Participatory Democracy in England: an Assessment of Local Government Influence on Democratic Engagement

Participatory Democracy in England: An Assessment of Local Government Influence on Democratic Engagement

Master thesis Political Science, Public Policy and Governance Research Project: Politics of Inequality

June 2017

David Stoker [11408987]

Supervisor: Franca van Hooren Second Reader: John Grin

Word count: 23,750 excl. references

Table of Contents

1 Introduction 4 1.1 Topic 4 1.2 Academic contribution 6 1.3 Societal relevance 6 1.4 Contemporary challenges to democracy 7

2. Theoretical framework 13 2.1 Concepts 13 2.2 Theories 15 i) Locating the case in deliberative democratic theory 15 ii) E-Democracy 18 iii) Evaluating democratic practises: a framework 20 iv) Emotions and democracy 28

3. Research design: 31 3.1 Methodological literature 31 3.2 Case selection 33

4. Analysis 36 4.1 Description of the Case 36 4.2 Locating the case in democratic theory 40 4.3 E-Democracy 43 4.4 Evaluation of the promotion of democratic values 43 Inclusiveness 44 Considered Judgment 49 Popular Control 51 Transparency 54 4.5 Emotions and democracy 57

5. Conclusion 59 5.1 Summary and answer to the questions 59 5.2 Theoretical implications 62 5.3 Critical reflection on the research as a whole 64 5.4 Policy implications 64 5.5 Future research 65

6. Acknowledgements 66

7. Bibliography 67

8. Appendices 83

1 Introduction

1.1 Topic

In 2014 it was estimated that up to 7.5 million eligible British voters were missing from the electoral register (Bite The Ballot, 2016: 2) and the UK had lower turnout than many other European countries in 2015 (UK Data Service, 2016: 14). My topic is how to improve citizen participation in democratic processes in English local government.1 It is not an easy time for local government. The grant from central to local government will be phased out entirely by 2020, leaving local authorities to fend for themselves and generate their own income (Publicfinance.co.uk, 2016). Scarce resources make the conditions far from ideal to rebuild engagement and relationships in citizens

Democracy can be called a “myth,” or “arguably one of the vaguest terms in common usage” (Emerson, 2014: xi). There are various interpretations of the word “democracy” that envisage different structures of government; today’s democracies cover a wide spectrum of practice with but the one thread common to many of them: somewhere, at some stage or other, people cast a vote, and something, or someone, gains a majority (Ibid). In the West this can include a mixture of: general elections, either for a presidential or parliamentary form of national government; decentralisation of power to regions, for example through elected councils; referenda on specific issues; citizen panels, and more.

Theories of democracy that developed before the late nineteenth century - republicanism, liberalism, and utilitarianism - dealt with the tension between equal consideration of collective decision making by linking individuals and the community in various ways (Morrell, 2010: 3). Republicans eliminate the tension by recasting equal consideration in terms of the common good. They delineate between private interests, the sum of which Jean-Jacques Rousseau calls the “will of all,” and the public interest, Rousseau’s “general will” ([1762] 1988, 96, 100-101). Each citizen has an equal voice, but if some disagree with the final decision, they have either misperceived the common good or followed their own private interest (Morrell, 2010: 3). Democratic theory since the middle of the twentieth century has consisted largely in attempts to develop an explanation of democracy’s ability to allow both equal consideration and legitimate collective decisions that is more nuanced and less elitist (Ibid: 5).

To take democracy seriously, we must know what we are talking about. Developing a precise definition of democracy is particularly important when trying to describe and explain variation and change in the extent and character of democracy. Tilly (2007: 7) describes four models of democracy: constitutional, substantive, procedural and process-oriented. A constitutional approach concentrates

1 I will use the terms municipality, council, local authority and local government interchangeably for this paper. 4

on laws that a regime enacts concerning political activity (Ibid). Substantive approaches focus on the conditions of life and politics a given regime promotes: does this regime promote (as a list of possible topics to emphasize) “human welfare, individual freedom, security, equity, social equality, public deliberation, and peaceful conflict resolution” (Ibid)? Most procedural observers center their attention on elections, asking whether genuinely competitive elections engaging large numbers of citizens regularly produce changes in governmental personnel and policy (Ibid: 8). Process-oriented approaches to democracy differ significantly from constitutional, substantive and procedural accounts. They identify some minimum set of processes that must be continuously in motion for a situation to qualify as democratic (Ibid: 9).

Contemporary challenges to democracy, as discussed in chapter 1.4 could if unchecked, lead to undemocratic movements, such as nationalism and from there, authoritarianism (Burston, 2017), as evidenced by the rise of populist right-wing figures in Western democracies: Trump, UKIP, Front Nationale, Alternativ für Deutschland and more. Moreover, the consequences of complacency in local government democracy could mean further political disengagement and disaffection from citizens, which could in turn eventually destabilise government through populist movements, or public disorder, as seen in the 2011 riots that started in London and spread to other English cities. Citizen engagement, citizen participation and co-production are rapidly becoming catch-all concepts, buzzwords continuously recurring in public policy discourses but that quite often point more to the rhetoric of participation than to its reality (Castelnovo 2015). My research seeks to improve our understanding of methods that improve the quality of public debate and empower people to influence decisions that affect their lives. My objective is to discover how municipality officials and citizens interpret the purpose and effectiveness of one particular local government citizen engagement initiative. I look specifically at processes of active engagement. My motivation is to find out what is and isn’t working in citizen engagement practice, the meanings behind this and to find barriers to and opportunities for better engagement. What are the effects of efforts to engage citizens? Consequently, the following two research questions are formulated:

“What principles, processes and procedures can we take away from the Kirklees Democracy Commission to build into a model of participatory democracy best practice?”

“How and to what extent has the Kirklees Democracy Commission contributed to the promotion of democratic goods?”

This study is structured in three parts. The first part, Chapters 2 and 3, consists of the theoretical framework and the methodological approach. In the theoretical framework the concept of participatory democracy and its alternative deliberative democracy are discussed, as well as existing

literature on how to judge the quality of a democracy. In the second chapter a research design is formulated. The second part, Chapter 4 , contains the empirical findings, starting with judging what the evidence reveals about the principles, processes and procedures of the KDC case. The third part, Chapter 5 includes the conclusion and discussion of the findings.

1.2 Academic contribution

Academically, I hope to shed light on three things. Firstly, my intention is to add to the third generation of deliberative democracy (as specified by Elstub, 2010) which concerns institutions, and the challenges of doing democracy in reality (compared to the idealised settings of earlier theorists).

Second I wish to add the theory around e-democracy, defined as the process of using telecommunications technology by democratic actors, including governments, elected representatives, civic organizations, communities, political groups, and activists to improve the political process and political institutions (Khosrowpour, 2013: 311). Examples of e-democracy include online discussion groups, blogs, government websites, and other forms of networked participation and civic engagement. (Cruz, 2009). Specifically I wish to add to the theory of e-democracy in institutional settings, which is a small niche in the literature and is under-represented in more general democratic literature considering the rate of change. The literature suggests there is a lack of innovation in e-democracy. I seek to fill gaps and add insights to the theory regarding the ways digital tools can in principle help improve the overall health of a democracy.

Thirdly and finally, I aim to add to the theory regarding emotions in political and specifically democratic practice. We see that emotions have been increasingly studied in politics, particularly with regards to the rise in nationalism in western liberal democracies. However it is remarkable to me that emotions clearly drive political campaigns but are omitted from consideration in policy formation processes.

1.3 Societal relevance

The findings of this study are relevant in various ways. Socially, the findings may shed light on ways councils can improve the legitimacy of and alleviate disaffection with their democratic institutions. It could be the starting point for cross-country learning between local authorities seeking to refresh their relationship with citizens. Like other studies, this study has its limitations. In order to guarantee the validity and reliability, several methodological choices were made. What I discover will not become a simple ‘recipe’ for citizen engagement policy worldwide or indeed in England. In answer to the question, “How could the contribution of research to policy making be improved?” Burnham et al reflect that “the pursuit of best practice is important, but it should also be remembered that informing

government policy is not the sole or even the primary function of social research” (2008: 324). My findings will be tied to the geographical context in which I conduct my I research. Nonetheless I am quite hopeful that readers will gain valuable insights to understand the nature and use of citizen engagement strategies in local government settings.

1.4 Contemporary challenges to democracy

In this section I will consider some contemporary challenges to democracy: austerity, devolution, social divisions, group isolation, citizen ignorance, crisis in legitimacy. This is not to engage in what Schmitter calls “ambulance chasing” (2008: 268). There has been a degree of alarmism and haste in diagnosing ills in the state of Western democracies following the election of Donald Trump and the Brexit vote. Instead, I wish to posit the case in its specific contexts. There is a greater possibility of being able to generalize from my findings (if I have some positive ones) by considering how and where the positive lessons can be utilized in situations with similar circumstances.

Austerity In local government in England, the context of austerity is omnipresent in the day to day operations and shapes strategic decisions. Powerful forces outside localities are imposing an economic agenda that seriously limits their ability to manoeuvre. If local democracy is full of freely moving agents, then austerity, at least for the time being, is the iron-bound case they can move within. To paraphrase an old quote, you can wear any colour you like, so long as it is austerity. New notches will be punched in ever-tightening belts. Figure 1.1 illustrates that local authorities’ spending power is in steady decline.

Figure 1.1: Spending Power Reductions from 2010/11 by Deprivation Band and Year (all purpose authorities

(Hastings et al 2013: 14)

Local government actors seeking to build a more cooperative relationship with citizens have the

damage of bureaucratic and distant government discourse to undo. Government ‘objective,’ impersonal language treats people as abstractions (Chickering and Turner, 2017: 15). This discourse distances policy decisions from the social effects of cuts. One team of social researchers reports that interviews with senior staff described how a “differential financial envelope” was applied to expenditure within the various “workstreams” underpinning the process of budgetary decision making. Thus, within each workstream the first priority was to make cuts to ‘support services’” (Hastings et al, 2013). This language can be expected to alienate citizens. Former Chancellor George Osborne called benefit cuts “tough love” (The Guardian, 2013). Local government officials are aware of the problem: “concern about [community] dissent is palpable” (Durose and Lowndes 2010: 355). The high likelihood of increased fiscal austerity and budgetary uncertainty following the shock of Brexit mean that this is an issue that will need to be addressed.

Devolution Secondly, increased localism and devolution makes renewed participatory democracy especially relevant. In previous governments we saw the beginning of the localism and devolution agendas. The 2003 Local Government Act promoted devolution to the lowest possible level (Gov.uk 2008: 12).. Old political structures are fracturing: in March 2017 Article 50 was triggered in a House of Commons vote, starting the process for Britain’s exit from the European Union (The Guardian, 2017a). In the same month, Scotland voted for a second independence referendum under Nicola Sturgeon’s popular leadership of the Scottish National Party (The Guardian, 2017b). In May 2017 Manchester elected Andy Burnham as its first mayor (The Guardian, 2017c) with significant spending power. At the same time we see a power-grab from local government to central government. Local government is increasingly reduced in scope as central government seeks to “cut out the middleman” - for example, schools when academised become removed from local authority control and responsible only to the Department of Education.

Social divisions Thirdly, cultural division has always existed in England via the class system, but in recent years we see increased ethnic division. Mass immigration diversified working-class Britain – indeed, it is working-class communities that tend to be the most ethnically mixed – but also led to unchecked resentment (The Guardian, 2016a). Once fringe far-right nativist sentiment, fueled by a migrant-hostile tabloid press and increased TV media presence of UKIP’s Nigel Farage, has gone mainstream and been a strong contributing factor behind Brexit. Hate crime has increased post-Brexit (Independent, 2016). Poorer communities, notably white working class, perceive an existential threat from a high rate of migration into England over the past decade from recently joined European countries, notably Poland. This group express patriotism a desire to ‘Make England English again”. Two terror attacks in short succession in May-June 2017 will be a challenge for fending off

Islamophobia. Moments of national joy and togetherness such as the 2012 Olympics turned out to be fleeting.

Socio-economic divisions are increasing. The Conservative government has sought to polarise the deserving and undeserving poor into “skivers and strivers”. Regionally, both Londoners and non-Londoners speak of the city as ‘like another country’: voices from many parts of England protest that government only cares about London and the south east and neglect the rest of the country.

Generational divisions also exist in England. Older people voted more for Brexit. Under-45s voted more to stay, with a lower turnout. By most conventional metrics today’s younger generation are the first that will lead a lower quality of life than their parents’. The economic divide exists generationally, notably with most over 40s owning a home and scarce few under-30s. This sign outside a Bristol pub went viral: ‘Remember when we cried as children & our parents said “we’ll give you something to cry about”? – We thought we were getting a smack – instead, instead they destroyed the housing market, quadrupled uni fees, melted the ice caps & voted Brexit.’ (The Poke, 2017). It would be a mistake to joke over all the divisions. Outright pessimism is unjustified, however: Luskin et al show that civil, constructive discussion between communities is not only possible but fruitful (2012: 133).

Group isolation Personalization is pushing us into advertiser-driven "tunnels" of information online that “can limit the unexpected encounters that spark innovation and the democratic exchange of ideas” (PublishersWeekly.com, 2011). The public sphere of political deliberation has diminished: social media algorithms create “echo chambers” (Del Vicario et al., 2016) of ideologically insulated individuals. Citizens increasing exist in a “filter bubble” (Pariser, 2014). Social media is reducing the likelihood of interacting with people who disagree with us. It is possible municipality-led citizen engagement can bridge this divide. Factually, in terms of current levels of citizenship, we see a mixed picture: a recent national survey of British social attitudes showed that political engagement increased, but not turnout (Bsa.natcen.ac.uk, 2016). Those without a strong sense of political commitment were particularly likely to stay at home at the 2015 general election (Ibid). Social isolation is a problem in general, and encouraging people to participate in democracy by community discussion and by exercising their vote is one way of reducing social isolation (Gov.uk, 2015).

Crisis in legitimacy Fifthly, the crisis in political legitimacy makes citizen engagement timely. Over half of Britons say none of the political parties represent their views (Natcen.ac.uk, 2017). The voter turnout in the June 2017

General election was the highest on record, but with a hung parliament (BBC News, 2017) and no clear winner, there is a challenge to the traditional notion of a single strong leader. The world is widely acknowledged to be in a phase of “democratic recession” - a phrase coined by political scientist Larry Diamond (Diamond, 2015). Mistrust of politicians has grown in the UK, notably post-Iraq war with Blair’s misrepresentation of the evidence (he has since admitted he “would have invaded Iraq anyway” (The Guardian, 2009b). More recently the perception that the British government has not handled the issue of immigration effectively has significantly affected political trust (McLaren, 2011: 163). The public are right to have a degree of skepticism about politicians brandishing facts, but this doesn’t explain why trustworthy sources remain unable to debunk misinformation effectively. This would suggest an erosion of what Pielke would call “honest brokers” (2007).

Citizen ignorance of politics, or ‘Post Truth’ Finally, citizen education is a common feature of citizen engagement. Education is rather akin to power (Sztompka 1999: 129). This factor “plays multiple roles in the generation and deployment of trust: making decisions on the trustworthiness of others, confidence at not falling into the trap of blind trust, or obsessive distrust” (Ibid). There must be education for trust through everyday experience (Ibid: 138). Lack of education (and therein ability to access and process the facts) was cited in many post EU-referendum analyses. For example, the Google search “What is the EU?” was trending immediately after voting to leave it (Collins, 2016). Is it possible a significant section of people didn’t understand what they were leaving? The evidence is that university-educated people voted to remain, as illustrated in Figure 1.2. Figure 1.2: Education Level and Vote in the EU Referendum

Demographic data: UK Census, Office for National Statistics.

One hypothesis for British citizen ignorance is misinformation from the media. Hajer and Uitermark (2008) cited media-derived authority. Politicians who use the media well are rewarded. Rein and Schön explain how stubborn policy controversies hold an epistemological predicament: “what can possibly be the basis for resolving conflicts of frames when the frames themselves determine what counts as evidence and how evidence is interpreted?” (1993: 145). ‘Solution aversion’ (Campbell and Kay, 2014) can lead to motivated disbelief, for example climate change for Republicans. Politicians have been known to cherry picking their facts (Channel 4 News, 2011) and it can be difficult to get an objective answer. In this new era of “post-factual politics” (Stoker, 2016) one hypothesis is that emotions are more important than facts in preference formation.

Conclusion In this section I have shown that there are a number of challenges to democracy that explain why Kirklees (and Britain) can be considered a “least likely case” for improving democracy.

1.5 Research questions My general question is what good practices can be learned from a selected case of local democracy that can be picked up and practised elsewhere. I chose a specific example in which to investigate this, which had relevant characteristics. Kirklees is a fairly typical municipality in the UK, but it is more proactive than most, which makes it a likely area in which to identify adaptable practices. Therefore I have two research questions that are equally important:

1. “How and to what extent has the Kirklees Democracy Commission contributed to the promotion of democratic goods?”

2. “What principles, processes and procedures can we take away from the Kirklees Democracy Commission to build into a model of participatory democracy best practice?”

2. Theoretical framework

2.1 Concepts

There are three main concepts I wish to discuss: two types of democracy (participatory and deliberative especially) and democratic ‘goods.’ As Collier and Adcock (1999: 546) suggest, “scholars should be cautious in claiming to have come up with a definitive definition of a concept’s meaning” and it is more productive to justify concepts based on the research goals and “the specific research tradition within which they are working” (in Mair, 2008: 196). With the correct dose of caution regarding how definitive my meanings of these concepts are, here I consider the debates around the concepts, specify the definitions I adopt and justify these choices. In terms of Sartori’s ladder of abstraction (1970: 1044) I seek to use deliberative democracy as a ‘middle-range theory’ that are “neither too general or too unique, and can make comparisons among relatively homogenous contexts” (Mair, 2008: 184).

Over recent years a range of theoretical perspectives have emerged that emphasise increasing and deepening citizen participation in political decision-making. Examples include participatory democracy (Pateman 1970), deliberative democracy (Bohman 1998), direct democracy (Saward 1998), difference democracy (Young 1990) and cosmopolitan democracy (Held 1995) (in Smith 2009: 8). There are important differences in emphasis and, on occasion, substance among these theoretical streams. Participatory democracy involves non-elected inhabitants with de facto decision-making powers, although the final decision making remains in the hands of the elected representatives (Sintomer et al 2012: 19). Deliberative democrats pay particular attention to the process by which decisions are made. In contrast, direct democrats emphasise the moment of decision making. Finally, cosmopolitan democracy is unashamedly global in its pretensions, questioning the legitimacy of transnational institutions. Of all of these variants, deliberative democracy dominates the current academic literature. By 2007 John Dryzek could write that “deliberative democracy now constitutes the most active area of political theory in its entirety (not just democratic theory)” (Pateman 2012:7).

Distinguishing participatory from deliberative democracy is not easy. Participatory democrats such as Carole Pateman tend to emphasise the intrinsic value of participation – its educative and developmental effect on citizens (Smith, 2009: 8). Pateman writes of “current fashion” for deliberative democracy as a core concept and argues that deliberative democrats have shown little interest in the last thirty years of participation promotion (2012: 14).

Notwithstanding Dennis Thompson’s belief that “the turn toward deliberative theory has not displaced participatory theory,” the prevalent view, albeit not always made explicit, seems to be that deliberative democracy has now overtaken and subsumed its predecessor (Ibid: 15). Smith in contrast writes that the dominant current within democratic theory is one that tends to valorise participation (2009: 17). Pateman says that the meaning of deliberative democracy is hard to pin down, but highlights the central claim of deliberative democratic theorists: “that individuals should always be prepared to defend their moral and political arguments and claims with reasons, and be prepared to deliberate with others about the reasons they provide” (Ibid). Some authors such as Diana Mutz argue that “the theories of participatory democracy are in important ways inconsistent with theories of deliberative democracy” (2006: 16) because for one, the tone as well as the context associated with deliberation, given its insistence on cross-cutting political conversation, seems completely inappropriate for most participatory settings - perhaps informal deliberation exists at serious dinner parties, maybe at work, in the neighbourhood, or in meetings, but the calm, rational exchange (‘in monotone voices’) idealised in formal deliberation less so (Ibid: 17). I disagree. Firstly, I believe deliberation is the “juicy” part of participation; it is where issues get thrashed out, where people meet and engage, rather than just vote, for example. Other models of participatory democracy (e.g. mini publics and participatory budgets) all include deliberation within them. Participation without deliberation would be an empty shell. The style of deliberation that Mutz finds fault with is open to reform.

We must place the potentially overly-abstract participatory/deliberative democratic debate within the context of concrete democratic institutions. Institutionalised forms of participation in political decision making are at what Smith calls “strategic levels” – democratic devices that provide citizens with a formal role in policy, legislative or constitutional decision making (2009: 6). Nonetheless, I see it as a particular positive that the deliberative democracy theory started with ideals - one could imagine Plato’s “forms” - of deliberative democracy before getting into the practical implementation (to start with the practical implementation and then seek ideals would, I believe, muddy the waters with the contextual underpinnings of the case in question). We can also place these concrete institutions in the context of wider political processes of change, such as decentralisation: Patsias et al argue that “creating participatory democracy implies decentralization, which is both a particular feature of democracy and a process in its own right” (2012: 2214). Moreover, participatory democracy “has a particular appeal within the contemporary context of increasing multilevel governance” (Ibid). Therefore, we can agree that improving the democracy within institutions will involve, as at least one factor, a process of increasing participation.

To conclude on the participatory/deliberative question, I am using the dominant terminology in the

literature (deliberative democracy), whilst I don't fully agree with it. In order to integrate the concerns of a number of different positions in democratic theory, I think it is better to settle on an inclusive or what Smith calls an “ecumenical” approach (2009: 15). Schmitter advises, when designing research, to "try to reach back as far as possible in social and political theory to find grounds for the relevance of your topic and avoid being manipulated by academic fad and fashion" (2008: 267). But as a social researcher it’s necessary to engage meaningfully with the current debates. So in this paper I will speak of “deliberative democratic theorists” and create a framework for “assessing the quality of deliberative democracy” when engaging with the theory that speaks in these terms, and switch to speaking in terms such as “participatory democratic practices” or more generally improving the “quality of democracy” confident in generating no major contradictions.

Finally, ‘democratic goods’ I mean “desirable qualities or goods that we expect of democratic institutions” (Smith 2009: 16). Smith justifies his choice of four ‘basic democratic goods’ - inclusiveness, popular control, considered judgement and transparency - on the grounds that we cannot imagine satisfactory democratic institutions without them (Ibid).2 On the deliberation /participation question, the democratic goods of inclusion and popular control imply greater participation. Smith is clear that these four democratic goods are not exhaustive, nor are they the only ways to assess the quality of a democratic institution. So to avoid the fallacy of arbitrariness, I settled on this combination of concepts only after discovering a precedent for bridging mainstream deliberative democracy theory and Smith’s four democratic goods’.3

2.2 Theories

This section outlines the key theories used in this research. Firstly I trace the history of deliberative democratic theory through four generations (Elstub 2010, 2016). Secondly I engage in a thematic discussion and critical reflection of Smith’s four democratic goods. Thirdly I discuss the role of emotions in democratic theory, defining my contribution in this area. Finally I define a model of assessing the quality of democratic participation of citizens, in relation to the research questions. i) Locating the case in deliberative democratic theory

Stephen Elstub describes three generations of deliberative democracy theory (2010) and he has recently added a fourth generation (2016). He explains that these ‘generations’ can be viewed as “analogous to feminism’s ‘waves’: explanatory groupings of varied bodies of thought, not strict, time-bound entities of coherent parentage or lineage” (2016: 148) Here I will explain the generations and how I intend to add to this theory. For ease of understanding I begin with Table 2.1, of my own design.

2 Occasionally adding two more - efficiency and transferability (Ibid: 17). 3 See Elstub’s comparative democratic assessment framework (2014) for such an example. 14

Table 2.1: The history of deliberative democracy (interpreted from Elstub 2010, 2016)

Generation Decade Authors Contribution

1G 1960s Habermas, Rawls Wrote about idealised deliberation conditions.

2G 1990s Bohman, Gutmann, Added social complexity (realised ideal Thompson outcomes unlikely). But wrote nothing about institutions.

3G 2000s Baber and Bartlett, Wrote about institutions. Includes O’Flynn, Parkinson transnational / racially divided societies.

4G 2010s (with Mansbridge, Getting into the nitty-gritty of specific micro earlier Chambers, Parkinson. processes. Systems design. roots)

In the first generation, Habermas and Rawls debated the normative justifications of deliberative democracy, as well as the interpretations and necessary components of the theory. Most famously of the two, Habermas (1996) “outlines his vision of deliberation in the public sphere as opinion former and agenda setter” (Elstub 2010: 298). The second generation theorists James Bohman (1996), Amy Gutmann and Dennis Thompson (1996) “fused the first-generation deliberative democracy of Habermas and Rawls with practical requirements” (Elstub 2010: 291) The dominant view in these theorists is that “preferences will adapt to public reason and new information, but not in a uniform manner” (Ibid). There will be no ultimate consensus formed (reason is not not a pure enough faculty, you might say, to reach universal conclusions). They argue that forms of communication other than reasoned exchange can, will and should be included. The third generation contended that their forbears offered little substantive detail in terms of the type of institution required to ensure that deliberative democracy could be actualized in complex societies (Ibid, 291-2). In short, these claims are made without an institutional typology. So in a sprouting of institutional innovations, Baber and Bartlett (2005), O’Flynn (2006) and Parkinson (2006) provide many interesting ideas on the changes that could enable deliberative democracy needs to become a theoretically robust, sustainable and the dominant model of democracy in practice. (Elstub 2010: 292).

The three authors of the third generation of deliberative democratic theorists are very different from one another. For Baber and Bartlett the issue is deliberative democracy across borders, for Parkinson it is deliberative agenda setting and for O’Flynn it is constructing an inclusive national identity. (Elstub

2010: 303). They theorise in very different contexts (Ibid: 302). Consequently they also address distinct issues, particular to the context. Baber and Bartlett's across-borders approach is outside the scope and purpose of my research. I focus on local government institutions. The remaining two are worthy of individual attention because they address issues that are relevant to contemporary democracy - the social divisions I mentioned before, and multi-level governance.

Parkinson (2006) makes suggestions for a democratic agenda-setting process. He considers original empirical evidence from real-life approximations of micro instances of deliberative democracy such as a citizens’ jury in Belfast, held in relation to planning and delivery of health services. There is also a case study that combined macro and micro deliberation in consultation processes used to form the NHS plan. He proposes a formal public model based on this plan: 1. Specialists and interest groups’ representatives deliberate in workshops. 2. Facilitators present this information small citizen panels, resulting in citizen recommendations (all covered by the media and overseen by parliamentary committees). 3. The remaining proposals would then be voted on by elected representatives (presumably parliament, but this is not clarified) or a referendum (2016: 171). What is strong about this process is its multiple stages which allows a variety of voices and actors to participate without degenerating into a free-for-all. It would be interesting to judge this using Smith (2009)’s criteria for democracy, but there is sadly little space to do so. I would expect to see a multi-stage process such as Parkinson’s Belfast NHS case in the case I select for this research. I am curious whether this particular combination of specialists’ workshops and citizens’ panels is transferable, what the weaknesses are, and what contextual factors limit it to the setting.

O’Flynn (2007) argues that within comparative politics scholars, there is an ongoing debate about the kinds of institutions that are best suited to the task of fostering political stability in societies deeply divided along ethnic lines. Scholars generally agree that 1) democratic institutions represent the best hope for such societies and, 2) that those institutions must provide for power sharing between conflicting ethnic groups. But beyond those two points of agreement, there is much disagreement. O’Flynn says the main disagreement is whether the choice of democratic institutions should principally be driven by a concern for the value of inclusion or for the value of moderation (2007). He concludes we need both. He asserts that for divided societies, we must “take questions of institutional design extremely seriously, no matter how difficult these questions prove in practice” (2007: 733).

O’Flynn states that the dominant (and perhaps only) model of democracy employed in ethnically divided societies such as Northern Ireland is “consociational” democracy (2006: 101) which means in layman’s speak, ‘government by elite cartel’. In this consociational (elite cartel) model, different ethnic leaders reach compromises through bargaining and then justify these bargains to their ethnic groups.

It is a private process that is not dependent upon the exchange of reasons, and therefore does not resemble deliberative democracy (Ibid, 101–2). O’Flynn goes on to ask whether deliberative and consociational democracy can be combined to facilitate the inclusion of more citizen voices (Ibid: 104). He argues that it can, and that such a combination would make the transition from conflict to democracy more sustainable (Elstub 2010: 300). There is a caveat: consociational decision making “must be reformed” to meet the deliberative requirements of publicity and reciprocity, by replacing bargaining with deliberation. The presence of an opposition, and proportional representation electoral systems, are proposed to facilitate this. I find O’Flynn’s analysis interesting for challenging the assumptions of western liberal democracy; in the consociational model O’Flynn shows a model such democracies could revert to if ethnic divisions are exacerbated. Regarding the third generation, Elstub concludes in a more cautious tone, as if to ward us off cold political realism: “In the main, a more practically relevant version of deliberative democracy is welcomed, but we must also guard against jettisoning its normative ideals in the process” (2010, 291). This is a relevant warning today in regards to the rise in populism, nationalism and nativism in Western democracies.

The fourth generation of thought within deliberative democracy scholarship is characterised by Elstub et al as a ‘systemic turn’ (2016: 143). Its character is the most participatory, yet it is an attempt to “secure the norms of deliberative democracy on a mass scale” (Ibid: 144). In the fourth generation the notion of what constitutes deliberation is broadened and its criteria relaxed (Ibid: 145). Third generation authors envisioned a division of labour in deliberative democracy. Accordingly, “the criterion for good deliberation should not be that every interaction in the system exhibit [all desirable democratic traits] but that the larger system reflect those goals” (Mansbridge, 1999: 224). For example, Parkinson (2006) claims that different sites and different moments offer diverse contributions to public deliberation (Elstub et al, 2016: 144). But fourth generation deliberative scholars suggest that only a systemic approach to deliberative democracy can ensure mass democracy. The dangers of widening our definition of ‘deliberative democracy’ too far - beyond the formal sphere and into the informal sphere - is discussed earlier in the Conceptual framework.

So far in this chapter I have outlined the four generations of theory in deliberative democracy. In my research I wish to add to this theory, by taking seriously the institutional settings of deliberation, and judging the case I find against the theoretical ideals. In this respect, I will be bridging the empirical and normative aspects of deliberation. To do this, I will now engage a pragmatic topics that is underrepresented in the deliberative literature, namely digital tools for democratic participation. ii) E-Democracy

There are important gaps in the discourse of public administration when it comes to the effectiveness of citizen participation and e-participation programs in various countries (Kim & Lee, 2012: 826).

Nonetheless, digital methods will inevitably be utilized in democratic processes. Some of the more commonly used tool functions include crowdsourcing citizen ideas, conducting citizen polling, and collecting citizen feedback on specific plans. Moss and Coleman evaluate the UK Government’s e-democracy policy and argue that policy experimentation in the area has been disappointing overall (2014: 410). Their analysis emphasizes the ongoing importance of online deliberation in achieving inclusive, informed and negotiated policy formation and political decision making (Ibid). Chickering and Turner suggest that “harnessing the transpartisan power of social media offers the possibility of aiding creative political evolution, especially of a leader’s highlighting (with media support) successful experiments in self-governance” (2017: 13). Therefore, given the increasing take-up of digital tools in democratic practice, I will add to the theory by studying an empirical case of e-democracy practice and analysing the effectiveness of theory,

My research has revealed a cornucopia of methods. Rose and Saebo (2005) outline five different ‘genres’ of digital democracy each with three-five features /sites of activity, which I have adapted into Table 2.2:

Table 2.2: Opportunities for development of Democracy based on known web technology features

Genre name Web-features

The Challenge and Chat rooms, E-docket/Dialogue system, Anti-campaign sites, Virtual Riposte petitions, On-line voting.

The Political Party websites, Inquiring information, Super-sites, Voter Compasses, Manifesto Campaign sites, Web logging, Politicians corner, Broadcast opportunity, City Halls

The Rational Issue Round table discussions, Broadcast meetings, Debate

The Respectful Develop Netiquette/ User agreements, E-debates via mail and online Question and posting, Citizen Panel, Contact Information for Politicians, Web-meetings Answer with politicians.

The Unanswered Directory for further action, Identify who is responsible for responding Question (adapted from Rose and Saebo, 2005: 162-3)

Experimentation in the UK Government’s e-democracy policy has been disappointing overall (Moss and Coleman, 2014: 410). There are nonetheless many potential innovations in e-democracy. Two next-gen digital tool ideas with promise are the Delphi technique, and Collaborative policy annotation. Firstly, the Delphi technique is currently used for policy development and perhaps it can be trialled online. The Delphi technique’s stages can be compared to Parkinson’s use of expert panels: this method uses external referees to reach consensus instead of the expert panel. In principle it could inform people and provide a new way for them to provide constructive feedback. Secondly, in

Collaborative policy annotation, experts (or genuinely interested and knowledgeable lay people) collaboratively annotate policy documents is one practical tool (Google Documents makes this quite easy)

The literature paints a mixed picture of E-Democracy. Some see it as a potential way to increase government responsiveness (Kim and Lee, 2012), others emphasise the potential of the Internet as a space of direct power and control (Moss and Coleman, 2014: 423). As in all effective systems, it needs analysis to accommodate evolving political issues and opinions, and thus its design must be an iterative process,

In this section I have traced my theoretical framework, starting with a genealogy of deliberative democracy theory, before engaging with e-democracy. In the next section I will outline a framework for evaluating democratic practice. iii) Evaluating democratic practises: a framework

We require a more robust analytic framework for systematic approaches to deliberative democracy that attends to real-life policymaking (Ankeny, 2016: 21). In assessing democratic innovations I will consider the extent to which they realise four explicitly democratic goods, namely inclusiveness, popular control, considered judgement transparency (Smith 2009: 16).

These four goods are particularly apposite for evaluating the democratic qualities of innovations because, arguably, they are fundamental to any theoretical account of the democratic legitimacy of institutions (Smith 2009: 16). However they are interpreted and weighted, it is difficult to conceive of a reasonable account of democratic institutions that did not consider these goods (Ibid). In other words, a democratic theory that overlooked any one of these goods would likely be deemed severely deficient (Ibid). We are not making any claims as to whether these goods are intrinsic or instrumental to democracy (Ibid): different theories of democracy will offer different accounts as to which of these goods (and others) are intrinsic and which are instrumental and the relative significance given to each of these goods (Ibid). Our approach avoids making any such claims beyond the perspective that the democratic status of institutions that fail to realise these goods in a compelling combination is likely to be challenged (Ibid).

For Smith, a key question is: can democratic innovations buck the trend and institutionalise effective incentives for participation by citizens from across different social groups (Ibid: 24)? In addition to considering the wider literature beyond Smith for each democratic good and raising my own questions, I will consider the role of e-democracy in realising (promoting or hindering) each good.

Inclusiveness Our understanding of inclusiveness must be reconnected with the “very basic measure of social justice: how many people are able to participate?” (Rushkoff, 2004: 65) Inclusiveness “turns our attention to the way in which political equality is realised in at least two aspects of participation: presence and voice” (Smith, 2009: 16). Smith writes that “the first challenge offered by critics and sceptics is that inclusiveness cannot be realised because of differential rates of participation across social groups” (Ibid: 18). With regards to presence, ‘getting people to the table’ is a challenge highlighted in much participatory democratic theory. In many Western democracies we see low turnouts at elections. Opting out “amounts to a political statement - a third choice that, in effect says ‘No!’ to both options on the table” (Chickering and Turner, 2017: 16). With regards to local participatory democracy we find that “entreaties to participate promised on gaining social recognition have no effect” (Arceneaux and Butler, 2015). People are shy to turn up: when engaging people with democracy, the “highest drop out occurs when the prospect of having to attend an actual debate/deliberative event is raised” (Karjalainen and Rapeli, 2014). People are not “motivated by democracy as a concept unless things are going seriously wrong” (Demsoc.org, 2013). The people who do attend tend to be more confrontational and have higher political efficacy (Niemeyer, Felicetti and Ruggero, 2012: 10). Those who are less educated lack the skills and thus confidence to volunteer (Arceneaux and Butler, 2015: 131). It seems reasonable that full participation or even majority participation is an unrealistic ideal. Smith writes that “in practice inclusiveness will not, or even cannot, be realised” (2009: 19).

Partisanship and political divisions are a growing problem for democratic processes. Inclusion is also a question of ‘reasonable politics’, the ability to meet in discussion - to physically meet to deliberate with a variety of people and accept the other side as legitimate. In today’s world we face challenges to intergroup relations in pluralistic contexts: increased political polarization (Haidt 2013); a diminished willingness to compromise with outgroups (Al Ramiah and Hewstone, 2012). Increasing numbers of Americans only marry within their party affiliation (Hersh, 2016) suggesting polarisation into tribes on partisan lines could become entrenched. There exist risks of living and learning in silos (Hetrick, 2014). Several authors naturalise out-group excluding behaviours due to the rewards of bonding inclusion of tribal behaviour and the formation of two groups: “insiders” and “outsiders”. Duyvendak defines the emotional sphere of home with some exclusivity: a "symbolic space with one's own people and activities" (Ibid). Putnam’s “Bowling Alone” (2007) describes the alienation of individuals in the USA, which like most trends originating from that country, is followed by the UK in a slightly more moderate form. From reading a wide range of literature, there are several questions arising; in my own words: does trust-building within an in-group necessitate an out-group? Does cosmopolitan theory neglect this emotional/social need unrealistically? Potentially, expanding in-group inclusion can reduce out-group rejection: racism, tribalism, factionalism, political partisanship; demonization of people of the opposing party.

To realise inclusiveness, if we want to realise fuller democratic participation, perhaps we need to utilise the power of positive emotions such as hope to get people to the table, and certain types of love to keep them there. Positive emotions are rarely if ever explicitly discussed in deliberation or policy formation processes, at least in design. I find this odd, as emotions such as hope drives political engagement, such as in Obama’s famous campaign, but democratic designs take a cold, unemotional approach to what attracts people to participate in the first place. I argue this rational-actor approach leads to democratic disengagement. In contrast, Martha Nussbaum argues for ‘love’ in politics (2015).

The literature is equivocal about the benefits of the internet to inclusiveness in democracy. On the positive, the fact participation is virtual rather than face-to-face, “may in principle empower engagement by citizens who are often excluded from traditional forms of participation” (Smith 2009: 152). Because citizens and other actors are not actually required to gather at a single physical location, then in principle very large scale conversations are possible (Ibid: 156). This can easily happen across borders, facilitating a transnational politics more inclusive than previously imaginable before the internet. Rushkoff emphasises the power of internet to extend collective autonomy, in contrast to the passive consumer model: This population [of internet users] is made up not of customers to whom you must sell, or even constituents to whom you must pander, but of partners on whom you can rely and with whom you can act. Treat them as such, and you might be surprised by how much you can get done together. (Rushkoff, 2004: 65) Less positively, low ICT proficiency could impact the level of engagement by participants (Smith 2009: 160); trolling can intimidate, marginalise and exclude people with abusive language (Coles and West, 2016). Worcman (2002) challenges the idea that the internet is analogous to ‘real-world’ society: “Digital division is cultural exclusion. But is digital inclusion cultural inclusion?”

Popular Control Popular control “requires consideration of the degree that participants are able to influence different aspects of the decision making process” (Smith 2009: 16). An influential model for assessing the level of popular control is Arnstein’s (1969) Ladder of Citizen Participation with ‘manipulation’ at the bottom, ‘consultation’ in the middle and ‘citizen control’ at the top. Smith explains that popular control gets a lesser weighting by most strains of democratic theory: “Much more attention is given to inclusiveness in both democratic theory and practice compared to realising popular control (direct democrats aside). What is often missing from the design of most democratic institutions is any sense that citizens have effective control over significant elements of decision making” (2009: 26).

Smith goes on to ask, “Are there procedures that can be put in place that ensure that outputs are given due consideration and weight in future political decisions” (Ibid: 27)? Moreover, through participative democratic initiatives, the social basis of the citizen-government relationship can change for the better. According to Fung and Wright (2003: 18), participative experiments “establish new channels for those most directly affected by targeted problems... to apply their knowledge, intelligence and interest to the formulation of solutions” (Bifulco, 2013: 178). Accountability is also a factor. If the deliberative democratic process fails to take into account citizens’ views, is there recourse? Accountability culture in politics can be a problem if it leads to blame and defensiveness (which actively encourages hiding of failure). The media encourages outrage, through sensationalization (Schlosberg, 2013).

Digital democracy has the potential to empower citizens. “Access to media technology empowers people to discuss how they might want to change the status quo” (Rushkoff, 2004: 63). Understandably, “E-participants’ satisfaction with government responsiveness is positively associated with their perceptions of influencing government decision making” (Kim and Lee, 2012: 819). Networking technologies allow for online collaboration in the implementation of new models, and the very real-world organisation of social activism and relief efforts (Ibid). “The internet is ungovernable and is made up of intelligent and autonomous nodes” argues Padilla (2013, in Moreno-Callabud, 2015: 141). In Spain, the ‘copyleft’ movement has effectively de-legitimised copyright since the nineties, partly due to the rise in hacklabs (laboratories experimenting with new technologies to serve political ends) (Zapata, in Moreno Caballud, 2015: 150). “Post-media” voices in the digital sphere can recount their own versions of events and circumvent traditional media (Moreno Caballud, 2015: 215).

Not all are so optimistic about the power of the internet to empower. British filmmaker Adam Curtis argues that since the 1970s, governments, financiers, and technology utopians have given up on the complex "real world" and built a simple "fake world" that is run by corporations and kept stable by politicians (Hypernormalisation, 2016). In 2016 the British government passed the Investigatory Powers Bill, known as the ‘Snooper’s Charter’; it claimed to 'take the fight to the terrorists' but has been criticised for removing privacy for citizens’ sensitive data (Telegraph, 2016). Marinez argues that the internet constrains ways of doing things that influence the collective ways of communicating and producing, ‘creating feedback cycles between users and technology’ (2014a, in Moreno-Callabud, 2015: 143). Using the internet to challenge neoliberalism contains a contradiction because “technology for democracy comes itself from neoliberalism” (Moreno-Callabud, 2015: 141). So we must see the internet as an opportunity for democracy because of its openness and accessibility, whilst simultaneously being critical and reflexive in our evaluation of its workings, choice architecture, and elite control structures.

Considered Judgment

“Learning without thought is labour lost;

Thought without learning is perilous.”

—Confucius, 551–479 b.c.

In this section I will consider Smith’s (2009) account of considered judgment, the facilitator role in deliberation designs, and finally, the impact of the internet on considered judgment.

Firstly, Smith argues that the “legitimacy of citizen participation in political decision making arguably rests on the capacity of citizens to make thoughtful and reflective judgements” (2009: 27-28).

My second point on considered judgment is that deliberation facilitators are a key element of many deliberative designs, but remain understudied in the literature thus far. Deliberative designs speak in general terms about informing citizens and guiding the conversation. This is in stark comparison to the literature on conflict mediation (Laws and Forester, 2007) which elaborates on best mediation practice in precise detail. The two most obvious roles of effective facilitator (that even casual facilitators would know instinctively) are to keep the discussion focused on a topic, and to keep a level of order, to calm down participants if things get too heated. Even the inexperienced facilitator may have to engage with the tangled emotions and conflicting thoughts that we all carry with us to varying degrees. More skilled facilitators would offer timely interjections in discussions for, to encourage ‘frame reflective discourse’ (Rein and Schön, 1993). There is evidence that suggests pondering your internal conflicts may help you stereotype others less. (Stern and Kleiman, 2015).

Thirdly and finally, with regards to digital democracy, Smith is cautious: “The various designs indicate that while there is some potential to enhance the realisation of inclusiveness, transparency, efficiency and transferability, democratic and institutional gains cannot be taken for granted” (2009: 164). As discussed in the ‘challenges to democracy’ section, a fragmented audience online in “filter bubbles” risks an equally fragmented knowledge base, with different sections of the population making judgements by only considering partial information (tailored by algorithms to confirm and reinforce their existing beliefs). On the positive, the internet has undeniably improved the access to information. Kim and Lee suggest that a sense of shared activity between citizens and representatives matters: “[E-participation practices] rehearse and reinforce a key weakness of actually-existing democracies: the lack of meaningful opportunities for citizens to compare and contrast their reasons for holding views and to engage in such activity in the knowledge that public authorities

and political representatives are similarly engaged” (2012: 819). So we are right to be equivocal about the role of the internet in considered judgement in democratic practice.

Transparency In this section I will discuss: 1) the pitfalls of accountability culture, 2) a significant evidence base for adopting a more forgiving model of transparency, and 3) the impact of the internet on transparency in democracy.

When something is transparent, you can see through it, like glass. Transparency “consists of accuracy, clarity and openness or visibility” (Hargreaves, 2016: 124). In the social rather than physical world we think of transparency as being a way to hold the powerful to account, or accountability. In participatory democracy, this means the process needs to be open to scrutiny “not only to the participants, but also to the wider public” (Smith, 2009: 29). But accountability in Britain is often associated with mob justice, spearheaded by the tabloid press.

There are other models of transparency than the current popular conception of accountability. In The Six Secrets of Change, Michael Fullan (2011) advocates combining transparency with a non-judgmental culture that refrains from being punitive. In other words, “inquiry, not inquisition, is the key to transparency” (Hargreaves, 2016: 124). For Fullan, “positive pressure” is not punitive pressure; rather than punitive accountability, increased transparency “promotes openness, inquiry, better communication and a shared responsibility for improvement” (Hargreaves, 2016: 125). Evidence for this can be found in the medical world: in one hospital’s pediatric ward, implementation of the anonymous reporting system with training was associated with a statistically significant increase in the rate of reported medical errors (Taylor et al, 2007).

To take a whole-systems approach, democracies can learn from scrupulous learning from mistakes that happens in the airline industry that makes them “antifragile” (Taleb, 2003): they “[convert] disorder, error, mistakes, variability into fuel for improvement" and “with every single crash, airlines become safer, more reliable and more secure” (Pedersen, 2016). Likewise in basic research, when incidents are recorded anonymously, analyzed, discussed, and communicated so that a recurrence can be prevented and harm avoided by learning from past mistakes (Dirnagl et al, 2016). Through reporting without punitivity, we create a “mature error culture” and ultimately a “safer and more communicative environment” (Ibid). In democracy, transparency “centres reflection on the openness of proceedings” to both participants and the wider public (Smith 2009: 16). The question that follows is: can we apply the lessons of Fullan’s positive pressure, Dirnagl et al’s anonymously reported errors and and Taleb’s antifragile airlines to local government? Could municipalities become transparent in

a way that helps democracy? It will be interesting to see how open or defensive the case’s representatives are.

Thirdly and finally, the internet offers opportunities to make democracy transparent. Transparency in media makes information available to those who never had access to it before (Rushkoff 2004: 63). However, the internet can also undermine transparency: accusations that Russian hackers were able to “breach” of the 2016 American elections “threatens future US elections” (Bloomberg, 2017). “Leaks” of official documents are hailed by activists as creating transparency, but condemned by governments as undermining national security. While the US government actively supports free internet and social media use abroad, their criticisms of the Wikileaks disclosures “reveal the bias in relation to transparency and democracy,” writes Pieterse (2012).

Developing an assessment tool To develop a practical assessment tool, Elstub uses the same criteria as Smith and in his analysis table (2014: 405, recreated in table 2.3) adds a rather helpful division of steps in the process of democratic models. He does this to allow a comparative analysis of institutional devices and how effectively they can enact democratic goods across different decision-making stages, namely Agenda setting, Debate, Decision making, Implementation and Review (Ibid). He calls this the DePER (Deliberative Pragmatic Equilibrium Review) framework, and says it can be adapted to any political context, but here is specifically adapted to the UK. This DePER framework will result in a deeper understanding of “what different institutions can really achieve” in relation to enacting deliberative democracy (Elstub, 2014: 406).

Exactly how one judges what is ‘low’ or ‘high’ is difficult to determine specifically here: “As there is no absolute standard to judge by, it is necessarily a relative comparison” (Ibid: 404). Elstub simply says that a judgment will draw on a range of quantitative and qualitative empirical data, which “is not easy to combine and reconcile” (Ibid). Elstub addresses the subjectivity of the judgment head on, saying that “normative judgement is also being applied” which brings the danger of “complete relativism:, and concludes the framework’s users are responsible for justifying their judgements (Ibid: 404).

When applying this framework, I will justify my judgments based on the evidence before me throughout (both one at a time, and in summary). My reasoning will inevitably be at least partially subjective, so to avoid relativism I will explain my judgments each time. It is noteworthy that Elstub chooses comparison as the benchmark of a standard, because this has the strength of real-world applicability, but the weakness of abandoning ambition by setting the benchmark based on what is currently available. I am aware the five stages of the process will be applicable to the case as they are features of any democratic program.

Table 2.3: Elstub’s (2014) democratic assessment tool4

Case

Inclusiveness Popular Control Considered Transparency judgment

Agenda setting low/moderate/high low/moderate/high low/moderate/high low/moderate/high

Debate low/moderate/high low/moderate/high low/moderate/high low/moderate/high

Decision making low/moderate/high low/moderate/high low/moderate/high low/moderate/high

Implementation low/moderate/high low/moderate/high low/moderate/high low/moderate/high

Review low/moderate/high low/moderate/high low/moderate/high low/moderate/high

Conclusion There are obviously more ways to assess the quality of democratic practices than the Smith’s (2009) four democratic goods that I have laid out here. Smith includes two further criteria that I have chosen to leave out of my main assessment tool and consign to later discussion: efficiency and transferability (2009: 29-30). I have done this for two reasons. First, efficiency is a double-edged sword with democratic processes, especially deliberative processes: it takes time to deliberate, and you cannot have the same quality discussion in five minutes that you could in an hour. So I prefer to reflect on this question in my analysis of this case and concluding comments, to avoid locking in the presumption that faster is better (of course blatant inefficiency is unhelpful but this is about defining the quality of a process and not merely its speed). Second, transferability is a nebulous criterion that cannot be easily judged given the array of local, and national contexts. The third sub-question of this paper is precisely to what extent the realisation of the four main democratic goods (inclusiveness, popular control, considered judgment and transparency) can be transferred to other contexts. If a process does not rank highly in these four criteria, we would not wish to transfer it to other settings. So again I defer this question. There is no shortage of possible criteria: ‘procedural independence of civil society’ and ‘top-down or bottom-up’ (Sintomer et al, 2012: 28) are just two, so discretion is required.

4 Elstub produces a second set of the five left-hand labels, for comparison of two systems. For my case and the scope of this paper as a single case study, one will suffice. 26

iv) Emotions and democracy

This section will involve a critique of pure reason (to quote Kant); an argument for adding emotion to our conception of deliberation, a consideration of empathy as the most important emotion, an evaluation of the paradoxes of trust, a plea for emotional facilitation, and a query into the lack of other positive emotions.

Firstly, whilst deliberative democracy prioritises rationality, growing body of psychological research shows that we are very imperfect reasoners: Nyhan and Reifler found in their study that when watching news coverage that covers two points of view, people actively stopped listening to information that contradicts their opinion (2010: 304). They called this the backfire effect and is ‘consistent with a wide array of research’ (Ibid). Another name for the backfire effect is confirmation bias. This means that “when people would like a certain idea/concept to be true, they end up believing it to be true” (Heshmat, 2015) and “once we have formed a view, we embrace information that confirms that view while ignoring, or rejecting, information that casts doubt on it” (Ibid). Thus, we may become prisoners of our assumptions. I interviewed participation scholar Martin Carcasson (who also runs public deliberation events, and trains his college students to become facilitators) in a call from Amsterdam to his office in Colorado, and he told me that confirmation bias is the single worst cognitive bias that he encounters, and the one he sees most often (2017).

Secondly and relatedly, the omission of the affective element of deliberation strikes me as a major gap in the literature. Richards (2007) claims that ‘emotional governance’ is greatly needed. Trump, “even if he’s wrong on the economics, he’s telling people he has heard them and will be responsive to their grievances and fears. And they are starved for that” (Chickering and Turner, 2017: 15). “Journalists have a major role to play in shaping the profile of feelings which define a national emotional public sphere, as do celebrities and other public figures” (Richards, 2013: 126). With headlines such as “this tidal wave of migrants could be the biggest threat to Europe since the war” (Daily Mail, 2015) tabloids have spread fear of migration persistently. British society offers very few outlets for this backlog of fear and frustration. Sheff claims “repression of emotions is a key institution in modern societies,” and that it “underlies both interpersonal and intergroup violence” (2013: 84). What is more, “emotional expressions are contagious if groups carry a backlog of unexpressed emotions”” (Ibid: 91). Sheff’s claim is supported by the fact that hate crimes in the UK ‘surged by 42%’ post-referendum (Independent, 2016). Therefore I argue that we need to design deliberative systems that take emotions seriously and that emotions should be included in Smith’s (2009) criterion of considered judgement.

My third point is that, if we agree that a participatory democratic system promoting considered judgment in deliberation requires an appreciation of emotion, a strong contender for the priority

emotion is empathy. Empathy facilitates prosocial behavior and social understanding (Gutsell and Inzlicht, 2011); but perhaps we face an “empathy deficit” (Schumann et al, 2014). It is commonplace to describe empathy as “stepping into someone else’s shoes;” “Moral empathy gaps” (Ditto and Koleva, 2014) can exacerbate political conflict (and other kinds of conflict as well) by contributing to the perception that people who do not share our moral opinions are unintelligent and/or have malevolent intentions. Participatory democracy concerns (ideally and implicitly, if not always explicitly) a collection of their judgments about what is good for the whole, not merely a collection of the selfish preferences of individuals. Haidt’s Moral Foundations Theory (2008) holds that our deeply held values such as personal freedom or social justice “bind us and blind us” - they bind us to an in-group and blind us to people with different moral foundations to ours. Given that exaggerated perceptions of differences with others can lead to “symbolic threat” (Oskamp, 2008: ch.2) that worsens inter-group relations, I agree with the literature that empathy is important for bridging divides. However, the question whether increasing empathy will result in better moral decisions and behaviors is debated (Lamm and Majdand ić, 2015). ž

Fourthly, trust is a key emotion in democracy. Participatory processes-designers can determine the social conditions which make collective, shared experiences more likely, and therefore create a context conducive for the emergence of a lasting “trust culture” (Sztompka 1999: 119). Lenard (2008) argues for the centrality of trust to the democratic process and that distrust is inimical to democracy, along two dimensions: first, “citizens must trust their legislators to have the national interest in mind and citizens must trust each other to abide by democratically established law”. Second, “citizens must be vigilant with respect to their legislators and fellow to citizens” (Lenard 2008). Inequality is the strongest determinant of trust (Uslaner, 2005). Trust plays an important role in participation levels, but contrary to more traditional models, the causal relationship runs from trust to participation (Ibid). Yet there are paradoxes in trust. Mistrust engages people: “mistrust depends on trust” (Lenard, 2008): “we trust fellow citizens to monitor for abuses of our own rights and privileges just as [we theirs]”. Devos et al (2002) found that the level of trust in various institutions correlated positively with values that stress stability, protection, and preservation of traditional practices, and negatively with values that emphasize independent thought and action and favour change. This is like the concept of Schudson’s “monitorial citizen” (2000).

Fifthly, facilitators can and do play a role moderating emotions in deliberative institutional settings. Behaviour needs to be modeled: experimental psychologists have demonstrated that one doesn’t feel better after venting anger (shouting) and that what works is explaining our frustration in a courteous way. (Sheff, 2013: 91). This kind of structured release of pent-up emotion underpins the success of restorative justice in criminal proceedings, in which a victim meets a perpetrator and has a calm, or at least physically safe, discussion with them. One potential training method is Non Violent

Communication (Rosenberg, 2007) because it encourages the accurate and free expression of emotions without blaming others, alongside teaching ‘active listening’. In her work Peaceful Persuasion: The Geopolitics of Nonviolent Rhetoric, Ellen W. Gorsevski speaks of “rhetoric in the service of social knowledge” (2004: vii). If this language seems alien, it is because our democratic culture has to go some way to realise the potential of peaceful enquiry and not the war-like battle of opinions (where there are winners and losers, or painful compromise) that is implicit in much of our inherited concepts of deliberation.

Finally, the internet may impact considered judgment. Smith asks, “Does computer-mediated engagement affect the extent to which mutual understanding and empathy are realised (2009: 161)? There are differences in timescale and hence intensity between online and offline proceedings (Ibid) with the traditional deliberative poll spending a few hours in small discussions, whereas informal online conversations can spread out over days as many users dip in and out casually, and an unknown audience observes. The impact of theses different elements of online and offline engagement are yet to be investigated (Ibid).

In this section I have explained that the democratic good of ‘considered judgment’ is perhaps the most controversial of all four, and that the political literature that addresses emotions and takes the emotional life of citizens seriously is small. Therefore contributing to this theory is an ambition of my research.

3. Research design:

3.1 Methodological literature

This research design is a single case study which focuses on one single case (N=1) that is expected to provide insight and or understanding in a population of other cases when they are found to have similar circumstances (Gerring and Seawright, 2007: 86). My approach is interpretive. An interpretive approach is most suitable to answer the research question because the variety of actors and the multi-stage process means that a great deal of information must be cross-examined and triangulated to judge the case against normative principles of effective democracy. In addition, interpretive analysis allows me to study the meeting point between humans and processes in democracy and the relationships that form: amongst representatives, amongst citizens and between representatives and citizens. The case selected for the analysis is the Kirklees Democracy Commission. As will be explained further in the Case section, I chose this case because it is active and sequential.

A single case study was chosen because 1) I could do it in the time available; 2) the fast pace of change in the wider context of English local government (redrawn boundaries; austerity; Brexit; a general election; the shift to financial independence from central government by 2020) - and the consequent need to reformulate the relationship between local government and citizens are a sufficiently complex set of resultants that an in-depth study of this single widely-known ambitious democratic innovation could be sufficiently informative and useful for the positive evolution of democratic institutions in England.

In qualitative interviewing, there is a strong interest in a more nuanced view than can be gotten from closed survey questions (Bryman 2012: 470). Qualitative interviewing obtains more nuanced and detailed information than forced choice questionnaires. Questioning strategies can be utilized to obtain explicit choice information. These can be pre-planned with branching questions dependent on answers; or they can be ad-hoc to accommodate rich details or unanticipated topics. As a result, qualitative interviewing tends to be flexible. It can respond to the direction interviewees take the interview. Researchers can perhaps adjust the emphasis of their research if major issues emerge from the interviews (Ibid). In qualitative interviewing, a researcher ideally wants rich, detailed answers (Ibid).

Interviews were semi-structured, so that the more specific issues can be addressed (Bryman 2012: 472). The main benefit over structured interviews is that semi structured interviews offer flexibility. Interviewees themselves can raise additional or complementary issues, which go on to form an integral part of a study’s findings. The open-ended, discursive nature of the interviews can permit an iterative process of refinement, whereby lines of thought identified by earlier interviewees could be

taken up and presented to later interviewees (Beardsworth and Keil 1992: 261-2, in Bryman 2012: 472). Brinkmann writes of the “knowledge-producing potentials of dialogues” (2013: 21). Interviews involve (i) gathering basic information about a case; (ii) filling in gaps in existing historical accounts; (iii) [addressing] more theoretical concerns such as finding omitted variables and hypotheses; and (iv) uncovering causal processes (George and Bennett, 2005 in Tansey, 2007). In some cases, interviews corroborate evidence from other sources (Tansey, 2007).

Furthermore, primary sources such as government official publications offer the political researcher a reliable starting (Burnham et al, 2008: 194). They form the essential outer framework for political research since they are often the result of the policymaking process (Ibid).

I intend to use a mix of deductive and inductive reasoning in my case study. It is partly deductive in the sense that I've scrutinised the theory in depth, so I base what I am looking for on the theory. It is partly inductive because it is my interpretation of the case, and the research not "rigorous" in the sense of controlled variables measured in linear steps. This mix is sometimes called 'abductive.'

Data collection

The case study consists of primary data. To answer the question “How and to what extent has the Kirklees Democracy Commission contributed to the promotion of democratic goods?” a qualitative content analysis of interviews and policy documents is used.

Sampling

The “snowballing” technique was used. The advantage of snowball sampling is that it is the best way to come in touch with the various officials that were involved in the Commission. Random sampling of local officials would make no sense. Initially five members of the Commission were approached (see interviewee list in appendix 2): the project lead, and one from each of the four political parties, as well as the senior responsible manager from the Council. These were chosen to get a representative picture of the commission from the organisers’ side. Second on my list was citizens, to offer an impartial perspective, to complement the citizen voices recorded in the Commission’s primary documents. Third on my list are third-party practitioners and interest group representatives that are involved in the case. The organisations that were approached were the Social Marketing Gateway and The Youth Council. At the bottom of the list were experts on democratic theory and practice who were not directly involved in the case, to learn about developments in participatory democracy theory and practice.This list was relatively complete in terms of the range of actors involved, interviewing varied officials covering all roles, including the two most senior officials.

Method of analysis

With the information I gathered, I constructed meaning and generated insights by creating a set of themes. I analysed transcribed interviews, applying codes to them using textual analysis software. I used specialised software MaxQDA for this. When developing a coding framework I started deductively, from the theory, with Smith’s (2009) four democratic goods. The framework then evolved inductively from there based on the material I discovered, first into subtopics within those four goods, and then separately, branching into three other main themes. First, the local political context. Second, the stages in the process of the Commission, and comments about each stage. Third, the relationship between the council and citizens. Making in total four top-level coding themes, In total I used 96 separate codes to analyse the material.

3.2 Case selection

I wanted to investigate a positive example of democratic engagement in Britain. I chose Britain because it is close, I understand the system, and I knew that going somewhere with my native language would increase the feasibility of the study and make gaining richer insights possible. One could call Britain a “least likely case” for success in improving the quality of participation in democracy because of its many challenges (see section 1.4). I was recommended Kirklees by the Electoral Reform Society as an example of a ‘live’ project that could be exciting to look into. I wanted to find a compromise between the unique and typical case (Bryman 2012: 70): a uniquely active case of citizen engagement, but a relatively typical case of a local authority in England, to maximise its transferability.

One council that is proactive in redefining its relationship with citizens is Kirklees, Yorkshire. It includes the city of Huddersfield and three more rural regions. The Kirklees Democracy Commission is aiming to “design the next generation of democracy in Kirklees”. A number of stages have taken place encompassing a review of national research, public enquiries with expert testimony, democracy roadshow events, public enquiries with expert witness testimony, and group discussions. Numerous actors have been engages: citizens, councillors, experts. Questions the KDC seek to answer are across 3 themes: Councillors, Elections and Decision Making. One concrete proposal is reducing councillor elections to once every four years. By opening up such constitutional questions to its citizens, Kirklees is fairly unusual in its high levels of engagement.

The institutional circumstances, size and citizen makeup of this case are relatively representative or typical for local authorities in England, which have evolved in parallel with universal standards and guidance, and only recently are developing more autonomy. This increases the transferability of the insights drawn from the case, because other local authorities could feasibly replicate many if not all of the methods of the Commission in their jurisdictions. When reflecting on the typicality of Kirklees, the only atypical features I can determine are its newness as a political jurisdiction, being formed in 1974,

and its relatively spread-out population, at least when compared to solely urban boroughs).

Successful policy pilots in local authorities can spread quickly. For example, the outer London borough of Redbridge successfully trialled an online participatory budgeting process which was then adopted by multiple other authorities (Participedia.net, 2016). Thus the balance between being a unique and a typical case is ideal for piloting new democratic processes, analysing the successes and disseminating knowledge gained about effective or ‘best’ practice.

In the case of a negative result (there is nothing positive and new to build into best practice), it could still add value to theory and practice. Arceneaux and Butler (2015) title their paper ‘How Not to Increase Participation in Local Government.’ Anthony Zacharzewski of The Democracy Society suggests ‘things that have gone wrong are sometimes more interesting to learn from’ (Demsoc.org, 2013). Reflecting on why the case is non-translatable to other settings could help others avoid repeating mistakes when they start such a process.

Validity

“Interview effects” are a major concern with interview situations (Burnham et al, 2008: 123). Interview effects arise when respondents give different responses to interviewers because they are perceived to be more or less empathetic to the respondent (Ibid). This may be because of gender, ethnicity, accent, demeanour, dress or similar attributes (Ibid: 123-124). As a white male, I am unlikely to encounter negative interviewer effects based on race and gender, when the region is mostly white and most government officials are male. George Bernard Shaw commented “It is impossible for an Englishman to open his mouth without making some other Englishman hate or despise him” (1916: 3). With a clearly southern accent I am audibly from a different region of England from the northern respondents in Kirklees, Yorkshire. Antagonism between English regions is mostly light-hearted, apart from perhaps in football, and is unlikely to significantly affect the validity of interview responses.

One interview effect that is entirely possible is that respondents will be on ‘best behaviour’; they will put on their ‘public face’ and see a master’s student interview as a ‘PR exercise’ and will attempt to hide professional shortcomings and ‘sell’ their project. This is especially possible with a high-profile project such as the Kirklees Democracy Commission, in which respondents have invested significant time and energy. In the face of salesmanship, I will resist the manner of a dog with a bone, or a seasoned TV anchor hungry to catch out a junior minister on live prime time television. Questioning will aim first and foremost to build rapport to solicit expanded answers. Serious scrutiny will be left for the analysis stage when multiple sources can be compared.

As this research plans to interview representatives from each political party, it is possible that the

pre-existing relationship between parties in the area will raise adverse competitive dynamics. The snap general election announced in April 2017 may result in a spike in partisan sentiments. There are local elections scheduled too. I am a Labour party member, a fact easily identified with a cursory social media search. I will not volunteer this information; nor will he hide it if asked. To attenuate accusation of bias, I have therefore been completely transparent in the interviewee selection method when inviting respondents to interview (one from each of the four parties represented in the council: Labour, Conservative, Green and Liberal Democrat). It helps for neutrality that the Democratic Commission is explicitly a cross-party (or nonparty) effort. Nonetheless, party relations are not a taboo subject for the research: the research will explore the question of the role of party politics in citizen engagement and will ask if the Commission resulted greater cross-party collaboration, either between councillors or amongst citizens.

4. Analysis

4.1 Description of the Case

The case I chose is Kirklees Democracy Commission. In this section first I will engage in some contextual scene-setting of Kirklees as a place to help the reader locate it geographically within the British Isles (Figure 3), paint a mental picture of the local urban centres (Figure 4) and offer some statistics to help the reader understand the social conditions in which this democratic initiative was operating. Second, having provided this largely aesthetic backdrop, I then provide a detailed overview of how the participatory democratic process known as the Democracy Commission worked, explaining its origins and guiding principles, before finally presenting this graphically in an easy-to-follow flow chart (Figure 5).

Local Context Kirklees is located in the north of England, in West Yorkshire, as Figure 4.1 illustrates: Figure 4.1: Map of the United Kingdom locating Kirklees.

(Maps.google.com, 2017)

Kirklees is situated within the former industrial north. Industrially speaking it could be called “rust belt” though in reality, it is a mixture of green rolling hills and handsome 19th-century limestone architecture in its urban centres (see Figure 4.2). It is a well-known fact in the country that many northern British regions have not recovered from the closure of their coal mines under the Prime Ministership of Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s. In recent years, the national British government located in London in the south has used a rhetoric of redeveloping the north into a ‘Northern Powerhouse’ but northern representatives complain of a continued ‘south-east bias’ (The Guardian, 2016c). Economic statistics show the north-south economic divide continues to widen (FT.com, 2015) as Britain operates a ‘two speed’ economy comprised of booming London attracting investment and people away from the slower economic tempo found in the remainder of the country.

Figure 4.2: Dewsbury town centre

(North Kirklees News, 2017)

Approximately 440,000 people live in Kirklees, according to latest estimates (Observatory.kirklees.gov.uk, 2017a). The largest settlement of the district is Huddersfield, which is also its centre of political administration. More Kirklees residents work in the manufacturing sector than average for the country (19%, England 8%) (Ibid). 79% are satisfied with their local area as a place to live (Ibid). The wellbeing index score for Kirklees residents is slightly below the national average (Kirklees.gov.uk, 2016: 6).5 In the EU referendum Kirklees as a whole voted 55% ‘leave’ (Huddersfield Daily Examiner, 2017), though one of its four districts voted 51% to stay (Ibid). One of its constituencies, Batley & Spen had a by-election in 2016 (En.wikipedia.org, 2016). The by-election was triggered by the killing of incumbent Member of Parliament Jo Cox on 16 June 2016 (Telegraph,

5 Scoring 22.9 out of a maximum of 35 across seven statements. The national average is 25.2. 36

2016). Today, 54% of people agree their local area is a place where people from different ethnic backgrounds get on well together (Observatory.kirklees.gov.uk, 2017a).

The Commission KDC was an attempt to engage a population in a process, to revitalise democracy. Improving the quality of participatory democracy in Kirklees is placed high on the political agenda of the Council. The Commission developed a Mission Statement “to help them guide the way to the thriving local democracy that our citizens deserve”: “By 2020 Kirklees is an informed citizen-led democracy with accountable elected representatives who enable communities to influence and affect decisions governing their lives” ( Kirklees Council, 2017: 13). It started because the Council democratic services team wanted to consider reducing the number of councilors, but soon branched into other questions. It involved the creation of a panel known as the Commission, a selection of 20 from 64 elected councillors, to discuss and decide the final result.The Kirklees Democracy Commission was set up on a cross-party basis, with representation from all political groups in Kirklees and an independent Chair, Dr Andrew Mycock from the University of Huddersfield. From the beginning all the Commissioners agreed to a set of principles and ways of working.

There were roadshows where the council put stall in e.g. supermarkets to meet people. They conducted a survey of residents, both electronically and by mail, to learn what citizens thought on the three themes (Councillors, Elections and Decision Making). Moreover, the commission surveyed councilors. In addition to this, citizens were recruited. Workshops were held to enable discussion. There were held by consultants partly. A ‘public enquiry was held’, to learn the best way to get people to participate. Experts were consulted and submissions were gathered from actors including think-tanks such as the Democracy Society, and local groups including Kirklees Youth Council. Reports were written by staff in the Democratic Services team based on the results. Next, the Commission (the 20 councilors chosen as commissioners) met a few times, culminating in discussions over three consecutive days. Finally, a final full council meeting was held, broadcast online, and the report was launched. A visual summary of the process is provided in Figure 4.3.

Figure 4.3: Process flow-chart of Kirklees Democracy Commission

(Adapted from DemocracyCommission.org.uk, 2017)6

6 In online surveys, a mixture of closed questions and open questions were employed. For open questions, designated officials effectively summarised large volumes of citizen opinion and expressed this succinctly to decision makers.

A little over 1,000 people participated in total. Of these: 88 people took part in discussions at deliberative events, 43 expert witnesses gave evidence; 318 citizens completed an online survey; 441 Kirklees Council staff completed a survey;. 43 citizens attended ‘preview’ evenings (Kirklees Council, 2017: 9). Varied outreach activities were undertaken by some or all of the 20 Commissioners. Firstly they heard from councillors and political groups (Kirklees Council, 2017: 10). Secondly they visited other councils to learn from their experiences (Ibid). They also met with Kirklees Youth Council, the University of Huddersfield Students Union, partner organisations and other groups (Ibid). Fourth and finally, they received comments in writing, via social media, via their web site and by email (Ibid).

4.2 Locating the case in democratic theory

We can most fruitfully relate the Democracy Commission to the third generation (3G) of Deliberative Democratic theorists because it was only this generation that focused specifically on the institutional settings of deliberation. In contrast, the first and second generation theorists (1G, 2G) considered idealised deliberation without considering its real-world practice in institutional settings, and the fourth generation (4G) widened the sphere of deliberation into wider 'systems' that included a wide variety of informal public discussion. Because the Kirklees Democracy Commission was by definition an institutional effort, we can confidently relate it to the third generation theorists such as O'Flynn and Parkinson. Of these two authors, Parkinson and his Belfast NHS case is the most natural parallel to Kirklees, due to the multi-stage process and a division of labour he out, whereas O'Flynn's focus was in divided societies with clearly defined and antagonistic ethnic/cultural groups, which is untrue of Kirklees (beyond the national social divisions, which remain un-formalised). By comparing Parkinson's NHS multi-stage process (Table 4.1) and Kirklees Democracy Commission's multi-stage process (Table 4.2) we see a difference in order and contact: Parkinson has specialists and interest groups' representatives deliberating in workshops, the result of which facilitators present to citizen panels (publicised), which generated proposals that were finally voted on by elected representatives. In contrast, in Kirklees we had a wider layer of separate information gathering, from experts, citizens, staff, and interest group's representatives; then facilitated citizen deliberation (which was not explicitly informed by information gathered in the first stage); all of which was then presented to elected representatives, who deliberated and decided (whether consensus decision making or voting was used in this final stage is less clear).

Table 4.1: Parkinson's NHS multi-stage deliberation process

1. Specialists 2. Facilitators present to 3. Representatives vote deliberate with Interest Citizens deliberate + Group Representatives generate proposals

Table 4.2: Kirklees Democracy Commission's multi-stage deliberation process

1. Experts share knowledge 2. Facilitator presents to Representatives, who Interest Group Representatives, and Staff deliberate + decide express views + indicate preferences (in person + online survey) + Staff (online survey only) + Citizens deliberate with Facilitator help

| Or simplified into a formula, using the initials from above, and to indicate deliberation between two parties, F(...) to indicate facilitation, and >V to mean voting.

Figure 4.4: Parkinson and Kirklees democratic processes represented as formulae Parkinson: E I → F (C C) → R >V

Kirklees: E + I + C + S + F (C C) → F (R R)

Both processes and divisions of labour have strengths and weaknesses: Parkinson's benefits from informing the citizens with the information gleaned from specialists and interest group representatives, whereas Kirklees gathers citizen's views without significant information input via facilitators. This means that in Kirklees, citizens' underlying preferences and voices were included, but arguably citizen judgment was less considered due to lack of expert input to inform the discussion. Parkinson has representatives voting (in his Belfast NHS case representatives may have conceivably deliberated before voting, but he does not state this in his design), whereas Kirklees gives representatives the bulk of the deliberation, and their final decision-making method is not made explicit. One benefit for Kirklees of having its elected representatives in a cross-party (or nonparty) group with the innovative role of “commissioner” is that is in principle reduces the possibility of one party dominating (it is a relatively atypical feature of Kirklees that its council is relatively evenly split between the political parties, so this affects the transferability of the model) or individual party members being 'whipped' into voting as a bloc. One feature of Parkinson's is that citizen recommendations are covered by the media and overseen by parliamentary committees (he does not

make it clear if it is the citizen deliberation as well) which is a strength for its transparency, at least the media coverage. One does not imagine parliamentary committees' proceedings would reach a wide audience. Press coverage of Kirklees Democracy Commission is omitted from its explicit design, however with all evidence freely published online, it is hardly excluded either.

Returning to the another third generation democratic author, Kirklees raises questions of transferability to O'Flynn's model for deliberative democracy in ethnically divided societies. O'Flynn's consociational model of ethnic-cartel bargaining bears little relation to Kirklees Democracy Commission. Firstly, Kirklees is not ethnically divided to the stark definition of Northern Ireland. Within the Kirklees context, more minority councilors are being elected to power (Commissioner, 2017) but we would need to imagine quite a dramatic rupture to begin a process of ethnic-minority and white-majority councilors jostling for power and resources. Nonetheless, it is entirely possible that minority groups nationally will seek to organise more politically in response to anti-immigrant sentiment. Immigration concerns are likely to stay high on the political agenda for at least the next few years until a Brexit deal is finalised and its effects are felt. Secondly, whereas O'Flynn formalised divisions between representatives, Kirklees in effect sought to neutralise divisions (party divisions) within the role of 'commissioner' to enhance their deliberative function. The interviews reveal that the commissioner role was a highly successful technique in enhancing cooperation and focusing representatives on making judgments free from party influence (Commissioners, 2017). The literature showed that when you remind citizens of their party affiliation they try to represent that party's views (Unsworth & Fielding 2014). Whether Kirklees' neutral commissioner model could help in ethnically divided societies by seeking to neutralise them is less clear. Indeed, to ignore or downplay divisions could be a weakness of its model. Overall, the relatively undivided politics of Kirklees affects the model's transferability, just as O'Flynn's Northern Irish context affects the transferability of his. One does not rule out the notion that 'one size does not fit all' when it comes to democracy.

With regards to the fourth generation, considering the 'deliberative systems approach' that promised to “offer a way to scale up” democratic goods (Elstub, 2016: 140), the Kirklees Democracy Commission cannot add much beyond a few considerations. Yes, KDC widened the scope of the conversation beyond the town hall, by reaching out into the community, hosting stands in public places. But the process was still very much in the institutional frame, or in the very least was filtered down into the institution of Kirklees Council. The Commission's multi-stage process (as outlined by Parkinson in 3G) could encompass the belief that “different sites and different moments offer diverse contributions to public deliberation” (2006, in Elstub, 2016: 144) which under the 4G was broadened to include the informal sphere. One criticism that can be levelled at both the Commission and the fourth generation deliberative democratic theorists is setting the bar too low for citizen participants, or prioritising the good of inclusion over the good of considered judgment: the Commission's major input was

non-deliberative (surveys) and of the 88 citizens who participated in deliberation sessions, the 'world cafe' method involved no modelling of good deliberation practice that could move their deliberation skills forward – so it is participation, but of a lower quality than is possible. Likewise the fourth generation theorists have a 'capacious' definition of deliberation that may lose its meaning if stretched the concept too widely. Therefore we can underline the importance of high aspirations for deliberation and not simply making our definition 'an excuse for the status quo'. However, elitist standards could be alienating, so it is a difficult balance to strike.

4.3 E-Democracy

Increasing the use of digital tools was a recurring theme in respondents’ answers: ”We need to see it as an opportunity to redesign what we do and how we do it” (Kirklees Council, 2017: 43). Furthermore, “This cannot be simply about digitising what we do already and we don’t want to lose sight of the excellent things that happen off-line” (Ibid). The final report suggested that too much digital democracy could actually lead to disengagement and a distancing from the electorate to the representatives: “[residents] said that electronic voting, on its own, is unlikely to get more people involved. If e-voting is introduced, our citizens are worried that it may reduce the sense of responsibility for the council to get the population engaged in elections” (Ibid). The theory around e-participation (such as Kim and Lee, 2012) did not suggest that e-voting would supplant traditional voting, emphasizing the perceptions of influencing government decision making as the main factor in electronic voters’ satisfaction with the process (2012: 819), though it is feasible that e-voting could accelerate the move from offline to online engagement. To conclude, recognising citizen concerns, the Commission outlines e-democracy’s limitations in this principle: “It’s important that we do not see digital technologies as a panacea that alone can improve local democracy for everyone” (Kirklees Council, 2017: 43). This seems like a fair summary.

4.4 Evaluation of the promotion of democratic values

The Council has been motivated for some years to engage in democratic initiatives and this has become reflected in the council’s positive self-image as being proactive. This motivation, however, seems to have mixed drivers and mixed results. There are a number of challenges to the institution: the changing role of the councillor, structural changes under devolution, and continued austerity. This gives an insight into the interaction between national policy processes and local democratic processes. How councils experience and respond to the rapidly changing political landscape has implications for possible local democratic renewal. It also provides an insight into the necessity for investment in an ongoing conversation with citizens.

This chapter is divided into five sections. First, the perception of the democratic quality of inclusiveness is discussed. Secondly, the perception of considered judgment is outlined. In the third section, the way in which the Kirklees Democracy Commission promoted popular control of citizens is examined. Fourthly, the responses of organisers and participants with regards to the transparency of the process is inspected. Followed by a concluding section in which the sub-questions are answered and what implications this has regarding the research question and theoretical framework. The data used in this chapter is collected from the interviews with KDC representatives from the Council, adjacent organisations and participants.

Inclusiveness

Inclusiveness refers to the very basic measure of social justice: how many people are able to participate (Rushkoff, 2004: 65). Smith made the distinction between two aspects of inclusiveness: 'presence' and 'voice.' Firstly to presence, a theme in interviews was increasing presence beyond the “usual suspects.” Although a Commissioner said that he met people who were engaged but didn’t hear about the Commission until it had been underway for some weeks or months, which suggests even “usual suspects” were not fully included (2017). Overall, it was inclusive at the formal level - “governance” - but weak at increasing citizen participation.

If Kirklees has been 'proactive' in engaging citizens for some years, we would expect to see some evidence of that in the data: increased voter turnout compared to neighbouring regions, for example, would not be conclusive on its own but would be one indication of an enriched political participation culture locally. For the June 2017 general election the turnout data shows that the average was 68.4% (Economist, 2017). Of the constituencies that share a border with Kirklees, the average was 68.05%, which is 0.35% lower. If we eliminate the party political factor and include only neighbour Labour constituencies (Kirklees elected only Labour MPs) then Kirklees’ voter turnout lead increases to 1.3%. The comparison is illustrated in Figure 4.4.

Figure 4.4 : General election voter turnout, Kirklees and neighbours

This shows a fairly insignificant increased level of political engagement in Kirklees compared to comparable neighbouring constituencies.7 There are many other factors that could sway this: disaffected UKIP voters, individual MPs’ popularity and performance, to name two. Performing the same calculations for the 2010 and 15 general elections shows Kirklees’ shows the following trend:

7 Full data tables can be found in the appendices. 44

Figure 4.5 : General elections voter turnout, Kirklees and neighbours

This suggests that Kirklees has had small increased political engagement than its neighbours for at least seven years. The latest election saw a significant spike in voter turnout for both, which narrowed that gap.8 The graphs show that inclusiveness is not significantly higher than neighbours.

Nonetheless, the fourth generation of deliberative democratic theorists do suggest that the network matters more than institutions when it comes to deliberation.

Interviews revealed that the Commission was relatively inclusive demographically, although the model does not directly speak of divisions or minorities, choosing instead a broadly inclusive message (“all citizens of Kirklees”). Regarding minorities (ethnic, gender, and age): when asked, all interviewees said the events had some Asian people (the largest ethnic minority in the borough).

Geographical differences were a more common theme in the interviews. A number of interviewees mentioned local differences. Commissioner Eric Firth's quote is representative: “the demographics in lots of parts the authority are totally different to others so that brings added pressures as well.” A number of respondents cited the relative recent political formation of the borough as factor, meaning there was little in the way of shared identity to unite the towns and villages in its 43 year

8 The 2015 election shows Kirklees’ turnout 2.7% higher than its neighbours, but there was one anomalously low figure. If we exclude this, the gap falls to 0.6%. 45

history. This meant that citizens feel a “real sense of concern” that towns and villages have “lost their identity and lost their connection with the council” when becoming Kirklees (KDC 2017). With regards to political polarisation, by coming together at the deliberation events, citizens were in theory no longer 'living and learning in silos' (Bruce, 2014: 17). Commissioners were very willing to compromise with out-groups, in contrast to Al-Ramiah and Hewstone (2012: 17) by creating a new in-group of Commissioners: “We had some discussions right at the start about, I suppose, basically, how you're going to conduct yourself as commissioners. They developed the sort of principles. One of the principles was, when we walk through the door we're commissioners. We're not councillors.” (Head of Democratic Services, Kirklees Council, 2017) Inventing the role of Commissioner helped because it avoided the finding of Unsworth & Fielding that reminding an individual of their party affiliation made them 'toe the party line' (2014).

Gender inclusiveness amongst citizens was not cited although it was seen as positive that many more females were becoming councilors. The change in gender representation was seen to bring more collaboration across party political lines: removing the old “male, pale and stale” view is creating a different kind of politics” (Independent Chair, Kirklees Democracy Commission, 2017). The commissioners commented that they saw the younger female councilors socialising together in the pub, a cultural change for experienced male councilors who traditionally mingled less. Overall it is unclear how the race/gender/age inclusiveness of representatives would automatically create a new kind of politics. The stereotype is that male politicians are more habitually tribal, competitive and war-like, which like all stereotypes may contain a grain of truth.

Engaging youth was a major theme of the final report, and was mentioned by numerous interviewees. The local Youth Council were formally engaged, and a number of their members spoke at the final council meeting concluding the project. Given the increase in youth registration to vote since the interviews for the June 2017 general election (ref) there is an opportunity to build on this. The message that came out repeatedly was the need to invest in the younger generation and a recognition that this is a long term project that cannot be solved by a small participation initiative. “We have to really develop our young citizens and that's a real theme that's going to come out. And that's going to take longer. That's a significant sea change.” (Head of Democratic Services, Kirklees Council, 2017) In terms of how to engage youth, evidence from an experts who contributed to the Commission suggested that “it’s important to focus on relevant issues as a starting point for engaging young citizens, as this means young people can get involved without needing to understand how local democracy works first” Kirklees Council, 2017: 35). It is commonly held that young people are online and that the way to engage them is to “go to where they are”. One challenge to this came from the

young people themselves, who suggested that they didn’t want to talk politics on Facebook, which was more for hanging out with friends. This suggests that young people’s inclusion requires a different online platform. In its final report of the Commission highlighted the importance of citizenship education in schools whilst denying any responsibility for improving it. It is worth stating that education policy is set nationally so local municipalities have no say over this. There is often little time or funding for education that is seen as non-essential. Any mention of lobbying for national policy change was absent from the Kirklees Democracy Commission. It is puzzling that whilst it would have been entirely possible for the Commission to say “so the Council will make the case to national government for re-introducing mandatory citizenship education ages 11-18” it chose not to do so, Perhaps this is a policy tension that was omitted precisely because there is little control over it. I would agree with the diagnosis, but the solutions seem incomplete. Their efforts to engage via a Youth Council, though laudable, are unlikely to lead to the entire youth population gaining a working familiarity of local government's power structures, what councilors do or how they could get involved. Furthermore, there were very few young people at the deliberation events (Kirklees citizen, 2017) which highlights an inter generational challenge in inclusiveness.

Turning to E-Democracy’s relationship to inclusiveness, the Commission’s “e-panel” (reminder: a straightforward internet survey) was cited by numerous interviewees as a way to increase the representativeness of democratic processes. They explained that demographic information was captured. The technical member of staff at the council explained that they analysed the results of this to account for geographical, age or ethnic differences (Democratic services officer, 2017). Cost was cited as the major barrier to truly representative sampling. Their main concern was getting the numbers overall, but they then recruited from underrepresented groups to bolster the numbers. In the age category, a certain amount of churn was expected as young people get older.

It was recognised the internet was not the way to include all audiences. The technical officer said it was a struggle because they recognise that online isn't the way that everyone wants to get involved (Ibid). The final report agreed that citizens told them they feel there’s a danger that key parts of the population (the less affluent and older residents) who have less access to the internet may be further excluded in future if this became a major feature of democracy in Kirklees (Kirklees Council, 2017). The final report recognised that digital literacy was an issue.9 However, I argue that this is really not so difficult: we could send them forms and reports; invite them to meetings. If they come it is like they did in the past, and if they don't come it is like they did in the past. More and more people will continue to be online - they will read about things that concern them if they know they are being considered.

9 23% of all adults in Britain don’t have the basic digital skills they need to be able to benefit – and nearly 6 million people have never used the internet. (Kirklees, Council, 2017: 43). 47

Printing a list of topics being considered and their URLs in the local newspaper and having opportunities for comment at the URLs would suffice.

It was unclear how the 20 Commissioners were selected from the 64 councilors. Given the centrality of the Commissioner role to the KDC process this is noteworthy and something that needs to be reviewed.

Table 4.3: KDC’s inclusiveness

Inclusiveness

+ Actively contacted citizens and groups - Did not reach the audience numbers desired. - No practical answer to digital literacy challenge - No systematic engagement with wider youth beyond the youth council

Considered Judgment

The legitimacy of citizen participation in political decision making arguably rests on the capacity of citizens to make thoughtful and reflective judgements (Smith, 2009: 27-28). Firstly, I will begin this section considering the issue of citizen knowledge/ignorance in policy deliberation. Then, because our case involves representatives deliberating, I will go on to reflect on their level of considered judgements as well. Thirdly and finally, I will consider the question of timing/efficiency in deliberation, before moving to a judgment on this case.

Relating the interviews to theory, it is notable that the examples given in the contemporary debate around citizen ignorance or “post truth” relate most commonly to active misinformation and partisan political attacks. In contrast, the single overriding concern about citizen ignorance in Kirklees was the role of councilors. This was framed as a challenge to the efficiency of democracy, which the project lead sad is often compromised by the fact that citizens don't have the literacy and experience to know who to go to, how to go to and when to go to different representatives at different times (Independent Chair, Kirklees Democracy Commission, 2017). For example, MPs are held up by enquiries about “potholes and streetlights and things like that” which are local council issues (Ibid). Agreed, it is fair to say that education on how the democratic structures work could alleviate a major cause of misdirected energy and inefficiency, and could increase democratic inclusiveness by directing citizen attention and action where it is most likely to have a positive effect. An alternative improvement would be creating a welcoming setting in which to discuss and deliberate:

“Deliberation is one of those things which - you can't teach deliberation. You can only give a sense of giving people the right safe spaces.“ (Independent Chair, Kirklees Democracy Commission, 2017).

Some were more understanding of citizen ignorance. Nicola, a council technical officer working in the democratic services team, said: “I mean, if I didn't work for the council I don't think I'd have a great understanding of what it did and I don't think that's... not trying to say that that's the council's fault in any way. It's just, busy people have got other things to think about, haven't they. [Laughs] Not everyone's so into it.” The press was cited by the council as a potential positive partner for better communications “The council [...] clearly benefits from a situation where citizens are “better informed and involved”. It is therefore important [we begin] developing a more proactive, collaborative and effective relationship with the local press.” ( Kirklees Council, 2017: 39) Councilors were also seen as in need of quality information to make considered judgments. Mentoring of new elected councils by more experienced councilors was described positively in interviews with Commissioners.

Moving onto the level of considered judgment of representatives, it is first remarkable how much information the Commissioners were expected to absorb and discuss: dozens of reports of evidence. I was interested in how much citizen voice came through all of this information, so asked the Head of Democratic Services if councilors were open to hearing the views of citizens. The response suggests that considering citizens voices had impacted their views and led to different judgements: “I think there was, going into that process, some views that may have been fixed. It's a no-brainer, isn't it? But as we've gone through a journey, you can see some of those initial views have changed, softened.” (2017) Amongst commissioners it seems like the level of deliberation and considered judgment was high: they ‘thrashed out’ issues, ‘though the unthinkable’ (Ibid). Officially, the job was taken seriously. Commissioners are ‘responsible for ensuring they are fully up to speed with all of the evidence received before deliberating and formulating findings’ (Final report, 2017). Interviews revealed a positive assessment of Commissioners’ consideration: There was an intelligence and evidence base that – over time – as you began knitting those strands together, placed a different perspective on some views and resulted in different conclusions that may not have been expected at the start of the process’ (Head of Democratic Services, Kirklees Council, 2017). Unfortunately, because these were in private, I cannot judge or comment on the level of debate or considered judgment. What we can say is that this aspect of the design in the Commission meant a lack

of meaningful opportunities for citizens to compare and contrast their reasons for holding views with political representatives (Kim and Lee, 2012: 819).

In my theoretical framework I did not focus on the timescales for considered judgment but I must do so here because in the Kirklees Democracy Commission it is possible that elements of deliberation were too rushed. The citizen I spoke to reported that they were disappointed about not being able to discuss all three topics at one deliberation event due to time constraints. I found that the third party organisers of the deliberation session boasts that its format is “fast and furious” and “included lightning talks”, and admits covering the topic was a “big task for a 50 minute workshop and we barely scratched the surface” (Thomson, 2017). One report on citizen’s assemblies concludes that “the timing of citizen’s assemblies is critical for potential outcomes” (Flinders, 2015: 3). Another report calls for flexibility: “we need to think about different sites (and possibly, different time frames) that suit different styles” (Niemeyer, Felicetti and Ruggero, 2012: 20). So, timescale for effective deliberation appears to be a minus point in Kirklees and something to address in the theory of effective practice.

Table 4.4: KDC’s Considered Judgement

Considered judgement

+ Commissioners informed from wide evidence base. + Citizens partially educated on democratic process. - Questionable if national context of austerity discussed enough. - No extra resources for youth political education and not advocated nationally. - Possibly deliberation was rushed. - Facilitators were ‘light touch’ and did not encourage reflective discourse.

Popular Control

Popular control requires consideration of the degree that participants are able to influence different aspects of the decision making process (Smith 2009: 16). Kirklees Democracy Commission is not direct power for citizens, nor was it ever intended to be. Deliberative democracy or participatory democracy are not the same as direct democracy. One of the Commission’s surveys suggested that people wanted more popular control, with 60% saying that they felt local people should have more decision-making power. Deliberative democratic theory prioritises inclusiveness over popular control. If the goal is to empower citizens, the KDC's democratic division of labour risks a patchy result. Perhaps it is the connections in the system that matter more.

The interviews revealed that there was a genuine ambition on the side of the Commission organisers to engage citizens and offer them a 'stake'. The Head of Democratic Services said that “one of the

principle things [about the Commission] is about – local people have a stake in their place and their local democracy” (2017). It is a positive sign that Commission organisers actively researched innovative examples of participatory models elsewhere, such participatory budgets10 and bottom-up processes.11 Something new for 2017 was the election of a city mayor in nearby Manchester, which was spoken of with cautious optimism. The report claims there is in Kirklees a “general appetite for having a more devolved approach to local influence, engagement and decision-making, from the ground up” (Kirklees Council, 2017: 32). All respondents agreed that managing expectations is important in a participatory democratic process like the Commission. The technical officer Nicola gave a representative quote: We don't want to give people the idea that, you know... [Interviewer] We're going to do everything they want? Whatever they come out with is, yeah, that we'll be able to. However we must not be mistaken that Councilors decide in the end. She was clear: “It is always, for the big decisions it is councilors who make those decisions in the end.” This characterises what emerged from the interviews. The limits of participation were clear: it was to inform decisions, not to decide.

Indeed, the council's final report suggested selective consultation was important; talking to the right people about the right issues, instead of the implication that everyone should be consulted on everything. “we need to value the knowledge of our citizens and be clear about who we need to hear from for each decision. We can’t consult on every decision, but we can be more selective in our methods – and get better informed decisions as a result.” Does this reflect the “division of labour” discussed by the third-generation deliberative democratic theorists? For example, an expert, from the Democratic Society, suggested young people should have more control over issues that affect them: “there is scope to delegate some decisions that specifically affect young people, at least as a “first draft” of those decisions [...] this could be a good opportunity to experiment with new models of politics” (Kirklees Council, 2017: 35). However this is more like ‘co-production’ on a sub-population by sub-population basis, not an inclusive democratic decision, and it is not saying much when it comes to different decisions about allocating resources between groups (demographic change and a growing older population presents a tension here).

A new concept in the KDC's final report was the 'active citizen' which “involves informal participation, community activity, informing decisions, campaigning, engaging with public services, petitioning,

10 E.g. Barnsley’s Ward Alliances. 11 Such as Frome, a town in south west England, who created an initiative called “Flat Pack Democracy.” 51

protesting and having a real stake in the place where you live [...] You should feel able to influence your community’s future and be willing to share what you know” (Kirklees Council, 2017: 25). The concept of active citizen is reminiscent of the “Big Society” policy that encouraged more community volunteering in Britain (Cameron, 2008). It is not easy to relate these concepts to the traditional idea of popular control, because they involve empowering citizens to act outside of the state (almost anarchistic, or as in Weatherley and Lipsky’s “street level bureaucrat” (1977), interpreting the rules) not decide how the state acts. A slogan might be “don’t wait for the state.” The council’s website refers to Bourdieu’s concept of “social capital” and claiming that “Social capital through informal neighbourhood networks and attachments builds social trust more strongly than other types of social capital such as increased civic engagement” (Observatory.kirklees.gov.uk, 2017b). This conception By prioritising community building over political empowerment, is the concept of social capital here out of step with common understandings of popular control?

However, the big question is whether citizens will choose to heed the Commission’s call and take on more responsibilities. Moreover, it is open to question what support citizens need to change from passive citizens into active citizens. Rustin (2017) suggests state actors can and should facilitate community building, and argues that in our divided and individualistic society, the pooling of resources by people who want to want to do things together should be supported (though Rustin does not make clear exactly how). In Kirklees, active citizenship was discussed as a role that council officials have shared responsibility for supporting and developing. I did not hear any detail about how exactly how citizens will be supported to be empowered; this question was left open. So as an interviewer I wondered if ‘active citizen’ mantra was wishful thinking. On the one hand we have the view that “it seems like citizens want to be empowered as well because they're more independent, there's less taste for the kind of paternalistic model of government” (Consultant, 2017). And on the other we have the view that that “I’m quite sure that a lot of people out there still want the paternal. They do. Not the participatory” (Commissioner, 2017). Both may be true of different parts of the population.

Perhaps we need to critique the category of ‘popular control’ to examine the choices for what kind of political culture we wish to create. I wonder if the recent EU Referendum that ended with Brexit gave citizens the wrong idea about democracy, that it only direct democracy counts. The councilors, by holding onto power, might shoot themselves in the foot by promoting a culture of accountability instead of co-production. There is a real desire for change, but the message I heard from the citizen I spoke to, herself a former employee of the council, was not anger, but exasperation: “They need to be humble. We all need to educate ourselves and why can we not do that together? Communities and councillors together. Because I feel very much that certainly a lot of councillors

feel like it is a hierarchy and they're at the top of it. And we are all it together and we have to work together. So we have to work as equals.” (Kirklees citizen, 2017)

To conclude, the degree of popular control created by the Commission is questionable. I don't think the Commission organisers were necessarily afraid to give up power. I think they are making it up as they go along. There is this genuine desire on the side of the council to create proactive citizens who can do more for themselves, and a somewhat paradoxical response coming back – citizens want respect, they want power, they don't want to be treated like children, but they want things one for them. But it is unclear how they will support citizens to do more and how willing citizens are to do more. The KDC shows an increased willingness to listen, but then, representative democracy is still the model. We can reflect that ordinary people need to be educated what's possible, and not be promised the world. It is striking that in the final report, actual decisions made were not put front and centre (e.g. the decision not to reduce the number of councilors) and were hidden in a degree of salesmanship. It is probable that the Council are in ‘PR mode.’ So the vision of active citizen was not supported by the implementation or any obvious transfer of power.

If we are to consider Arnstein’s (1969) ladder of participation, the process was not ‘citizen control’ and nor was it ‘manipulation’. The Commission took Kirklees citizens about two-thirds up the ladder, between ‘consultation’ and ‘partnership.

Table 4.5: KDC’s Popular Control

Popular Control

+ Citizens voices considered, it appears sincerely - Initial agenda was set by council + Encourages active citizenship, including dissent (petitions and protests) - No increase in direct citizen power - No increase in access to representatives

Transparency

In participatory democracy, transparency means that the process needs to be open to scrutiny “not only to the participants, but also to the wider public” (Smith, 2009: 29). Kirklees Democracy Commission was transparent insofar as they published the results of each stage online. However, the final deliberations where decisions were made were not published.

In my theoretical framework I discussed transparency as being closely connected accountability in British political culture, including in local government, and explored the possibility of a more open culture to foster trust. The citizen I spoke to was disappointed by the scope of the event and thought there was a lack of transparency about how the themes of the Commission were decided: “The first thing that struck me was that the scope of it seemed to be much narrower than I expected it to be and I was interested to know who set it. Who set the scope and whose agenda it was really.” This is a single example from the 500+ citizen participants, so we cannot make generalisations. But it could highlight an opportunity to improve communication about the thinking behind the questions posed in the consultation if doing it again. Therefore I recommend a process to engage citizens in the setting of the agenda. This would engage them and sustain them.

Trust and distrust in the democratic process are inimical to democracy (Lenard, 2008). Citizens must trust their legislators to have their interest in mind and citizens must trust each other to abide by democratically established law (Ibid). Local government can seek to rebuild legitimacy by determining the social conditions which make collective, shared experiences more likely, and therefore create a context conducive for the emergence of a lasting “trust culture” (Sztompka 1999: 119). Historically Kirklees Council has not facilitated enough shared experiences with citizens to engender trust. One Commissioner, Andrew, expressed frustration at the division, the finger-pointing and the lack of teamwork: “it's a bit of them and us. You feel, “your council”, in a democracy that is not appropriate. The council is their council” (2017). Defining a new citizen-council relationship was a clear ambition of the initiative that came out of the interviews.

There were other trends. Governance networks were discussed positively as something to be encouraged by a number of interviewees. This included civic society, established networks, press, and local businesses. The commissioners interviews were proud of their role in supporting local businesses. Finally, the publicity surrounding newly formed city mayor roles was seen as an opportunity for greater transparency by consultant Andy: “here's high visibility around these people. That may be creating, for the broader base of the electorate, more awareness about things that are happening” (2017).

The press, an important actor for transparency, were cynical about the Council, describing “a public perception of deception/evasion” and a claim that “defensive structures prevent the directorate from engaging with, empathising with, and explaining policy and action” because of a lack of leadership or taking responsibility (Kirklees Council, 2016: 2). It the role of the press to hound politicians so this is not so surprising. This history with the press may go towards explaining why interviews revealed a belief that the final deliberation amongst elected representatives was better held in private:

“Any public organisation needs to strike a balance between allowing decision makers, in coming to decisions, to sometimes think the unthinkable. Now thinking the unthinkable in the public domain is not always helpful” (Head of Democratic Services, Kirklees Council, 2017). It was unclear what policy options were “unthinkable;” presumably this meant “unpopular,” or outside the frame of public acceptability, sometimes referred to by theorists as the “Overton Window.”12 It appears that to build a small, trusting group of Commissioners, it meant shutting out the outside world, where they would inevitably be judged in their elected councilor role “I think we owe it to [Commissioners] to allow them to explore their thoughts and their feelings in a frank way and not run the risk of shutting that down” (Ibid). It is understandable with media scrutiny that the council is defensive. However, the Council could have generated more trust with citizens by exploring issues with them in a frank way.

It was evident that the council were selling themselves, and to an extent, in “PR mode” with a student researcher, albeit with tongue-in-cheek humour: “The future is Kirklees!” (Commissioner, 2017).

The question of national vs. local politics came out. It seems reasonable that the council focused on what was in its control. However, the citizen I spoke to said that avoiding the topic of austerity seemed odd, and that steering the conversation away from the everyday struggles of people and the national context driving it meant the conversation was missing something. “The cuts! It was the elephant in the room, really.” (Citizen, 2017) All respondents who were professionally involved in the Commission expressed a desire to engage citizens on a positive note, and not because of budget cuts. The Commissioners were keen to encourage an active citizenship because it was worthwhile in its own right, regardless of the fact savings have been made. The final report states: “Austerity has proved to be an unhelpful backdrop to the idea of being an active citizen. We don’t believe the right story to tell is that citizens “should now be doing more because the council is no longer able to”. This is far too simplistic, sends out the wrong message” (Kirklees Council, 2017: 27). Andy, the external consultant working in behaviour change methodologies, explained this as a pragmatic question of what was more likely to persuade citizens to act: “There is potential tension; depends how you look at it. If you see it in terms of, this is good because it saves the state money, that's one perspective and that kind of perspective is not likely to engender communities to do it.” (2017)

12The term is derived from Joseph P Overton, a former vice president of the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. He developed the theory in the mid-Nineties. It is a political theory that refers to the range (or window) of policies that the public will accept. (New Statesman, 2015) 55

It is likely that I am biased as a researcher, having lived through the Big Society policy agenda ten years ago and having campaigned against austerity policies. So I consciously direct the reader’s attention to the positive reasons for this, to achieve balance. The Commission highlight the potential of its program to simply adding to the ongoing positive engagement from citizens: “[the Austerity-driven-change story] ignores the brilliant things that our citizens have always done to contribute to wider civic society in Kirklees. It should be about building on these strengths.” (Kirklees Council, 2017: 27) So agenda setting was of low transparency, relating to the council’s decision not to address broader national contexts (such as austerity) when engaging citizens on local issues. To neglect the context that will be in people’s minds would risk alienating them, but it is understandable for a local event not to want to “open a can of worms” and discuss things outside of their control.

Table 4.6: KDC’s Transparency

Transparency

+ Citizen comments published verbatim online. - Final deliberation in private. + Full council meeting was webcast. - Omitted discussion of pressing national policy challenges e.g. austerity. - No clear return: “you said - we did.” + Wrote a digested 10-minute read of the results.

Conclusion This section described the way participatory democracy was interpreted in the Kirklees Democracy Commission and what we can learn from this. By doing so, an insight into the interaction between citizens and the officials in the Council is provided. It was examined to what extent the participation methods are perceived as promoting a better democracy to all actors.

4.5 Emotions and democracy

Research on cognitive biases shows that if we think that citizens can make considered judgements (Smith 2009) and change each other’s minds in public policy debates, we may be wrong, so maybe we need to revise our models of what a good debate looks like. A deliberation model that is truly inclusive would be wise to respect the role of emotions to encourage and maintain participation. The KDC didn’t address the perhaps biggest causes of fear and frustration from citizens: austerity cuts, and immigration. This is because their focus was on local decisions. The commissioners spoke of dealing with locals angry about the bureaucracy of parking fines, but not with the big forces that are shaping

their quality of life. Emotions were not represented; no outlet for release of fear or anger. There was some frustration expressed in the online survey “Stop acting like petulant children just because another councillor has a different view to your own. Grow up, for heaven’s sake” (Kirklees Council, 2016b: 12) but a few rants is typical of any consultation. Media manipulation of emotion does not seem to have been applied to the KDC process. The Commission hosted public deliberation, but they rushed the events so people didn’t have time to connect with others and process their feelings. Facilitators at events could do much more to engage with emotions around politics with a different style. The Commission consulted many groups, and hundreds of citizens, but Commissioners in interviews didn’t have much of an answer when it came to how they were going to demonstrate to citizens (get back to them to show) that their input had had an effect. There was no obvious connecting of the dots in that regard. They generate goodwill by being publicly visible, but if I were a Kirklees citizen, I think I would be frustrated by the lack of clarity about how much my voice mattered: “I would like to feel that the voices of the residents are heard more” writes one citizen (Ibid: 11). I might like my local councillor when I meet them at the market, but my faith in the system as a whole would not necessarily be improved. We see these tensions in a lot of contemporary politics: people dislike migrants in general, but like the migrants they’ve met on their street; they dislike politicians in general, but like their local MP.

Until institutions are transparent, straight with people, and reduce the hierarchy, they are unlikely to restore faith in democratic institutions and strike a more positive note emotionally. A repeated theme in the interviews was educating citizens about how the council worked, and that treating citizens like customers was wrong. Every interviewee who was asked agreed that citizens would rather not be asked at all than be asked a pre-decided question in a tokenistic consultation. However, as a remedy for this track record, the promise of the KDC remained alarmingly undefined to me: it was very vague what citizens would be getting. As a citizen, why should I care? Being told to be more active is more positive (rather than, “there’s no money so we need you to do more”) but without resources, it could easily come across as shifting the burden onto citizens and I am unconvinced people will take this up. More generously, it is a statement of intent; the beginning of a reorientation that takes time.

5. Conclusion

5.1 Summary and answer to the questions

In this section I will address firstly to what extent the research results can be generalised to cases other than the one being examined and what the research results reveal about the theory, and secondly the Kirklees Democracy Commission’s promotion of democratic goods. I consider what the research says about the adequacy of the methods used and the choice of the empirical material. I will examine whether methodological recommendations for future research can be derived from the research. Next, I will consider what improvements can be made in the future. Based on the research, I make recommendations for policy making. Finally I suggest avenues for future research.

Summary The Democracy Commission was valiant effort, with some addressable deficiencies. Undoubtedly, organisers were selling themselves. Everyone wanted to be proud of it. Undertaking such a commission is an expensive, time consuming process, so they are to be commended for taking the initiative to try. Many councils don’t try at all. And it is not easy engaging with 440,000 residents in any single process. I do not conclude it to be groundbreaking: it appeared to be a fairly standard process democracy model (mostly consultative) with a little Big Society thrown in. It may be unfair to consider only most innovative practices worthwhile, yet it is important to be constructively critical if improvements are to be made. The council are in a learning process, and further along it than many other councils, who should begin.

Answer to first research question: Principles, processes and procedures for participatory democracy best practice

Principles KDC published its own principles, but I take out different ones. The first relates to e-democracy, and the second to neutrality.

The first principle is that “It’s important that we do not see digital technologies as a panacea that alone can improve local democracy for everyone” (Kirklees Council, 2017: 43). Online engagement via e-democracy methods are in today’s age an essential ingredient to democratic inclusion because it is the most efficient way to collect a large number of citizens’ opinions or ideas. A number of factors and trends make this feasible: the widespread access to technology such as laptops and smartphones and the increasing trend for citizens to gain many kinds of information through social media, to name but two. And yet we must be clear, online tools simply cannot fully replace face to face methods of

deliberation. Firstly, a human will need to interpret the contribution of other humans (automation of citizen long-form contributions is not yet technically feasible). Secondly, not everyone wants to engage online, particularly of the elderly. We can conclude that face-to-face relationship building during citizens’ and representatives’ deliberation can be seen as a valuable part of the democratic process that reinforces trust and thus democratic legitimacy.

Secondly, building in the principle of neutrality via the creation of a “commissioner” role for elected representatives is a procedure that is thus far undocumented in the literature (as far as I am aware) and I recommend other municipalities adopt this. In this case it reduced the potential threat of party political partisanship and united officials to deliberate. In my interviews, commissioners reported working well together. This is in line with research that shows that when people are reminded of their party membership, they are more likely to try to say the official party line and not deviate from this with personal opinions (Unsworth & Fielding 2014, Cohen, 2003). Caveats and tensions exist: one favourable condition for this process in Kirklees was the relatively even spread of political parties represented. It is an open question whether this aspect would work where this is not the case and one party dominates. It might also work better where there is no opposition.

Finally, democratic theory as a whole does not respect emotions enough - I would make that point whether or not this case involved it at all. Yet, people in Britain are emotional about the cuts and the KDC ignored it which makes it less likely to lead to a refreshed relationship.

Processes and procedures The process was outlined in the case description (Figure 4.3) and the principles of an online/offline balance and neutrality (above) could easily be codified into procedures. Furthermore, I think the Council took on a task with no guidance about how to engage people, how to publicize their activities, how to report progress, and how to pick issues. At a logistical level, KDC’s process challenges can be solved relatively easily with standard processes from other sectors: a good information collection and feedback system; a continuously evolving iterative agenda that addresses topics and subtopics as needed. It is just management. I grant that knowledge or resources might be an issue. But that doesn't mean it cannot be done. I would like to point out that there are good methods and standard CMMI processes and practices13 that could be used to structure a commission so that they could get more communication and consideration done, because they would not have to figure out how to do everything themselves. They would have made more progress if they had not also had to develop their own methods along the way.

13 CMMI is a Process Model Framework for process-improvement. Standing for Capability Maturity Model Integration, is a structured and systematic collection of best practices for process-improvement. 59

Answer to question two: the promotion of democratic goods in Kirklees

Interviews that the project began with and sustained a great deal of goodwill; most interviewees reflected that progress was being made. But Table 5.2 identifies all the deficiencies named by my interviewees:

Table 5.2: Combined pros/cons assessment of Kirklees Democracy Commission

Inclusiveness Popular Control Considered judgment Transparency

+ Actively contacted + Citizens voices + Commissioners + Citizen comments citizens and groups. considered, it appears informed from wide published verbatim - Did not reach the sincerely. evidence base. online. audience numbers - Initial agenda was + Citizens partially - Final deliberation in desired. set by council. educated on democratic private. - No practical answer to + Encourages active process. + Full council meeting digital literacy citizenship, including - Questionable if national was webcast. challenge. dissent (petitions and context of austerity - Omitted discussion of - No systematic protests). discussed enough pressing national policy engagement with wider - No increase in direct - No extra resources for challenges e.g. youth beyond the youth citizen power. youth political education austerity. council. - No increase in access and not advocated - No clear return: “you to representatives. nationally. said - we did.” - Possibly deliberation + Wrote a digested was rushed. 10-minute read of the - Facilitators were ‘light results. touch’ and did not encourage reflective discourse.

Recreating Elstub’s comparison framework (2014) offers us a means of summarising many judgments in a single array (Table 5.3):

Table 5.3: Assessments of KDC using Smith’s (2009) four democratic goods (multi-stage)

Case

Inclusiveness Popular Control Considered Transparency

judgment

Agenda Low Low Moderate Low setting (no public) (no public) (reasonable) (not explained)

Debate Moderate Moderate Moderate Moderate (range of actors) (citizens shaped (citizens were (some published, what was debated considered) some private) at the end)

Decision Moderate Low High Moderate making (small group of (representatives (representatives (deliberation private. representatives) decided) considered) Final report, some reasons given)

Implemen Low Low High Moderate tation (no new actors) (no increased (appears thought (next stages political control; through) explained) encouraged to volunteer as “active citizens”)

Review N/A (too early) N/A (too early) N/A (too early) N/A (too early)

The process began with a genuine intention to engage and what resulted in a varied succession of engagements; both are to the Commission’s credit. Organisers seemed to be enthusiastic and reflective. More critically, some more transparency would have benefitted the process, particularly with regards to agenda setting. The council’s choice to focus the discussion on local matters and away from the national context of austerity in discussions with citizens was borne out of a sensible desire to build positive relationships and, one imagines, focus on things they can control. But is a fine line between focusing on the positive and being evasive; for openness’ sake, local government officials might be better off being braver and engage citizens by “telling it like it is.”

5.2 Theoretical implications

The Kirklees case is a useful addition to our canon of literature about what can work in local government participatory democracy. The findings of my research are similar to other research: Buser (2013) emphasised the need for accountability measures to improve democratic engagement in a

southern British municipality. I find two main theoretical implications: the necessity of considering efficiency when assessing institutional models of participatory democracy, and to build in a greater awareness of citizen emotions (both individual, and social psychology) when designing processes respecting the relational dimensions of participation.

Firstly, the timescale of participatory democracy is highlighted in Smith’s (2009) supplementary fifth democratic good, efficiency. This is particularly important with engaging in institutional design, as the third generation of deliberative democratic theorists did. The Kirklees case suggests that democracy is a long term project, with considerable time, effort and resources invested into its Democracy Commission. The case teaches us that other municipalities attempting such a project can expect a learning curve for practitioners and the public, and frame the exercise as developing a participatory culture long-term instead of ‘fixing’ democracy in a single burst and ignoring it until a later date. “Although you can't technically have democracy without voting, its real substance is ongoing conversation" (Mulgan, 2017). Democracy is a web of relations, an ecosystem, the totality of relationships within a defined territory, a craft that takes practice and time. “Live” democracy, the will of the people 24/7, would offer no stability. So theory may need to be more humanistic (especially with regards to digital tools), relax its techno-optimism, and state more explicitly that efficiency is not the primary aim.

Democratic theorists have recognised this tension, but I would argue, have unsatisfactory conclusions. Elstub suggests one solution to the “tensions between efficiency and participation” is “dualist,” separating “macro deliberation” in the informal public sphere and “micro deliberation” amongst a select group (2008: 173). However, it would be challenging to clearly define a specific agenda for the informal public sphere, and equal access to an informal public sphere is far from guaranteed, which could marginalise some. Elstub suggests (taking inspiration from the ‘systemic turn’ of deliberation) that “multiple, fluid forums” are the answer, but I am unconvinced. Such a system could in principle evolve, but it remains impractical to design institutionally. Therefore I can support dualism as a valid description of a functioning deliberative system, whilst finding Elstub’s proposal weak, because it cannot be systematised, and leaving the wider sphere completely informal is too easy an apology for the status quo. Contra to Elstub I recommend greater mediation between the formal/informal spheres, be it through an impartial media, or representatives of the informal public sphere brought forward to the micro deliberative stage.

Secondly, a major theme in the research was the tension between processes and relationships. Interviews revealed a unanimous agreement that democracy needs both, and I argue that this connects to the role of emotions, which is woefully underrepresented in the dominant deliberative democratic paradigm. Democracy is not a service that you “do to” people, it is a two-way relationship, and

democratic theorists, especially process theorists, risk seeing citizens as abstracts to be impersonally processed like data. Therefore we need to build in some of the substantive democratic theorists’ focus on the outcome. To what extent equality and empowerment, for example, are actually realised. A non-comprehensive list of emotions that need to be factored into participatory processes include empathy, trust, and hope. Democratic legitimacy builds on trust, and trust is build through demonstrating to people that their voice has an impact.

5.3 Critical reflection on the research as a whole

Case selection is a “highly personal effort, which can be an important source of distortion,” writes Schmitter (2008: 266). Moreover, “values become embedded in the topic and can exert a persistent influence on your choices” (Ibid). I reflect that it is possible that I projected my personal views onto Kirklees Council, because I have worked at a different Council and made judgements about the culture there (bureaucratic and slow to change) that could have led me to prejudge Kirklees. Methodologically, I find one significant weakness in my research design: whilst being a ‘live’ case was important to me because this means the experience would be fresh in the respondents’ minds, this means it is also too early to evaluate the Kirklees Democracy Commission’s long term impact. Therefore I would recommend a longitudinal design for evaluating the extent of improved democratic engagement. In terms of following my research design the process has been a success. I would have liked more citizen interviews, and made many enquiries to so so. If I were to rerun the research, I would have coordinated with the Commission earlier on to include an interview invitation in their participant mailing list (which was offered to me, but too late).

5.4 Policy implications

The principles, processes and procedures of KDC outlined in the previous section are adaptable to many other settings: experimenting freely with digital tools, whilst not seeing efficiency as the main aim and protecting formal offline participation; treating democratic participation is a long term project and allocating sufficient time and resources for this; and designing the neutral ‘commissioner’ feature into democratic processes. At an institutional level, communications must manage citizen expectations. At a practical level, protecting public meeting spaces (or creating new ones) would enable the public sphere to expand. Better citizenship education in schools is a national policy that must change to enable young people to participate more in democracy. I recommend that similar commissions be formed by other municipalities, bearing in mind the pros and cons of KDC’s choices and experiences (Table 5.2).

5.5 Future research

Many areas of future research suggest themselves from the results of this case. Would it work in more tense party arrangements? What methods of getting back to people are the most effective? Could digital methods involve live deliberation? The Delphi methods for example. Or “Democracy Squared” live document editing. How to best combine varied digital tools e.g. apps, being able to “upvote” citizen ideas, for example. How can the KDC method be translated to different geographical and political contexts? Can we achieve popular control via “activist councils”?

6. Acknowledgements

I would like to express my gratitude to all the interviewees in Kirklees; to my supervisor Franca van Hooren for her encouragement and expert guidance; to Michael Enright for his patience and critical eye; to my classmates David, Spike, Pavlos and Kayin for their feedback; and my dad for telling me to get on with it.

7. Bibliography

Theoretical sources Al Ramiah, A., and Hewstone, M. (2013). "Intergroup Contact As A Tool For Reducing, Resolving, And Preventing Intergroup Conflict: Evidence, Limitations, And Potential.". American Psychologist 68.7: 527-542. Web. 14 June 2017.

Ankeny, R. (2016). Inviting Everyone to the Table: Strategies for More Effective and Legitimate Food Policy via Deliberative Approaches. Journal of Social Philosophy, 47(1), pp.10-24.

Arceneaux, K. and Butler, D. (2015). How Not to Increase Participation in Local Government: The Advantages of Experiments When Testing Policy Interventions. Public Administration Review, 76(1), pp.131-139.

Arnstein, S. (1975). A Working Model for Public Participation. Public Administration Review, 35(1), p.70.

Baber, W. and Bartlett, R. (2005) Deliberative Environmental Politics: Democracy and Ecological Rationality. Cambridge MA: MIT Press.

Bifulco, L. (2012). Citizen participation, agency and voice. European Journal of Social Theory, 16(2), pp.174-187.

Bohman, J. (1996). Public Deliberation: Pluralism, Complexity, and Democracy. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Böker, M. and Elstub, S. (2015). The Possibility of Critical Mini-Publics: Realpolitik and Normative Cycles in Democratic Theory. Representation, 51(1), pp.125-144.

Brinkmann, S. (2013). Qualitative interviewing. Oxford, U.K: Oxford University Press.

Bryman, A. (2012) Social Research Methods (4th Ed).

Burnham et al (2008) Research Methods in politics (2nd ed)

Burston, D. (2017). “It can't happen here”: Trump, authoritarianism and American politics. Psychotherapy and Politics International, 15(1), p.e1399. 66

Buser, M. (2013). Democratic Accountability and Metropolitan Governance: The Case of South Hampshire, UK. Urban Studies, 51(11), pp.2336-2353.

Campbell and Kay (2014). Solution Aversion: On the Relation Between Ideology and Motivated Disbelief. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

Carcasson, M. (2017). Interview regarding deliberation facilitation theory.

Castelnovo, W. (2016), “Co-production makes cities smarter: citizens’ participation in smart city initiatives“, in Fugini, M., Bracci, E., Sicilia, M. (eds.). Co-production in the Public Sector. Springer, 99-122.

Chambers, S. (2012).“Deliberation and Mass Democracy.” In Deliberative Systems– Deliberative Democracy at the Large Scale, edited by J. Parkinson and J. Mansbridge, 52– 71. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Chickering, A. and Turner, J. (2017). The Transpartisan Moment: Donald Trump: How we got here, where we might go. Transpartisan Review, [online] w(w), pp.7-17. Available at: http://www.transpartisanreview.com/TTR_Issue_One.pdf [Accessed 12 Jun. 2017].

Civilpolitics.org. (2015). What is Civility? | Evidence-based methods for inter-group civility. CivilPolitics.org. [online] Available at: http://www.civilpolitics.org/home/ [Accessed 11 Jun. 2017].

Cohen, Geoffrey L. "Party Over Policy: The Dominating Impact Of Group Influence On Political Beliefs.". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 85.5 (2003): 808-822. Web.

Coles, B. and West, M. (2016). Trolling the trolls: Online forum users constructions of the nature and properties of trolling. Computers in Human Behavior, 60, pp.233-244.

Cruz, C. (2009). Use of semantics to manage 3d scenes in web platforms. In M. Pagani (Ed.), Encyclopedia of multimedia technology and networking, 2nd ed., (pp. 1487-1492). Hershey, PA

Davidson, S. and Elstub, S. (2014). Deliberative and Participatory Democracy in the UK. The British Journal of Politics and International Relations, 16(3), pp.367-385.

Del Vicario, M., Bessi, A., Zollo, F., Petroni, F., Scala, A., Caldarelli, G., Stanley, H. and Quattrociocchi, W. (2016). The spreading of misinformation online. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 113(3), pp.554-559.

Democracy.kent.gov.uk. (2016). Agenda item - Report by Leader of the Council (Oral). [online] Available at: https://democracy.kent.gov.uk/mgAi.aspx?ID=35576 [Accessed 7 Jun. 2017].

Demsoc.org. (2013). Democratic Public Services in Lambeth – The Democratic Society. [online] Available at: http://www.demsoc.org/2013/02/05/democratic-public-services-in-lambeth/ [Accessed 11 Jun. 2017].

Devos, T., Spini, D. and Schwartz, S. (2002). Conflicts among human values and trust in institutions. British Journal of Social Psychology, 41(4), pp.481-494.

Diamond, L. (2015). Facing Up to the Democratic Recession. Journal of Democracy, 26(1), pp.141-155.

Dirnagl, U., Przesdzing, I., Kurreck, C. and Major, S. (2016). A Laboratory Critical Incident and Error Reporting System for Experimental Biomedicine. PLOS Biology, 14(12), p.e2000705.

Ditto, P. and Koleva, S. (2011). Moral Empathy Gaps and the American Culture War. Emotion Review, 3(3), pp.331-332.

Drury S, Andre D, Goddard S, Wentzel, J (2016) Assessing Deliberative Pedagogy: Using a Learning Outcomes Rubric to Assess Tradeoffs and Tensions. Journal of Public Deliberation 2016 vol: 12 (1)

Durose, C. and Lowndes, V. (2010). Neighbourhood Governance: Contested Rationales within a Multi-Level Setting – A Study of Manchester. Local Government Studies, 36(3), pp.341-359.

Duyvendak, J. (2011). The politics of home. 1st ed. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan.

Elstub, S. (2014). Deliberative Pragmatic Equilibrium Review: A Framework for Comparing Institutional Devices and Their Enactment of Deliberative Democracy in the UK. The British Journal of Politics and International Relations, 16(3), pp.386-409.

Elstub, S., Ercan, S. and Mendonça, R. (2016). Editorial introduction: The fourth generation of deliberative democracy. Critical Policy Studies, 10(2), pp.139-151.

Elstub, Stephen. "The Third Generation Of Deliberative Democracy". Political Studies Review 8.3 (2010): 291-307. Web.

Emerson, P. (2014). Defining Democracy. Berlin: Springer Berlin.

Ercan, S. A., and J. S. Dryzek. (2015).“The Reach of Deliberative Democracy.” Policy Studies 36 (3): 241–248. doi:10.1080/01442872.2015.1065969 .

Fullan, M. (2011). The Six Secrets of Change. 1st ed. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons.

Fung, A. (2003) ‘Recipes for Public Spheres: Eight Institutional Design Choices and Their Consequences’, Journal of Political Philosophy 11.3: 338–67

George, A. L., & Bennett, A. (2005). Case studies and theory development in the social sciences. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Gerring, J., & Seawright, J. (2007). Techniques for choosing cases. Case study research: Principles and practices, 86-150.

Gorsevski, E. (2004). Peaceful Persuasion: The Geopolitics of Nonviolent Rhetoric. 1st ed. New York: State University of New York Press.

Gutmann, A. and Thompson, D. (1996) Democracy and Disagreement. London: Harvard University Press.

Gutsell, J. and Inzlicht, M. (2011). Intergroup differences in the sharing of emotive states: neural evidence of an empathy gap. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 7(5), pp.596-603.

Habermas, J. (1996) Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory on Law and Democracy. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Haidt, J. (2008). Jonathan Haidt: The moral roots of liberals and conservatives. [online] YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vs41JrnGaxc [Accessed 14 Jun. 2017].

Haidt, J. (2013). The Righteous Mind. London: Penguin Books.

Hajer, M. and Uitermark, J. (2008). Performing authority: Discursive politics after the assassination of Theo van Gogh. Public Administration, 86(1), pp.5-19.

Hargreaves, A. (2016). Autonomy and Transparency: Two Good Ideas Gone Bad. In: J. Evers and R. Kneyber, ed., Flip the system, 1st ed. Oxford: Routledge, pp.120-133.

Healey, Patsy, Claudio Magalhaes, Ali Madanipour, and John Pendlebury (2003) “Place, identity and local politics: analyzing initiatives in deliberative governance”, in Maarten Hajer and Henk Wagenaar (eds.) Deliberative Policy Analysis: Understanding Governance in the Network Society, 60–88, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Heshmat, S. (2015). What Is Confirmation Bias?. [online] Psychology Today. Available at: https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/science-choice/201504/what-is-confirmation-bias [Accessed 11 Jun. 2017].

Hetrick, B. (2017). The risk of living and learning in silos - IU Center for Civic Literacy. [online] IU Center for Civic Literacy. Available at: http://civicliteracy.iupui.edu/risk-living-learning-silos/ [Accessed 14 Jun. 2017].

Hoppe, R. (2015). The governance of problems. 1st ed. Bristol: Policy Press.

Hypernormalisation. (2016). [film] Directed by A. Curtis. London: BBC.

IDS (2000) ‘Citizenship, Participation and Accountability in Policy Processes: A Proposal for a Development Research Centre at the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex’, unpublished concept note.

Karjalainen, M. and Rapeli, L. (2014). Who will not deliberate? Attrition in a multi-stage citizen deliberation experiment. Quality & Quantity, 49(1), pp.407-422.

Khosrowpour, M. (2013). Dictionary of Information Science and Technology. Hershey, PA: IGI Global. MLA (Modern Language Assoc.) Khosrowpour, Mehdi. Dictionary of Information Science and Technology. vol. 2nd ed, IGI Global, 2013. EBSCOhost.

Kim, S. and Lee, J. (2012). E-Participation, Transparency, and Trust in Local Government. Public Administration Review, 72(6), pp.pp: 819-828.

Lamm, C. and Majdand ić, J. (2015). The role of shared neural activations, mirror neurons, and ž morality in empathy – A critical comment. Neuroscience Research, 90, pp.15-24.

Laws, D. and Forester, J. (2007). Learning in practice: Public policy mediation. Critical Policy Studies, 1(4), pp.342-370.

Lenard, P. (2008) Trust, Democracy, and Multicultural Challenges, Penn State University Press

Luskin, R., O'Flynn, I., Fishkin, J. and Russell, D. (2012). Deliberating across Deep Divides. Political Studies, 62(1), pp.116-135.

Mair (2008), ‘Concepts and concept formation’, pp. 177-197 in D. della Porta & M. Keating (eds.), Approaches and Methodologies in the Social Sciences, A Pluralist Perspective, Cambridge University Press.

Mansbridge, J. (1999). “Everyday Talk in Deliberative Systems.” In Deliberative Politics: Essays on Democracy and Disagreement, edited by S. Macedo, 211– 239. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Mclaren L (2011) World Politics Critical Citizens. American Journal of Political Science vol: 42 (42) pp: 163-185

Media Reform Coalition (2015). Who Owns The UK Media? 1st ed. [ebook]. Available at: http://www.mediareform.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/Who_owns_the_UK_media-report_pl us_appendix1.pdf [Accessed 14 Oct. 2016].

Moreno Caballud, L. (2015). Cultures of anyone : studies on cultural democratization in the Spanish neoliberal crisis. 1st ed. Liverpool : Liverpool University Press.

Morrell, M. (2015). Empathy and Democracy. University Park (PA): Pennsylvania State University Press.

Moss, G. and Coleman, S. (2014). Deliberative Manoeuvres in the Digital Darkness: E-Democracy Policy in the UK. The British Journal of Politics and International Relations, 16(3), pp.410-427.

Newell, P. and Wheeler, J. (eds), (2006) Rights, Resources and the Politics of Accountability, London and New York

Newman, J. (2013). Landscapes of antagonism: Local governance, neoliberalism and austerity. Urban Studies, 51(15), pp.3290-3305.

Nguyen, T., Bosch, O. and Nguyen, N. (2014). Using the Evolutionary Learning Laboratory Approach to Establish a World First Model for Integrated Governance of Haiphong, Vietnam. Systems Research and Behavioral Science, 31(5), pp.627-641.

Nickerson, R. (2001). The Projective Way of Knowing: A Useful Heuristic That Sometimes Misleads. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 10(5), pp.168-172.

Niemeyer,, S., Felicetti, A. and Ruggero, O. (2012). Preliminary Report: Valsamoggia Citizens Initiative Review. Canberra: Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance, Research School of Social Sciences, The Australian National University.

Nussbaum, M. (2015). Political Emotions: Why Love Matters for Justice. 1st ed. Boston: Harvard University Press.

Nyhan, B. and Reifler, J. (2010). When Corrections Fail: The Persistence of Political Misperceptions. Political Behavior, 32(2), pp.303-330.

O’Flynn, I. (2006) Deliberative Democracy and Divided Societies. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

Oatley, K. and Jenkins, J. (1992). Human Emotions: Function and Dysfunction. Annual Review of Psychology, 43(1), pp.55-85.

Ortuoste, M. (2012). Youth, Life, and Politics: Examining the Everyday in Comparative Politics. PS: Political Science & Politics, 45(02), pp.285-290.

Oskamp, S. (2008). Reducing prejudice and discrimination. 1st ed. New York: Psychology Press.

Pariser, E. (2014). The Filter Bubble. 1st ed. New York: Penguin Books.

Parkinson, J. (2006) Deliberating in the Real World: Problems of Legitimacy in Deliberative Democracy. Oxford: Oxford University Press

Patsias, C., Latendresse, A. and Bherer, L. (2012). Participatory Democracy, Decentralization and Local Governance: the Montreal Participatory Budget in the light of ‘Empowered Participatory Governance’. International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 37(6), pp.2214-2230.

Pedersen, H. (2016). Antifragility and Resilience - Key Lessons From The Airline Industry. [online] Available at: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/antifragility-resilience-key-lessons-from-airline-henrik-pedersen [Accessed 11 Jun. 2017].

Pielke, Roger. (2007) "The Honest Broker: Making Sense Of Science In Policy And Politics". Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management 3.4: 567-568.

Pieterse, J. (2012). Leaking Superpower: WikiLeaks and the contradictions of democracy. Third World Quarterly, 33(10), pp.1909-1924.

Putnam, R. (2007). Bowling alone. 1st ed. New York, NY [u.a.]: Simon & Schuster.

Rawls, J. (1993) Political Liberalism . New York: Columbia University Press.

Rein, M. & D. Schön (1993) ‘Reframing policy discourse’, in Fischer & Forrester (1993) The argumentative turn in policy analysis and planning, Durham: Duke University Press, p. 145-166.

Richards B. ( 2007) Emotional Governance: Media, Politics and Terror. Basingstoke: Palgrave. Google Scholar

Rose, J. and Saebø, Ø (2005) Democracy Squared Designing On-Line Political Communities to Accommodate Conflicting Interests, Scandinavian Journal of Information Systems vol: 17 2) pp: 133-168

Rosenberg, M. and Gandhi, A. (2005). Non-violent communication. 1st ed. Encinitas, Calif.: PuddleDancer Press.

Rousseau, J., Ritter, A. and Bondanella, J. (1988). Rousseau's political writings. New York: W.W. Norton.

Rushkoff, D. (2004). Open Source Democracy. 1st ed. Project Gutenberg.

Scheff, T. (2013). Repression of Emotion: A Danger to Modern Societies?. In: N. Demertzis, ed., Emotions in Politics, 1st ed. Palgrave Macmillan, pp.84-92.

Schlosberg, J. (2013). Power beyond scrutiny: media, justice and accountability. 1st ed. London: Pluto Press.

Schmitter, P. (2008), ‘The design of social and political research’, pp. 263 – 295 in D. della Porta & M. Keating (eds.), Approaches and Methodologies in the Social Sciences, A Pluralist Perspective, Cambridge University Press.

Schudson, M. (2000). The good citizen. 1st ed. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.

Schumann, K., Zaki, J. and Dweck, C. (2014). Addressing the empathy deficit: Beliefs about the malleability of empathy predict effortful responses when empathy is challenging. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 107(3), pp.475-493.

Shaw, G. (1916). Pygmalion. Tustin: Xist Publishing.

Smith, G. Democratic Innovations. 1st ed. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2009. Print.

Standing, G. (2016). The Precariat. 1st ed. London: Bloomsbury Academic.

Stern, C. and Kleiman, T. (2015). Know Thy Outgroup: Promoting Accurate Judgments of Political Attitude Differences Through a Conflict Mindset. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 6(8), pp.950-958.

Stoker, (2016) Post-factual politics: The emotive turn in Brexit and opportunities for democratic renewal (Masters essay)

Sztompka, P. (1999). Trust: A sociological theory. 1st ed. Cambridge [u.a.]: Cambridge Univ. Press.

Taleb, N. (2013). Antifragile. 1st ed. [Place of publication not identified]: Les Belles Lettres.

Tansey, O. (2007). Process tracing and elite interviewing: A case for non-probability sampling. Political Science and Politics, 40(04), 765-772.

Taylor, J, Brownstein, D, Klein, J, Strandjord, T. (2007) Evaluation of an anonymous system to report medical errors in pediatric inpatients. Journal of hospital medicine, Vol.2(4), pp.226-33

Tilly, C. (2008). Democracy. Cambridge [etc.]: Cambridge University Press.

Unsworth & Fielding (2014) It's political: How the salience of one's political identity changes climate change beliefs and policy support. Global Environmental Change, 27, pp.131-137.

Uslaner, E. (2005). Inequality, Trust, and Civic Engagement. American Politics Research, 33(6), pp.868-894.

Weatherley, R. and Lipsky, M. (1977). Street-Level Bureaucrats and Institutional Innovation: Implementing Special-Education Reform. Harvard Educational Review, 47(2), pp.171-197.

Worcman, K. (2002). Digital Division Is Cultural Exclusion. But Is Digital Inclusion Cultural Inclusion?. D-Lib Magazine, 8(3).

Empirical sources BBC News. (2017). Results of the 2017 General Election. [online] Available at: http://www.bbc.com/news/election/2017/results [Accessed 10 Jun. 2017].

Bite the Ballot. (2017). PROJECTS - Bite the Ballot. [online] Available at: http://bitetheballot.co.uk/projects/ [Accessed 19 Jun. 2017].

Bloomberg. (2017). Russian Cyber Hacks on U.S. Electoral System Far Wider Than Previously Known. [online] Available at: https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2017-06-13/russian-breach-of-39-states-threatens-fut ure-u-s-elections [Accessed 21 Jun. 2017].

Bsa.natcen.ac.uk. (2016). British Social Attitudes | NatCen Social Research. [online] Available at: http://www.bsa.natcen.ac.uk/latest-report/british-social-attitudes-33/politics.aspx?_ga=2.17113475 6.588347992.1496849252-2092973864.1496849252 [Accessed 7 Jun. 2017].

Channel 4 News. (2011). FactCheck: Did Ministers ‘misinterpret’ research to justify scrapping the EMA?. [online] Available at: https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-did-ministers-misinterpret-research-to-justify -scrapping-the-ema [Accessed 22 Jun. 2017].

CMMI Assessment. (2017). CMMI Assessment. [online] Available at: http://cmmi-assessment.com/ [Accessed 21 Jun. 2017].

Collins, K. (2016). 'What is the EU?' trends on Google in the UK as the country votes for Brexit. [online] CNET. Available at: https://www.cnet.com/news/what-is-the-eu-trends-on-google-in-the-uk-as-the-country-votes-to-leav e/ [Accessed 16 Oct. 2016].

Daily Mail (2015). Tidal wave of migrants could be biggest threat to Europe since the war. [online] Mail Online. Available at: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3141005/Tidal-wave-migrants-biggest-threat-Europe-war [Accessed 16 Oct. 2016].

Economist.com. (2017). Britain’s general election 2017: the results. [online] Available at: http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2017/06/ukresults [Accessed 10 Jun. 2017].

En.wikipedia.org. (2016). Batley and Spen by-election, 2016. [online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batley_and_Spen_by-election,_2016 [Accessed 11 Jun. 2017]

Flinders, M. (2015). Democracy Matters: Lessons from the 2015 Citizens’ Assemblies on English Devolution. [online] Electoral Reform Society. Available at: http://citizensassembly.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Democracy-Matters-2015-Citizens-Asse mblies-Report.pdf [Accessed 5 Jun. 2017].

Ft.com. (2015). The UK’s growing divide between north and south. [online] Available at: https://www.ft.com/content/74b8ca48-a024-11e5-8613-08e211ea5317 [Accessed 11 Jun. 2017].

Gov.uk (2008) Building on Strong Foundations - A Framework for Local Authority Asset Management [online] Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/framework-for-local-authority-asset-management [Accessed 14 Dec. 2016)

Gov.uk. (2015). Local action on health inequalities Reducing social isolation across the lifecourse Practice resource summary. [online] Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/460708/3b_Reduc ing_social_isolation-Briefing.pdf [Accessed 7 Jun. 2017].

Gov.uk. (2016). 2010 to 2015 government policy: localism - Publications - GOV.UK. [online] Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/2010-to-2015-government-policy-localism [Accessed 16 Nov. 2016].

Hastings, A., Bailey, N., Besemer, K., Bramley, G., Gannon, M., and Watkins, D. (2013) Coping with the cuts: local authorities and poorer communities. Main report. Glasgow: University of Glasgow.

Hersh, E. (2016). How Many Republicans Marry Democrats? [online] FiveThirtyEight. Available at: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-many-republicans-marry-democrats/ [Accessed 9 Mar 2017]

Huddersfield Daily Examiner (2017). Which Kirklees Constituency Voted Against Brexit? [online] Available at: http://www.examiner.co.uk/news/west-yorkshire-news/kirklees-constituency-voted-against-brexit- 12593757 [Accessed 11 Jun. 2017].

Independent (2016). Hate crime incidents up 42% on last year after Brexit vote. [online] The Independent. Available at: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/brexit-hate-crime-racism-stats-spike-police-england -wales-eu-referendum-a7126706.html [Accessed 14 Jun. 2017].

Kirklees Council (2017). Growing a stronger local democracy from the ground up: Kirklees Democracy Commission draft final report. [online] Available at: http://www.democracycommission.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Kirklees-Democracy-Com mission-draft-report-270417.pdf [Accessed 14 Jun. 2017].

Kirklees Council. (2016a). Danny Lockwood, The Press News Ltd. [online] Available at: http://www.democracycommission.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/6.Danny-Lockwood-evide nce.pdf [Accessed 22 Jun. 2017].

Kirklees Council. (2016b). DC e-panel survey. [online] Available at: http://www.democracycommission.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/DC-e-panel-survey-results. pdf [Accessed 22 Jun. 2017].

Kirklees Democracy Commission. (2017). Timeline. [online] Available at: http://democracycommission.org.uk/what-were-doing/timeline/ [Accessed 21 Jun. 2017].

Kirklees.gov.uk. (2016). Executive Summary, Current Living in Kirklees (CLiK) 2016 Survey. [online] Available at: https://www.kirklees.gov.uk/involve/entry.aspx?id=816 [Accessed 21 Jun. 2017].

Mulgan, G. (2017). Ludwig Kayser on Twitter. [online] Twitter. Available at: https://twitter.com/LudwigKayser/status/872450155399852032 [Accessed 11 Jun. 2017]

Natcen.ac.uk. (2017). Over half the public don’t feel any of the political parties represent their views. [online] Available at: http://www.natcen.ac.uk/news-media/press-releases/2017/june/over-half-the-public-don%E2%80 %99t-feel-any-of-the-political-parties-represent-their-views/ [Accessed 7 Jun. 2017].

New Statesman. (2015). What is the Overton window? [online] Available at: http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2015/04/what-overton-window [Accessed 21 Jun. 2017].

North Kirklees News. (2017). [online] Available at: https://northkirkleesnews.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/cropped-dewsbury_market_place3.jpg [Accessed 19 Jun. 2017].

Observatory.kirklees.gov.uk. (2017a). Population. [online] Available at: http://observatory.kirklees.gov.uk/jsna/population [Accessed 21 Jun. 2017].

Observatory.kirklees.gov.uk. (2017b). Social capital. [online] Available at: http://observatory.kirklees.gov.uk/jsna/health-and-wellbeing/home-and-community-factors/social-c apital [Accessed 21 Jun. 2017].

Participedia.net. (2016). You Choose: London Borough of Redbridge Council Budget Consultation Tool | Participedia. [online] Available at: http://participedia.net/en/cases/you-choose-london-borough-redbridge-council-budget-consultation -tool [Accessed 21 Jun. 2017].

Petie, O. (2017). 5 things we learned from NPC's event 'Should charities step in for public services in an era of austerity?' [online] Renaisi. Available at: http://www.renaisi.com/charities-public-services/ [Accessed 12 Jun. 2017].

Publicfinance.co.uk.(2016). Osborne scraps core grant and allows councils to keep business rates | Public Finance. [online] Available at:

http://www.publicfinance.co.uk/news/2015/10/osborne-scraps-core-grant-and-allows-councils-kee p-business-rates [Accessed 13 Dec. 2016].

PublishersWeekly.com. (2011). Now You See It: What Is the Internet Hiding from You? PW Talks with Author Eli Pariser. [online] Available at: http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/digital/content-and-e-books/article/47579-now-yo u-see-it-what-is-the-internet-hiding-from-you-pw-talks-with-author-eli-pariser.html [Accessed 7 Jun. 2017].

Sims, D. (2017). Growing a stronger local democracy – Key themes from our draft report, May 2017. [online] Kirklees Democracy Commission. Available at: http://www.democracycommission.org.uk/draft-report-key-themes/ [Accessed 14 Jun. 2017].

Telegraph (2016). Labour MP Jo Cox dies after being shot and stabbed as husband urges people to 'fight against the hate' that killed her. [online] The Telegraph. Available at: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/16/labour-mp-jo-cox-shot-in-leeds-witnesses-report/ [Accessed 11 Jun. 2017].

Telegraph (2014). Britain's rising self-employment vs rest of Europe. [online] Available at: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/11027858/Britain-becoming-self-employment- capital-of-Europe.html [Accessed 11 Jun. 2017].

Telegraph (2017). Snoopers' Charter: Government wins vote on Investigatory Powers Bill. [online] Telegraph.co.uk. Available at: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/12194441/Snoopers-Charter-Parliamentary-vote-on-the- investigatory-powers-bill-live-updates.html [Accessed 10 Jun. 2017].

The Guardian (2009b). Tony Blair admits: I would have invaded Iraq anyway. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2009/dec/12/tony-blair-iraq-chilcot-inquiry [Accessed 14 Oct. 2016].

The Guardian (2013). George Osborne: jobless benefit conditions are 'tough love'. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/sep/30/george-osborne-jobless-benefit-conservatives [Accessed 11 Jun. 2017].

The Guardian (2015). Labour has failed but it’s the low-paid and hard-pressed who will suffer | Polly Toynbee. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/may/08/labour-failure-low-paid-will-suffer [Accessed 11 Jun. 2017].

The Guardian (2016). Follow the money: how left-behind cities can hold their corporate bullies to account. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/aug/22/follow-the-money-how-left-behind-citi es-corporate-bullies-hedge-clippers [Accessed 7 Jun. 2017].

The Guardian (2016a). There’s a fight over working-class voters. Labour must not lose it | Owen Jones. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/oct/06/fight-working-class-voters-labour [Accessed 7 Jun. 2017].

The Guardian (2016b). Northern powerhouse at risk from south-east bias, says airport boss. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/sep/30/northern-powerhouse-at-risk-from-south-east-b ias-says-airport-boss [Accessed 11 Jun. 2017].

The Guardian (2017a). Parliament passes Brexit bill and opens way to triggering article 50. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/mar/13/brexit-vote-article-50-eu-citizens-rights-lords- mps [Accessed 31 May 2017].

The Guardian (2017b). Scottish parliament votes for second independence referendum. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/mar/28/scottish-parliament-votes-for-second-indepen dence-referendum-nicola-sturgeon [Accessed 7 Jun. 2017].

The Guardian (2017c). Andy Burnham elected mayor of Greater Manchester. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/may/05/andy-burnham-elected-mayor-of-greater-ma nchester [Accessed 31 May 2017].

The Poke. (2017). This sign outside a Bristol pub is pretty on the nose. [online] Available at: http://www.thepoke.co.uk/2017/05/02/sign-outside-bristol-pub-pretty-nose/ [Accessed 7 Jun. 2017].

Thomson, L. (2017). How can we create better local conversations? - Renaisi. [online] Available at: http://www.renaisi.com/can-create-better-local-conversations/ [Accessed 22 Jun. 2017].

UK Data Service. (2016). An introduction to data on Politics. [online] Available at: https://www.ukdataservice.ac.uk/media/604590/politicswebslides20102016.pdf [Accessed 19 Jun. 2017].

8. Appendices

8.1: Voter turnout, Kirklees and bordering constituencies

2010 2015 2017

District voters % voters % voters %

Huddersfield 40,486 61.1 40,524 62 43,834 65.4

Batley and Spen 50,479 66.6 51,109 64.4 53,780 67.1

Colne Valley 56,790 69.1 55,296 68.8 60,420 71.6

Dewsbury 53,630 68.5 54,008 67.3 56,545 69.5

Kirklees Average 50,346 66.3 50,234 65.6 53,645 68.4

Halifax 43,753 62.1 43,555 61.9 48,276 67.8

Bradford South 37,600 59.1 37,995 59.8 41,049 60.6

Wakefield 42,973 60.9 44,444 62.7 46,284 65.8

Penistone & Stocksbridge 46,854 65.9 46,516 67.9 49,787 69.8

Oldham East & Saddleworth 44,483 61.8 34,930 48 47,037 65.1

High Peak 50,789 69.3 50,337 69.9 53,853 73.5

Calder Valley 53,541 68.9 51,780 67.3 58,054 73.4

Kirklees' Morley & Outwood 48,250 63.3 48,856 65.8 52,357 68.4 neighbours Average 46,030 63.9 44,802 62.9 49,587 68.1

2010 2015 2017

Kirklees average 66.3 65.6 68.4

Neighbour average 63.9 62.9 68.1

Kirklees margin 2.4% 2.7% 0.4%

8.2: Contact Information

# Name Position Company Type of Date Contact

1 Martin Founder and CSU Center for Telephone 16/3/2017 Carcasson Drector Public interview Deliberation

2 Ravi Iyer Executive CivilPolitics.org Telephone 17/3/2017 Director interview

3 Dr Andy Senior University of Telephone 19/04/2017 Mycock Lecturer in Huddersfield interview Politics

4 Carl Head of Kirklees Interview in 02/05/2017 Whistlecraft Governance & Council person Democratic Services

5 Eric Firth Councillor Kirklees Interview in 09/05/2017 Council person

6 Andrew Cooper Councillor Kirklees Interview in 09/05/2017 Council person

7 Alison Cotterill Citizen N/A Interview in 09/05/2017 participant person

8 Nicola Research and Kirklees Telephone 22/05/2017 Boothman Consultation, Council interview Policy Unit

9 Andy McArthur Owner Social Telephone 24/05/2017 Marketing interview Gateway

10 Stephen Elstub Lecturer in Newcastle Telephone 8/6/2017 British University interview Politics