GRASSROOTS GRANTMAKERS
2008 TOPICAL CONFERENCE CALL SERIES
TOPICAL CALL 5
AUGUST 19, 2008 – 3:00 ET
Matt Leighninger on The Next Form of Democracy
INTRODUCTION
Twenty-three persons representing 22 organizations located across the United States
registered for this topical conference call. Included in the call were representatives from
community foundations of a variety of sizes, united ways, private foundations, community
development organizations, and technical assistance providers.
Matt Leighninger is the author of The Next Form of Democracy: How Expert Rule is
Giving Way to Shared Governance…and why politics will never be the same. Matt began
his work with and has had a long time association with Study Circles, now know as Everyday
Democracy. He serves as the executive director for Deliberative Democracy Consortium.
SHIFTING DEMOCRACY TRENDS
After graduate school Matt began work for Study Circles, now called Everyday Democracy,
getting people involved in discussion and action in their neighborhoods and with community
issues. Matt was sent all over the country to figure out how to recruit citizens, train
trainers, and conduct small and large group discussions. Through this work Matt got the
small picture of how to create discussion and action, but he didn’t see the big picture until a
couple of years ago while he was working in a suburb of Denver.
The Denver mayor and city legislators were working to balance the budget. The city was a
recipient of awards for excellent city management, but the budget was in the red
nonetheless because citizens continuously voted down local sales taxes. The mayor couldn’t
figure out why people wouldn’t pay for what they value. The mayor brought together city
stakeholders in order to find a solution. One participant explained that Denver’s relationship
with its citizens was a parent-child relationship, when what they needed an adult-adult
relationship.
This anecdote led Matt to this hypothesis. We are experiencing a generational shift in what
people want in their democracy.
 Ordinary people are more capable, confident, and skeptical.
 Citizens have less time for public life and at the same time bring more to the table.
 Citizens are better at governing, but worse at being governed.
Grassroots Grantmakers
Proceedings – Topical Call #5, 2008
Matt Leighninger on The Next Form of Democracy
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People are less connected to community affairs, but have a lower level of trust in
the government.
For government, it is harder and harder to hide behind jargon.
On the other side, local leaders of all kinds are becoming tired of confrontations with
citizens and tired of working with fewer resources.
 Their attitude is negative toward traditional sources for citizen involvement.
 Officials see citizens as absent or mad.
 Increasingly, they feel alienated and frustrated; they long to be validated.
 Officials often say they trying to engage the public in order to gain trust.
 In turn, people seem desperate for social connections and public processes seem to
fill that void for some.
This shift often feels like it is happening only in your community, but Matt sees this
everywhere. People are isolated not only be geography but by profession. For example, police
are isolated from teachers both of whom are trying to engage citizens at different public
gatherings to different ends. But by approaching citizens on issues in isolation, citizens are
frustrated. Public involvement needs a mixed use approach, just as Jane Jacobs
recommended mixed use neighborhoods so long ago.
Public involvement is still operating under the notion of expert representation, that the
representatives have been selected to make decisions based on their expertise. But
government can’t be about that anymore. It must be about engaging people to find out how
they can be involved in the solution.
 People refer to this many ways: public dialog, participatory democracy, etc.
 There are no plain words abut what this is and why it matters.
 That is the charge of the Deliberative Democracy Consortium.
FORMS OF DELIBERATIVE DEMOCRACY
There are two main forms of democracy now:
 Temporary organization efforts are when a critical mass is gathered to address an
issue or create plan.
o The engagement has a finite time period.
o Usually doesn’t lead to bigger changes and isn’t long enough to create change
 Permanent structures are usually neighborhood based.
o They act as arenas for citizens to bring issues year after year.
o They usually become small groups making decisions for larger groups.
Matt has identified principals for successful deliberative democracy:
 There is a proactive, network-based, recruitment system used to reach a mass group
of people.
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Proceedings – Topical Call #5, 2008
Matt Leighninger on The Next Form of Democracy
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The process uses both small and large group meetings, giving people a chance to
share experiences and values, talk about why issues are important, and to consider a
range of views or options.
There are different types/levels of change opportunities-volunteerism,
organizational change, and policy change.
Most of the time there is very little thought given to the public engagement process. It is
important to consider:
 What are the expectations of the decision-makers and citizens involved?
 What will be the result of public input?
Examples show that public decision-making can:
 Level the playing field of citizens vs. power brokers.
 People may end up doing things that might not be in their own interests when they
have the chance to recognize the greater good.
 People may change their views.
These things can happen but aren’t usually guaranteed because the up-front conversation
about the goals and the rules usually doesn’t happen.
Democracy strategies aren’t typically part of someone’s day job. It isn’t something we have
necessarily spent a lot of resources on. Therefore, in general, community outcomes can be
successful, but they rarely sustain themselves beyond the first couple of years.
 Recruitment is very important.
o Get serious about who you need-think very broadly about what/where the
assets in your community are and how people interact.
o Create relationships with those networks and help to recruit.
 Structure meetings so that people actually get to interact.
o Break into small groups. Instead of typical questions and answers sessions,
provide opportunities for discussion.
o Provide opportunities for children to be involved.
o Use not only food but the arts so you can recruit through interesting
meetings.
o Acknowledge that monthly meetings may not work for all. Every six months
hold is a bigger meeting with social and cultural events, using these to focus
on recruitment.
o Use all the online tools for recruitment, such as social networking and
discussion forums.
Grassroots Grantmakers
Proceedings – Topical Call #5, 2008
Matt Leighninger on The Next Form of Democracy
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PROCESS EXAMPLES
Creative processes are important to deliberative democracy. Often breaking the mold of
the traditional neighborhood association and traditional monthly meeting creates an
atmosphere for more participation:
 The Jane Adams School is a compilation of different neighborhoods and
organizations that to work on community issues. It is not a formalized organization
though. What they have found is that formalizing the neighborhood associations
creates dinosaurs-inflexible organizations.
 In St. Paul there is a long time partnership that brings neighborhood leaders and
recent immigrants together in the neighborhood known as the Ellis Island of the
Mid-West.
o They have monthly meetings of 100-150 people.
o For the first hour, participants are separated into groups to talk about some
thing cultural (like Somali food). There is always a children’s discussion circle
also.
o The second hour they discuss neighborhood business.
o One of the purposes of the group is to prepare immigrants for US
citizenship.
 In a small town in Idaho, they have created a shared structure for community
discourse.
o The town had undergone a large population growth.
o What began as temporary organizing effort became a permanent system.
o Every few months there is a hour long information forum on the hot topic of
month.
o Then the group is broken into small groups for deliberation on the issue. The
small groups submit ideas to main committee (sometimes meeting again the
next week before submitting final ideas).
o There is input from every entity in the small town (all government offices
and organizations). All of these groups fund this structure so it is jointly
owned by every sector in the community which makes it a neutral arena for
all public issues.
o One example of a deliberated issue is whether to build a new high school.
 In Del Ray Beach, Florida a long time community organizer (with roots in the Alinsky
method) enlisted his wife and the sheriff to help him create a group called Mad
Dads, a crime prevention group that patrolled the streets.
o From that effort then came Community Chat, a housing rehabilitation
project.
o Next the community began discussing the long absence of a neighborhood
school (kids were being bused to 17 different schools). They came up with an
idea and got funding for the Village Academy, a school which has wrap
around social services embedded.
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Proceedings – Topical Call #5, 2008
Matt Leighninger on The Next Form of Democracy
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The method of all of these projects was counter to the Alinsky style.
Stakeholders from all existing groups were there from the beginning,
creating wide base of power.
o Community organizers can now use a deliberative participatory approach,
such as the ones described above, or an Alinsky style approach depending on
what would be effective for the issue.
Some of the best neighborhood participatory structures also offer training for
participants. In Rochester, NY there is training on how to recruit and facilitate.
Neighborhood leaders and public employees go through training at the same time,
forming connections between citizens and public employees as they go.
Years ago the intention of setting up neighborhood associations was to establish a
sort of mini-government in each neighborhood, nearly an extension of city
government. That kind of institutional entrenchment can be an obstacle to the
democratic process. We must not think about it as just a government issue; when we
are creating a permanent community forum it should be a part of the whole
community.
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QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
There is an assumption on the part of many foundations that community organizing starts as
a fluid group of people and must evolve to a more formalized organization. Funders have to
initially get over that idea in order to engage in this new form of democracy; so how can
Grassroots Grantmakers help funders get to that point? What types of groups should
funders be looking to fund if they want to work in this area?
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Look for groups that are serious about and understand how to recruit large numbers
of diverse people to the table.
Look for people who are process savvy - who know how to structure a participatory
meeting so that people know they are heard and will come back for more.
Look for people who understand that it is better to give people a bunch of options
and for them to decide the solution for themselves, rather than start out with an
assumed solution to convince people to adopt it.
Look for people who recognize and value the different contributions everyone can
make-volunteers, community organizations, and policy-makers.
WRAP-UP
Matt’s slides will be posted on the Grassroots Grantmakers website.
November 11, 2008, in Orlando at the National League of Cities conference, Janis and Matt
will hold an interactive session focusing on democracy systems with staying power.
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Proceedings – Topical Call #5, 2008
Matt Leighninger on The Next Form of Democracy
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Discussion will center on what has been learned, both good and bad, from these systems;
what has been sacrificed along the way; and how the systems can be strengthened.
You can continue this discussion on the Grassroots Grantmakers’ blog, Big Thinking on Small
Grants., which can be accessed from www.grassrootsgrantmakers.org.
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Proceedings – Topical Call #5, 2008
Matt Leighninger on The Next Form of Democracy
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