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< Back George Varughese Associate About George Varughese has expertise in international development and academia, thought leadership and facilitation in governance, specialising in political economy & conflict. His is known for his skills in strategic analysis & advice, fundraising, program design & delivery, and policy development & navigation.

< Back Political parties as participatory arenas Anika Gauja, University of Sydney Tue 9 October 2018 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract In this presentation I engage with the often-made claim that shifting patterns of political participation threaten parties as viable organisations and as mechanisms of linkage between citizens and the state. I explore the possibilities for partisan democratic renewal and increased citizen engagement that arise with a shift to more individualised, or personalised types of political participation. Using data from a comparative study of party reform and an Australian-based study of contemporary party membership, I examine how political parties have accommodated new demands for participation within their organisational arrangements, focusing on the key party functions of candidate selection, policy development and campaign communication. Many of these participatory opportunities are being extended beyond party members to supporters, blurring the boundaries of party. I reflect on how these new structures and processes are reshaping the role of parties as mediators between citizens and the state, and the challenges involved in reconciling personalised politics with collective identity. Previous Next

< Back What exactly is voting to consensual deliberation? Emmanuel Ifeanyi Ani, University of Ghana Tue 27 October 2020 11:00am - 12:00pm Virtual seminar Abstract There have been two parallel views regarding the role of voting in deliberation. The first is that deliberation before the fabrication of balloting was completely devoid of voting. The second is that voting is, not just part of deliberation, but is standard to deliberation. I argue in this article that neither of these views is correct. Implicit voting has always existed across time and space but only as a last resort in the event of a failure of natural unanimity. What is relatively modern is the establishment of what I call explicit voting, namely, balloting, outside deliberation and often without deliberation. I also distinguish between natural and artificial unanimities, and clarify that artificial unanimities are products of implicit voting. I demonstrate these clarifications with some examples of deliberation. I deploy these clarifications to rid a certain debate of confusion regarding the precise role of voting in consensual deliberation. About the speaker Emmanuel Ifeanyi Ani is a Senior Lecturer and has taught Critical Thinking for several years at the University of Ghana, Accra. He holds a BA in Philosophy from the University of Ibadan, a B. Phil in Philosophy from the Pontificia Università Urbaniana Roma (Urban Pontifical University, Rome), Italy, an MA and a PhD in Political Philosophy from Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Nigeria. He is the University of Ghana external assessor for affiliate institutions on Logic and Critical Thinking. He was the Chair of Long Essay, Library and Graduate Studies, Department of Philosophy and Classics, University of Ghana. He briefly visited the Centre for Deliberative Democracy, Institute for Governance and Policy Analysis, University of Canberra (November-December 2017), and is one of the Associate Editors at the Journal of Deliberative Democracy. He has published in many high impact journals including Philosophical Papers, Journal of Political Philosophy, Philosophia, South African Journal of Philosophy, African Studies Quarterly, and Canadian Philosophical Review. He is a contributor to the Oxford Handbook of Deliberative Democracy, and the winner of the 2018 University of Ghana Humanities Provost Publication Award (Mid-Career Category). Previous Next

Simon Niemeyer, Will Steffen, Brendan Mackey, Janette Lindesay and Kersty Hobson < Back Social Adaptation to Climate Change in the Australian Public Sphere: A comparison of individual and group deliberative responses to scenarios of future climate change Investigator(s): Simon Niemeyer, Will Steffen, Brendan Mackey, Janette Lindesay and Kersty Hobson Funded by Discovery Project (DP0879092) ($378,500), the Project Team includes: Simon Niemeyer, Chief Investigator Will Steffen, Chief Investigator Brendan Mackey, Chief Investigator Janette Lindesay, Chief Investigator Kersty Hobson, Chief Investigator Project Description This project develops an understanding of Australia’s response to climate change and ways to improve adaptation from a governance perspective. An interdisciplinary team will construct and use original climate change scenarios to assess public responses through interviews, survey methods, contrasting individual responses with results of deliberative forums and follow up interviews. Significant developments in methods and concepts and understanding of adaptation will have an international audience.It will produce a series of regionally specific scenarios, statement of likely responses and role of institutional design and policy in improving adaptation.

Latest News - Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance < Back Deliberative Democracy and Refugees: Ensuring they have a voice Our PhD student Mohammad Abdul-Hwas shares his passion to study and research refugee crisis with UC's UnCover . Mohammad's parents’ and grandparents’ lived experiences of the ongoing Palestinian refugee crisis, that has lasted the past 70 years, has created a deep empathy for refugees. Connecting with Syrian refugees in Jordan who have similar lived experience drove Mohammad to research deliberative democracy, with the ambition to improve the experience and agency for people caught in a refugee crisis. Following multiple visits to Jordan – where his extended family is from – between 2012 and 2018, Mohammad’s interest and studies would pivot toward an underlying passion for refugee governance. His visits took place shortly after the Syrian conflict escalated from the Arab Spring protests in 2011 – an event that displaced millions, many of whom have ended up in neighbouring countries. He reached out to universities around Australia, looking to secure his PhD candidature in the space, including UC, and started reaching out to possible supervisors for his project. He succeeded in finding a supervisor ─ Dr Nicole Curato, Professor of Political Sociology within the University’s Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance . “Connecting her areas of expertise – deliberative democracy and paying attention to vulnerable people in disaster contexts – gave me a foundation to approach my PhD project about the Syrian refugee crisis,” Mohammad says.

< Back Cracking the whip: The deliberative costs of strict party discipline Udit Bhatia, University of Oxford Tue 26 September 2017 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract This paper explores how strict party discipline over legislators can harm a legislative assembly’s deliberative capacity. I begin by showing different ways in which control over legislators can be exercised, and why some warrant more attention than others. Next, I discuss three ways in which such control stifles the discursive autonomy of legislators. In the third section, I outline two ways in which deliberation in the context of legislatures can be understood: the classical and distributed approach. The fourth section argues that the stifling of discursive autonomy of legislators imposes costs on deliberation in parliament, whether this is viewed in the classical or the distributed sense. In the fifth section, I outline different approaches we might adopt to party discipline in order to minimise its deliberative costs. About the speaker Udit Bhatia is a doctoral candidate and lecturer (Lady Margaret Hall) at the University of Oxford. His research interests lie at the intersections of democratic theory, political representation and social epistemology. He is currently examining the exclusion of persons from democratic citizenship on the basis of epistemic inferiority. Previous Next

< Back Kei Nishiyama Associate and Former PhD Student About Kei Nishiyama studies deliberative democracy with a specific focus on the role of children and young people. Kei worked at the University of Canberra and the Australian National University and will join the Doshisha University, Japan, from April 2020.

Simon Niemeyer, John S. Dryzek, Nicole Curato, Andrè Bächtiger, Marina Lindell, Mark E. Warren, Hannah Barrowman, Francesco Veri, Nardine Alnemr < Back A Metastudy of Democratic Deliberation: Updating Theory and Practice Investigator(s): Simon Niemeyer, John S. Dryzek, Nicole Curato, Andrè Bächtiger, Marina Lindell, Mark E. Warren, Hannah Barrowman, Francesco Veri, Nardine Alnemr Funded through a Discovery Project (DP180103014) ($526,411), the Project Team includes: Simon Niemeyer, Chief Investigator John S. Dryzek, Chief Investigator Nicole Curato, Chief Investigator Andrè Bächtiger, Partner Investigator Marina Lindell, Partner Investigator Mark E. Warren, Partner Investigator Hannah Barrowman, Postdoctoral Research Fellow Francesco Veri, Postdoctoral Research Fellow Nardine Alnemr, PhD student Project Description The project combines a meta-study and comparative case study to develop a leading edge understanding of political deliberation by analysing and synthesising results from available studies of deliberation. It aims to reconcile conflicting findings and provide the first comprehensive, theoretically-grounded account of defensible claims about political deliberation. The project will compile the source material and findings in a publicly-available database to facilitate standardisation and enhancement of future research in the field. It will seek to settle important questions that remain among deliberative democrats and, more practically, facilitate avenues for democratic reform in an area where the need for renewal is increasingly pressing.

< Back Assessing the poor’s deliberative agency in media-saturated societies Nicole Curato 2020 , Theory and Society. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11186-020-09421-1 Summary Read more Previous Next

Former PhD student < Back Carolyn Hendriks Former PhD student About Carolyn Hendriks' work examines democratic aspects of contemporary governance, particularly with respect to participation, deliberation, inclusion and representation. She has taught and published widely on democratic innovation, public deliberation, policy evaluation, network governance and environmental politics and is an Associate Professor at the Crawford School of Public Policy at the Australian National University.

< Back Overdoing democracy: The problem of political polarization Tue 18 August 2020 Robert Talisse, Vanderbilt University 11:00am - 12:00pm Virtual seminar Seminar recording is available on our YouTube channel. Abstract Democracy is such an important social good that it seems natural to think that more is always better. However, we also recognize that it’s possible to have too much of a good thing. In this talk, Robert Talisse (Vanderbilt University) draws from current findings regarding political polarization to argue that, as important a social good as democracy is, it is nonetheless possible for citizens to overdo it. Today, our everyday activities are increasingly fused with our political profiles: commercial spaces, workplaces, professions, schools, churches, sports teams, and even public parks now tend to embody a particular political valence. When politics is permitted to saturate our social environments, we impair the capacities we need in order to enact democracy well. In a slogan, when we overdo democracy in this way, we undermine it. The solution is to build venues and activities where people can engage in cooperative activities together in which their political identities are neither bolstered nor suppressed, but simply beside the point. If we want to do democracy well, we need to put politics in its right place. About the speaker Robert Talisse is a political philosopher focusing on democracy and civic ethics. He has authored over a dozen academic books and more than 100 peer-reviewed articles. In addition, Talisse hosts the podcast Why We Argue, and co-hosts the podcast New Books in Philosophy. Talisse is also a regular contributor to various public philosophy venues such as Aeon, Scientific American Mind, 3 Quarks Daily, 3AM Magazine, Skeptical Inquirer, Free Inquiry, Think, and Institute for Arts and Ideas magazine. Previous Next

< Back PROSPECTS OF DELIBERATIVE POWER-SHARING IN AUSTRALIAN CITY COUNCILS? A NEW GOVERNANCE FRAMEWORK FOR CO-CREATION Despite the increase of empirical studies on institutionalised public deliberation in OECD countries, where Australia is one of the leading countries, institutionalised local co-creation task committees remain unexplored beyond Northern Europe (OECD 2020). The concept of power-sharing in the context of deliberation and co-creation is also relatively understudied. For this research project, I examine the prospects of deliberative power-sharing in city councils in Australia. I explore the concept of deliberative power-sharing by adapting and applying the Danish local co-creation task committee model, the Gentofte Model, to the democratic, political and institutional context of city councils in Australia (Sørensen & Torfing 2019). The Gentofte Model has been identified as a suitable power-sharing framework between democratically elected councillors and citizens to increase public trust, political legitimacy and bipartisanship because citizens impact public policy directly through distributed political decision-making power (De Jong, Neulen and Jansma 2019). My research project will use action research as the methodology. Specifically, a participatory action research approach will be used to co-develop and implement an institutionalised local co-creation task committee in an Australian city council. My lived-experience with deliberative power-sharing in co-creation from a Danish city council will be a part of the participatory action research process of developing new knowledge and transformative change with Australian mayors, councillors, local government CEOs and citizens (Bartels et al. 2020). The outcomes of my research project aim to contribute to the field of deliberative and participatory governance because the Danish local co-creation task committee model offers a new and deliberative approach to power-sharing between councillors and citizens which has not been explored beyond the North European countries. Seminar series convenors Hans Asenbaum and Sahana Sehgal . Previous Next

< Back Representation of future generations through international climate litigation: A new site for discursive representation Peter Lawrence, University of Tasmania / Lukas Koehler, Munich School of philosophy Tue 30 August 2016 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract While the recent Paris Agreement represents a step forward in terms of international action on climate change, grave doubts remain in terms of whether it will deliver the dramatic reduction in greenhouse gas emissions called for by scientists. These doubts relate to both the power of vested interests but also the chronic inability of democratic governments to take into account long-term interests. Such short-term thinking could be redressed by “discursive representation” (Dryzek and Niemeyer 2008) of discourses which reflect the interests of future generations. The paper explores the potential for such discursive representation in relation to international climate litigation (including the International Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights). Such litigation is potentially valuable as a vehicle for pressuring governments to take stronger action on climate change. But this approach gives rise to a series of difficult questions which our paper will address. How do we decide which discourses legitimately represent the interests of future generations in a context where such cases depend on NGOs articulating what they regard as future generations’ interests? Should courts inquire into the internal processes of such NGOs as a precondition for granting them standing? Can restrictive ‘standing provisions’ which limit who can bring claims before such tribunals be overcome? Is a judicial process inherently too limiting given the undemocratic nature of international courts with judges appointed by governments which are not necessarily democratic themselves? In spite of these challenges, the paper argues that the notion of discursive representation provides a convincing way of ensuring the democratic legitimacy of such litigation on the grounds that: ii) marginalised intergenerational justice discourses can be given greater prominence in decision-making processes and ii) judges can apply and develop concepts that may help to represent future generations through international legal concepts with intergenerational content (e.g. sustainable development, the non-discrimination and equal human rights principles). The paper is linked to ongoing work by the authors in relation to a project funded by the Germany-Australia DAAD research cooperation fund. About the speaker Peter Lawrence ( Peter.Lawrence@utas.edu.au ) is a Senior Lecturer at the University of Tasmania (UTAS) Law School, the author of Justice for Future Generations, Climate Change and International Law (2014) and Faculty Advisor of the University of Tasmania Law Review. Previously Peter worked for the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, including as First Secretary to the Australian Mission to the UN in Geneva. Lukas Koehler ( lukas.koehler@hfph.de ) is Director of the Centre for Environmental Ethics and Education of the Munich School of Philosophy, Germany. He is a joint author of Human Rights as a Normative Guideline for Climate Policy, in: Bos/Duwell (eds) Human Rights and Sustainability (2016 Routledge). Both Peter and Lukas are currently working together on a Germany-Australia (DAAD) research project on ‘Representation of future generations through international climate litigation’. Previous Next

< Back Walter Baber Associate About Walter F. Baber is a professor in the Environmental Sciences and Policy Program and the Graduate Center for Public Policy and Administration at California State University, Long Beach. He is also a lead member of the Amsterdam-based Earth System Governance Project and an Affiliated Professor at the Raoul Wallenberg Institute of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law at Lund University.

< Back Operationalizing democratic listening Mary F (Molly) Scudder, Purdue University Tue 5 November 2019 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract In order to capture the epistemic, ethical, or democratic benefits of deliberation, people must listen to one another. In fact, listening is constitutive of the deliberative act. Therefore, finding ways to evaluate listening is essential to the project of deliberative democracy. In this paper, I consider how to measure the act of listening in small-scale face-to-face deliberative encounters. Specifically, I tackle the observational challenge of measuring the act of listening itself, as opposed to listening outcomes. Prior work measures listening by focusing on narrow constructs like aural recall, or by emphasizing the outcomes we hope listening might bring about, such as responsiveness. I show that each of these measures, in isolation, is inadequate and fails to capture the most democratically meaningful aspects of listening. I go on to explain, however, that these measures can be usefully combined into a lexical scale that captures different degrees of, or steps toward democratic listening. I also propose new measures to include within such an index, including the perception of speakers themselves, whether they feel as if others have listened to them. About the speaker Dr. Mary F (Molly) Scudder is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Purdue University. She received her PhD from the University of Virginia. She specializes in democratic theory, especially practices of citizenship and the conditions of meaningfully democratic deliberation in contexts of deep difference. She has published articles in Polity and Political Studies and is currently wrapping up work on a book investigating how citizen listening can move deliberation in the direction of greater democracy. Previous Next

< Back The place and role of the intimate sphere in deliberative systems Tetsuki Tamura, Nagoya University Tue 15 March 2016 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract This presentation reconsiders the place and the role of the intimate sphere in deliberative systems. While recently developing deliberative systems approach focuses on the connection between different sites and practices of deliberative and non-deliberative democracies and begins to pay attention to various sites of deliberation, the intimate sphere has not got enough attention except both the original suggestion of ‘everyday talk’ by Jane Mansbridge (1999) and her other essays and the most recent formulation of a deliberative system by John S. Dryzek and Hayley Stevenson (2014). However, this presentation contends that their understandings of the intimate sphere are still insufficient especially in the light of another aim of the deliberative systems approach; deliberative democracy beyond liberal democracy. Both Mansbridge and Dryzek/Stevenson do not fully overcome the liberal democratic conception of the public-private dichotomy and they are still shackled by the ‘methodological governmentalism’. This presentation argues that introducing the concept of ‘nested deliberative systems’ makes it possible for us to see not only state but also the intimate sphere as a deliberative system and to overcome the public-private distinction entirely. About the speaker Tetsuki Tamura is professor of political science at the Graduate School of Law, Nagoya University, Japan. He is a former visiting scholar and a current associate at the Centre for Deliberative Democracy & Global Governance. His research interests include contemporary democratic theory including deliberative democracy, the welfare state and basic income, feminism and politics, and the relationship between normative theory and empirical analysis. For more information, visit the following website: http://researchmap.jp/tetsuki.tamura/?lang=english . Previous Next

< Back Emanuela Savini Practice Lead & Lecturer About Emanuela is a researcher and professional who is highly committed to strengthening citizen-led action and exploring ways citizens have more influence over public policy decision-making. Her PhD research explored how government organisations adapt and operationalise deliberative engagement practices and she is keenly interested in ways to build capacity for democratic innovations in public management. In her practice, Emanuela is the Director of The Public Value Studio, an organisation that was established to support increased civic participation and community-led initiatives. She facilitates programs such as the Democracy Lab and is currently the Chair of the International Association for Public Participation Australasia (IAP2A) Research Working Group. Emanuela’s practice is founded on a deep belief that elevating the expertise of communities is fundamental to bringing about the change we want to see in our cities, and society more broadly. Industry Experience Director, The Public Value Studio, 2019 - current Chair, Research Working Group and Australasian representative on the Diversity Equity and Inclusion Taskforce, International Association for Public Participation (IAP2), 2019 - current Merri-bek City Council, 2008-2018 Key Publications Savini, E., & Grant, B. (2020). Legislating deliberative engagement: Is local government in Victoria willing and able?. Australian Journal of Public Administration, 79(4), 514530. Academic Fellowships Industry Fellow, Institute Public Policy and Governance, University of Technology Sydney, 2019-2023 Academic Conferences 2024 Deliberative Democracy Summer School International Public Policy Association 2023 Australian Political Science Conference (Panel) 2022 International Research Society for Public Management Conference Australian Political Science Conference Political Organisations and Participation (POP) Workshop 2021 International Research Society for Public Management Conference Interpretive Policy Analysis Conference Australian Political Science Conference 2019 International Public Policy Association Conference Academic Teaching Experience Lecturer - Public Participation in Decision Making (Masters) UTS, 2020 Lecturer – Organisational Theory (Masters) UTS, 2020-21

< Back Communicative justice: New forms of digital secure political deliberation using Deciso 1.0 Javier Romero, University of Salamanca Tue 24 October 2017 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract The growth of the Internet has been one of the most remarkable phenomena of the last century. In the early 1980s, Internet was known to only a handful of scientist and academics, but it is now being regularly used by almost 4000 million people. The Internet is more than merely a communications network. According to Manuel Castells, the Internet is an infrastructure helping to create a new social, political and economic order characterized by global connectivity and the decentralization of authority. Nonetheless, although the new technologies determines to some degree how we live and work, new forms of power and domination have appeared againts the "lifeworld" (in terms of Jürgen Habermas): Big Data, communications surveillance, Internet of Things (IoT), hacking democracy, dark web… Our human freedom in the digital political deliberation can be hacked by states, technology companies, and black hackers. On a practical level, Green States and Social Movements need secure technology for secure communications. DeCiSo 1.0 (Secret Chat for Deliberation in Civil Society using Wi-Fi Covert Channel-802.11 protocol) is an example to secure communications with cryptography and Free Software (GNU/Linux). The "communicative justice" is a requirement of deliberative democracy. We need more, not less democracy. About the speaker Degree in Philosophy. PhD student in “Deliberative Democracy and Environment” (Tatiana Pérez de Guzmán el Bueno Foundation). Member of Spanish National Cybersecurity Institute (INCIBE). Ethical Hacker. He works deliberative democracy, digital democracy, political ecology, environment, and CyberEthics. He supports online rights (Free Software Foundation and Electronic Frontier Foundation). Twitter: @j4virom Previous Next

< Back Learning to value nature? International organizations and the promotion of ecosystem services Hayley Stevenson, Universidad Torcuato Di Tella Tue 11 December 2018 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract The idea of valuing nature has become a core element of contemporary sustainable development and green economy agendas. This has been enabled by the widespread acceptance of the ‘ecosystems services’ concept, which tries to capture the value of the environment for human wellbeing. As the ecosystem services concept is embedded in development planning and economic policy-making, it is important to understand the opportunities it creates for environmental conservation and social development, and its inherent tensions and limitations. This requires a degree of reflexivity in policy-making to ensure that policies are informed by the historical lessons of ecosystem services experiments, the diverse knowledge of contemporary stakeholders, and self-critical awareness of uncertainty and multiple ontological perspectives. An international research team led by Hayley Stevenson and James Meadowcroft is studying the emergence and political uptake of this concept at international and national levels. In this presentation Hayley will share some initial findings about how nature valuation has been integrated into the work of international environmental and development agencies, and the patterns of reflexivity we observe. These findings also cast doubt on the political future of the ecosystem services concept. About the speaker Hayley Stevenson is Associate Professor in International Relations at the Universidad Torcuato Di Tella (Argentina), and Reader in Politics at the University of Sheffield (UK). She is the author of Institutionalizing Unsustainability, Democratizing Global Climate Governance (with John S. Dryzek), and Global Environmental Politics: Problems, Policy, and Practice. She is currently leading an international project with James Meadowcroft, “Ecosystem Services: Valuing Nature for Sustainable Development and a Green Economy”. Previous Next

< Back What prevents or promotes listening? A relational content analysis of reciprocity in online political discussions Katharina Esau, University of Dusseldorf Tue 11 September 2018 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract In recent years, governments have created non-conventional opportunities for participation in order to respond to a perceived crisis of democracy. Frequently, online tools are used to include large numbers of participants in deliberation processes. From the perspective of deliberative theories, analyzing, evaluating, and developing these participatory procedures requires the application of normative standards. While conceptualizations of deliberation vary in detail, most authors agree that deliberation is a demanding type of communication characterized by equality, rationality, reciprocity, and respect. Regarding structural equality or equality in terms of access, anyone affected should have the chance to participate regardless gender, ethnic, or social background. In the past, participation procedures repeatedly have fallen short in creating structural equality. Nevertheless, it is reasonable to assume that once citizens find their way to a discursive space and speak, they at least then experience discursive equality in the form of listening. Against this normative background, “being listened to” can be considered one crucial outcome of successful deliberative procedures. However, most studies are focusing on discursive equality in terms of voice. In contrast to this, this presentation focuses on the distribution of listening in online political discussions and on factors that prevent or promote listening. About the speaker Katharina Esau is a PhD candidate in Communication Studies at the University of Düsseldorf and part of the NRW Graduate School for Online Participation and the Düsseldorf Institute for Internet and Democracy. Her research interests include digital democracy, online deliberation, online public sphere, and public opinion formation. Her PhD project deals with online deliberation processes created by state actors on the local and regional level of government. Combining relational content analysis and sequence analysis, she investigates the interrelations between argumentation, narration, expression of emotion, and humour and how these fundamental forms of communication foster or impede reciprocity, reflexivity and empathy in online discussions. The PhD project is supervised by Prof. Christiane Eilders. In Düsseldorf, Katharina lectures on democratic theory, public sphere theory, deliberation research, and deliberative design. Previous Next