Group dynamics in the Citizens’ Assembly on Electoral Reform Manon de Jongh ISBN: 978-1-56592-479-6 Design: Het is mooi werk, Cothen, the Netherlands Photograph on cover: Arthur Mebius Photography, Naarden, the Netherlands Print: Toptryk Grafisk, Gråsten, Denmark © 2013 Manon de Jongh. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner. 2 Group dynamics in the Citizens’ Assembly on Electoral Reform Groepsdynamiek in het Burgerforum Kiesstelsel (met een samenvatting in het Nederlands) Proefschrift ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Universiteit Utrecht op gezag van de rector magnificus, prof.dr. G.J. van der Zwaan, ingevolge het besluit van het college voor promoties in het openbaar te verdedigen op vrijdag 17 mei 2013 des middags te 12.45 uur door Manon Sabine de Jongh geboren op 18 augustus 1978 te Deventer 3 Promotor: Prof.dr. S.G.L. Schruijer Dit proefschrift werd (mede) mogelijk gemaakt met financiële steun van Maatschap voor Communicatie, Ministerie van Binnenlandse Zaken en Koninkrijkrelaties, en Udviklingskonsulenterne. 4 Foreword Today is the 25th of March, it is exactly seven years since I formally started this PhD project! And now, seven years later, my project has been approved and I am finishing the very last part of the thesis, the foreword. Coincidence? Maybe there is no such thing as coincidence... While reflecting on the past seven years, the first thing that comes to mind is the round of interviews that I held during the autumn of 2005. I was considering embarking on a PhD and felt that I needed to collect data about what it was like to write such ‘a thing’. I spoke to twenty people; some had finished their projects, some had stopped along the way, some had never started, and some were still working on them. One of the respondents warned me: “I feel the most important thing to say to you is that you should take care of your life; don’t lose it, while you’re busy finishing your PhD”. I have thought about this sentence again and again. It has probably been one of the most important things that was said to me in my professional life. And maybe this is the reason why, during the process, I actually could live my life. What have I gotten out of these seven years? Apart from the knowledge that I gained, I feel that writing this PhD has mostly been a personal development process. For how lucky can one be, spending seven years of one’s life reflecting, wondering, thinking, feeling, making mistakes, producing, not producing, being in chaos, not knowing, hoping, choosing, and fighting. During this development process, my professional and private lives changed – not coincidentally – and in no small measure. So, when I try to answer the question above, I wish to share that these seven years have brought me in contact with my true self. Many have supported me in this process, and I would like to thank them here. First, I would like to thank my sponsors for facilitating this project: Maatschap voor Communicatie, Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations, Udviklingskonsulenterne, and Lone. Especially, I would like to thank the project secretary and the chair of the Citizens’ Assembly (deliberately referred to anonymously, see Section 5.4.3) and all the Assembly and staff members and external parties that helped me to fulfill this research. Without you, all this learning would literally have not been possible. A special note is addressed to the chair: thank you for your courage, collaboration, and trust. You supplied science in your professional and personal reflections and actions, which made it possible to explore the role of a facilitator in a more detailed way than one usually can. I am grateful for these contributions and the moments you wanted to share with me. Then, my supervisor Sandra Schruijer. Thank you for sharing all your knowledge, wisdom, and experience. Working with you has been very inspiring, meaningful, and instructive. Not always easy, but especially therefore challenging. Thank you for pushing me to think individually and critically, for giving me freedom, and last but not least for your good heart. 5 Furthermore, I wish to thank my clients and colleagues who supported me with knowledge and learning during the last seven years. Especially, Anders Trillingsgaard, Anne Tortzen, Dorthe Degnegaard, Eric Spaans, Frits Lintmeijer, Gemma van der Ploeg, Marcel Brosens, Michael Bo Nielsen, and Morten Fogsgaard. Jette Lindhard and Kenneth Albæk, thank you for managing me the way you did. Last but not least, I would like to thank my family and friends. They probably suffered more than most from this project. Merel, thanks for listening so much to me, even though the B-word (Burgerforum) became taboo in the end. And Lone, you deserve a PhD in patience, acceptance, and trust: I could never have fulfilled your role. Manon de Jongh Århus, Denmark, March 2013. [email protected], +45 26554030 6 Table of Contents Foreword ............................................................................................................. 5 Chapter 1: Introduction ...................................................................................... 13 1.1 The Citizens’ Assembly on Electoral Reform (Het Burgerforum Kiesselsel) ............................... 13 1.2 Problem definition ........................................................................................................................ 14 1.3 Context of the study ..................................................................................................................... 17 1.4 Relevance and ambitions ............................................................................................................ 18 1.5 Outline of the thesis ..................................................................................................................... 20 Chapter 2: Democracy and the participation of citizens ................................. 21 2.1 Introduction .................................................................................................................................. 21 2.2 Democracy and its basic concepts .............................................................................................. 21 2.3 Types of democracy .................................................................................................................... 23 2.4 The role of citizens in a democracy ............................................................................................. 27 2.5 Dutch democracy: an emerging atmosphere of political distrust ................................................. 29 2.6 Deliberative democracy ............................................................................................................... 32 2.7 Citizen assemblies as instruments for deliberation ..................................................................... 35 Chapter 3: The Citizens’ Assembly on Electoral Reform ................................ 38 3.1 Introduction .................................................................................................................................. 38 3.2 The task ....................................................................................................................................... 38 3.3 Reasons and political background of the task ............................................................................. 39 3.4 Organization of the project .......................................................................................................... 40 3.4.1 Staffing.................................................................................................................................. 41 3.4.2 Assembly members .............................................................................................................. 43 3.4.3. Finance ................................................................................................................................ 45 3.4.4 Work method and philosophy ............................................................................................... 45 3.4.5 Weekend meetings ............................................................................................................... 47 3.4.5.1 Start-up and Learning phase (weekend meetings 1, 2, and 3) ..................................... 47 3.4.5.2 Consultation phase (weekend meetings 4, 5, and 6) .................................................... 48 3.4.5.3 Decision-making phase (weekend meetings 7, 8, 9, and 10) ....................................... 49 3.5 The proposal ................................................................................................................................ 51 3.6 What happened to the Assembly’s proposal? ............................................................................. 53 Chapter 4: Dynamics in large groups: relevant theoretical perspectives ..... 56 4.1 Introduction .................................................................................................................................. 56 7 4.2 Group dynamics .......................................................................................................................... 57 4.2.1 Theoretical contributions ...................................................................................................... 57 4.2.1.1