A group of headteachers in St Albans are asking parents not to let their children have a smartphone until they are 14. According to a BBC report in May 2024 “Most of the primary school headteachers in the city say they are backing the ban, as they are worried children are exposed “to a number of negative risks” when using smartphones.” Naturally, there’s a lot of conversation in St Albans on this topic. We at […]

Perry Walker writes: If you’ve been to any of our Win Win Workouts, or watched our video, you’ll know that we’ve been concentrating on identifying the aims – the interests, needs, values and principles – that underly the policies around which so much political argument takes place. We do this because it is at this deeper level that common ground is to be found. This event was different. Given aims for housing policy, how did […]

Perry Walker writes: For this workshop in Hereford we decided to adapt Pol.is, which is a website that: Gets people to make statements about some issue Invites others to say whether they agree or disagree with those statements Uses that information to sort people into attitude groups Then invites people to suggest statements that might command agreement across those groups We decided to adapt this to a small-scale meeting. We felt that the lack of […]

Perry Walker writes: Introduction For people who haven’t come across the Win-Win Workout before, here’s a summary. The aim is to find solutions to tricky and divisive political issues that work for everyone. We do that in two stages: Identify a set of shared aims that everyone can live with Seek solutions that meet those shared aims This two-stage solution is critical. In this divisive and divided age, discussion of solutions so easily gets stuck […]

Perry Walker writes: This is the name of a book, just published, by Manon Loisel and Nicolas Rio. They are two practitioners of…wait for it… participatory democracy, running a consultancy called Partie Prenante, or Stakeholders. The book is full of provocations, as you might guess from the title, and well worth a blog. I confess that I’ve not read the book. My French is not up to it, and it is not (as yet) available […]

Introduction For people who haven’t come across the Win-Win Workout before, here’s a summary. The aim is to find solutions to tricky and divisive political issues that work for everyone. We do that in two stages: Firstly by identifying a set of shared aims that everyone can live with; and then looking for solutions that meet those shared aims. This two-stage solution is critical. In this divisive and divided age, discussion of solutions so easily […]

Perry Walker writes: Those of our readers who have followed the evolution of the Win-Win Workout (see here and here) will know that we believe in splitting political decision-making into two stages. First, citizens decide what aims the decision-making should achieve. Second, there is then a role for experts in deciding what solutions best deliver those aims. In emphasising expertise in the second stage, we don’t mean to suggest that citizens have no role. Quite […]

Perry Walker writes Introduction Actually, the title’s a bit of a liberty. This article is not about Salzburg, where the Sound of Music is set. Rather, it concerns Vorarlberg, the Western-most state of Austria, which shares borders with Germany, Switzerland, and Liechtenstein. It is a small state, with fewer than 400,000 inhabitants. Why Citizens Councils (Bürgerrat in German)? Well, suppose the Win-Win Workout was adopted by some part of the British system of governance. How […]

Perry Walker writes Introduction For people who haven’t come across the Win-Win Workout before, here’s a summary. The aim is to find solutions to tricky and divisive political issues that work for everyone. We do that in two stages: Identify a set of shared aims that everyone can live with Seek solutions that meet those shared aims This two-stage solution is critical. In this divisive and divided age, discussion of solutions so easily gets stuck […]

Mark Potts writes Introduction Salisbury Democracy Alliance ran this event in May 2023 with the local network of the Royal Society of Arts. Participants included two Labour councillors, along with the only Independent councillor. How it worked Participants were allocated to groups of 5/6 persons. Each group had a facilitator. The organisers had chosen the 24 cards out of the original 60 that were most relevant to Salisbury. A set of these cards was dealt […]