
\nCOLLABORATE:\u00a0\u201cTo partner with the public\u2026\u201d. <\/strong>
\nHere\u2019s where the Spectrum floats away into\u00a0fantasy. In principle, it\u2019d be nice to partner with the public. However, partnering is about equivalence of power. And\u00a0there is a immense\u00a0disparity of power in plan-making that makes \u2018collaborate\u2019 only ever an aspiration. A nice one, but, sorry, the final decision is always with the power-holder, and it would be ridiculous, and disingenuous, to pretend\u00a0it\u2019s anywhere else.
\nAlso, looking at real life examples, I really can\u2019t distinguish Involve and Collaborate in the field. They end up being kind of the same thing: basically a group of people being workshopped by a facilitator, who occasionally allows them to influence the process.
\n(OK, I know of a couple of examples approaching partnership, but they are in only after near-death experiences by public agencies. They are exceptions that prove the rule.)
\nEMPOWER:\u00a0\u201cWe will implement what you decide\u2026\u201d<\/strong>
\nThis is where the Spectrum gets completely\u00a0silly. In our society, power is not relinquished. The perceived risks for authorities are too great. I can see it\u2019s nice to have there, like a glowing light on the hill, but when I train public officials I face a seemless wall of scepticism and self-doubt about this level. If I am being realistic it\u2019s not a serious option. I suspect it\u2019s just there as a fossil from Sherry Arnstein\u2019s original 1969 Ladder of Citizen Participation<\/a>. It\u2019s neat. I can see it looks right. But it\u2019s not the job of government to hand complete power to citizens. It\u2019s not even a good idea most of the time. When agencies have ceded power, it\u2019s almost always when citizens force their way onto the table, and even then it\u2019s grudging and temporary. Take Landcare as an example: it looks like empowerment, but the funding schemes are withdrawn at a whim, and action is so mired in paperwork and accountability that it wears down active citizenship.
\nIn summary: \u00a0<\/strong>3 of the 5 levels in the Spectrum do seem to have conceptual or reality problems. They don’t seem to make sense as\u00a0intellectual categories either\u00a0because they can’t be implemented or, in the case, of INFORM, aren’t actually a\u00a0category\u00a0of consultation. With this in mind, perhaps it would be more rational to have a Spectrum of Consultation with just two components:<\/p>\n

CONSULT <———–> INVOLVE\/COLLABORATE<\/p>\n

I think that would be a much closer simulation of reality.<\/p>\n

WHAT\u2019S MISSING: Just listening<\/strong>
\nInterestingly, there’s a whole class of community engagement that’s absent from the Spectrum. It could be\u00a0the most important kind of all.
\nMost of our public organisations have lost contact with their publics. They suffer from\u00a0Chronic Engagement Deficit Disorder (CEDD) which cannot be solved by yet more formal and structured engagement processes. Exactly the opposite is required: engaging tactics that make possible just plain listening, where agency staff meet citizens\u00a0without an agenda, and hear from\u00a0each other as human beings.<\/p>\n