These behaviors are indefensible, in the light of our responsibility to future Americans. But they are not simply character flaws or the result of poor ethics. They are in my view, symptoms caused by the fact that our national discourse is missing some critical elements. Our national discourse does not currently have a framework that imposes the prerequisites for productive collaborative planning. Some of those prerequisites are:

In addition, our national discourse lacks the proper tools to allow citizen participation in collaborative planning on a large scale. Because our national discourse lacks the proper tools, and has no imposed sense of objective, time, or penalty for failure, we return time and time again to entrenched political polarization – a behavior that future generations may view as a petty indulgence.

Over-reliance on the limited capacities of mass media

Our national tendency toward polarization is linked to an over-reliance on the limited capacities of mass media. Because our political discourse relies so heavily on mass media, the limitations of mass media have had a direct and deep impact on our political discourse. Two primary limitations are described below:

1. Mass media’s limited ability to provide complete and accurate information. Coverage of news and issues must be profitable, and (therefore) must be prioritized. This inevitably results in the oversimplification of issues or incomplete coverage of issues by any single entity. Profit driven journalism – in both print and television – has no choice but to oversimplify issues to at least some degree in order to avoid diluting the stream of advertising that allow the average publication or media company to survive. The connected requirements of profit and prioritization also drive news organizations to comply with the prevailing perceptions (accurate or not) of what the average person will pay attention to. Scandal and conflict receive much more airtime than constructive progress and positive developments. Likewise the majority of news topics – even important ones – receive condensed coverage rather than in-depth coverage in most of the leading news publications. Critical planning discussions, aside from the occasional sound byte, receive practically no air time at all.

2. Mass media’s limited ability to facilitate two way interactions between various groups. The mass media that existed before the widespread adoption of the Internet (radio, television and print) could only facilitate a one-to-many broadcasting model with communication going only one direction.

Before the rise of modern mass media, American political polarization was often fueled by, or at least coincided with, the printing of countless pamphlets as well as public discussion and debates. The mass media of the 20th century, and the pamphlets and debates of the 18-19th centuries have something in common. They have all been limited by the same factors:

There have been attempts by numerous mass media entities to facilitate two way communication through public debates, forums, meetings or in more modern times, focus groups. However these attempts could never allow more than a tiny fraction of the population to fully participate. On a different note, the carefully scripted television debates and town hall meetings common today would be most accurately described as political theatre (if not propaganda), and can hardly be categorized as a meaningful attempt to facilitate two way communication or collaborative planning.

To summarize, before continuing with the remaining flaws, our polarization appears to be linked to an over-reliance on a mechanism (mass media) which is incapable of facilitating two way communication, and fully informed participation in a collaborative planning process.

Where two way communication and full participation are both impossible, the basis for lucid democracy is endangered. Whenever people find that they cannot bring their concerns to a receptive thoughtful forum for consideration, whenever they find they have no meaningful input to the plans being made, they have a grave choice. They can do nothing, or they can resort to more extreme options such as public revolt and protest, or even violence. At a minimum they will begin to exhibit all the hallmark behaviors of political polarization: caricature of the opposing views, suspicion, accusations, distortion, and alarmism.

No common vocabulary

We have no common vocabulary for the issues under discussion. Instead the contestants – those politicians, activists, and others engaged in debate over an issue – may hide behind double meanings, disparate definitions or conflicting uses of terms. This may or may not be deliberate, but we cannot hope to leverage our collective intelligence if we do not discuss issues using common terms and definitions.

No complete view of an issue

We are rarely given a complete layout of an issue with all of its components. Instead politicians, with the complicity of sympathetic journalists, are often able to obscure the components of an issue, upon which their stance might degrade their chances of re-election. Others, particularly those with fundraising objectives, omit inconvenient details which might cast their issue as anything other than an apocalyptic battle for good and evil. This partial obscuring of the elements of an issue is at the root of many, many needless debates.

No time sensitivity in our national discourse.

In most national debates, participants in the national discourse behave as if they were sports team fans, or contestants in some trivial contest, or televised wrestling match. There is tacit acceptance of a notion that these are intractable battles, which will last forever, or until the unlikely event that one side becomes exhausted. Or that our most important political debates and elections are just seasonal events, like playoffs, where old rivalries are gleefully resurrected and nurtured year after year. There is the constant performing for the camera. We pay no attention to the ticking of our national clock. We do not seem to realize that we have very limited windows of opportunity to achieve what we need to achieve as a nation in order to prepare properly for the challenges of our future.

No clear sense of objective

Our national debates seem to have no sense of objective. We are debating this issue so we can achieve what? What is the goal? I worry that sometimes the goal actually equates to some complete banishment of any opposing ideas. In other words, tyranny.

It is easy to debate in a vacuum. It is quite another level of responsibility to debate an issue within the constraints imposed by commonly held goals, limited time, and limited resources. This kind of debate requires foresight and an understanding of how to move things forward even in difficult circumstances. It also requires an appreciation for the value of differing viewpoints in the context of debate.

No appreciation for the true value and purpose of debate

Participants in the national discourse are above all else, partners in the pursuit of their future security. Ideas and plans always require refinement or scrutiny. Debate and the conflict between opposing concerns or ideas can be productive if the process reveals the essential (pivotal) elements of the issue instead of obscuring them. This is how legitimate debate differs from frivolous bickering.

Legitimate debate is critical to the success of a plan or idea. The person with the sharpest arguments against your idea is not by any stretch the primary obstacle to its success. The obstacles to success are myriad other things which will come to bear during the idea’s implementation - no matter if there is a complete absence of resistance to the idea. The opponent who appears to be sharply contesting your idea, may well be one of your best allies. Not because the person liked your idea, but because the person offered insight that forced you to strengthen the idea. Or forced you to think about another aspect of the idea, before embarking on a costly mistake. In the context of our national discourse, useful debate is not about “who wins the argument” but more about discovering:

When you look at it this way, you hope that there are dissenting opinions and hope with all your heart that they are coming from sharp intellect and founded on good reason.

Unfortunately our national discourse in its current state does not leverage the value of legitimate debate.

Over-reliance on polling

Conventional wisdom in political circles assumes that polling is the standard method for determining the will or wishes of the people. Polling certainly can be a useful tool for those hoping to assess the opinions of a target set of individuals. The heavy reliance on polling underscores the hunger that politicians have for knowing what their constituents think and want. It is probably one of the best currently available tools, and in most cases great care is taken to ensure the accuracy of the results.

But in spite of this there are a number of problems with focus groups, polling and other market research techniques as they are applied to politics.2 Polling can be good for limited purposes, but it does not address the need to facilitate better citizen participation in government – nor is it meant to – and is no substitute for the solution this book attempts to propose.

When we conduct focus groups, only a small fraction of the population are able to participate. Any attempt to tap into a “representative” minority of the whole population or of a significant group is risky, not just because it has a margin of error, but also because it is limited in scope, budget and purpose. Polling is commissioned by individual entities for specific limited purposes. It does not provide a solution for systematically soliciting the best ideas and best thinking of the American people on all issues that the nation faces.

When we conduct ad hoc street corner polls, or call people during dinner, we interrupt busy people to get their top-of-mind thoughts about deeply important issues. When we do this, we are asking people their opinions under two particular circumstances not conducive to good results:

This method is not likely to plumb the best thought of the citizenry. It is the equivalent of bumping into your lawyer in the grocery store and breathlessly asking for on-the-spot advice about your messy and expensive divorce. Or shouting your symptoms across the parking lot, to your doctor who is just getting out of his car. If these individuals are competent, they will probably give themselves time to deliberate and investigate the details before offering their recommendations. Citizens, who are asked to offer their recommendations on issues of equal or greater significance are rarely offered true assistance or time for thinking about the issues.

Online polls and surveys3 – when conducted by qualified organizations - have one advantage in that they can allow participation by a much broader group of people for a given cost. And, unlike phone polls or street polls, participants often have some choice over when and where they take the poll and how much time they want to spend doing it.

In summary, polling offers useful methods for sampling the opinions of groups of people, but decades from now I suspect it will be seen as a formative first step, but still a rather primitive species in the evolution of democratic representation. Polling is no substitute for a more advanced mechanism that helps citizens organize and articulate their wishes to their elected representatives.

No framework that facilitates collaborative planning

So far we have seen that our national discourse relies heavily on mass media and a variety of polling techniques. These are two pieces of what should be a much larger framework that facilitates full participation of citizens in collaborative planning.

We must have a way to share different views, and then bring them together constructively. We must be able to look at the different sides of the coin, listen to the concerns of all the various stakeholders, and then make a plan. The plan has to address the concerns of all involved, and it has to achieve something in the near term, and it has to impact the long term. This kind of rational, inclusive planning is missing in our national discourse right now.

Citizens are the most qualified experts on the front line issues of being a citizen. Initially they might not be able to fully articulate their requirements and needs,4 but will over time be able to offer increasingly beneficial input, if – and only if – there is a mechanism that gathers and brings order to their input. This would be a key ingredient in any framework that is set up to facilitate collaborative planning.

Chapter 1 Notes

1. This point was objectively raised by Lillian B. Rubin in the essay "Why Don't They Listen to Us? Speaking to the Working Class," Dissent Magazine, Winter 2005. The full text of the essay is available online at http://www.dissentmagazine.org/menutest/articles/wi05/rubin.htm

2. In addition to the limitations of polling discussed in the text, there are some polling practices and issues which can undermine the ability of polling to serve as a reliable barometer of the will of the people. Some of these practices and issues are related to the wide variety of entities who engage in polling and surveys. Reputable research firms seek to adhere to the best practices and require their employees to be aware of and to practice research and analysis techniques that contribute to accurate results. Unfortunately, a significant number of other entities engage in questionable research and polling practices either deliberately or inadvertently through the use of untrained and loosely supervised employees or even volunteers. Some examples of questionable practices are noted below:

(a) Screening survey candidates before inviting them to take a poll. In some instances, polling companies call a survey candidate, and ask them a series of questions. If the candidate answers the questions a certain way, the pollster then invites the person to take an online poll. This method has been used to provide elected representatives with polls implying a huge majority of public support for a certain position. If the survey candidates had not been screened, the poll results may not have implied such a huge majority.

(b) Sugging and Frugging. Sugging refers to selling under the guise of polling, while frugging is a term used to denote fundraising under the guise of polling. Both practices involve the misuse of questions, statements or other survey techniques in an attempt to influence the participant rather than simply obtain opinions or information. Reputable market research and polling firms typically do not engage in these kinds of practices. The Market Research Association has developed detailed definitions of both terms. See http://www.mra-net.org/resources/abuse.cfm

(c) Illusions of consensus. What happens when the public is presented with a poll stating that the majority of people have a certain position on an issue? Such presentations could be a distortion of the collective intelligence of the public, but would still be influential to at least some of the public. There are those who will change their mind if they know that the majority of their fellow-citizens have decided a certain way, or believe that a certain thing is or is not a problem. For example, what might be the ramifications of newscast with poll results showing that 95% of Americans believe that there is no need for concern over the future of Social Security.

(d) Superficial or incomplete presentation of options. Polling may sometimes force a certain classification of people or ideas onto situations where they might not be appropriate. For example, I may run an opinion poll that asks: what is the best way to get from NY to LA? Let’s suppose that I simply list 3 major airlines, as if these were the only possible ways of getting from NY to LA? Or what if I simply listed several interstate highways? By limiting the number of choices I am changing the entire exercise. What are we trying to resolve here? Which airline is best or which interstate is best? Or which cities might be the most pleasant overnight stays en route from NY to LA? Information gathered from such a poll will be artificially limited by the frame of reference set by the question. This approach is convenient and useful for corporations trying to understand how a customer will respond when faced with a limited number of alternatives. This approach is not appropriate (though it is often used) in situations where a group of people are trying to find a creative solution to a problem.

3. The discussion of online polling does not include the popular public polls that appear on many web sites, because these polls often have very limited ability to ensure that each person participates only once.

4. The inability to immediately articulate requirements is a known issue that if not managed properly will hamper any project. The users of a system (or building, etc) require assistance in articulating what exactly they need. The articulation of needs must also be organized and prioritized, and a mechanism for doing this is needed. A number of business analysis and project management methodologies include techniques and practices for assisting and organizing the articulation of requirements. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Requirements_gathering for an overview of requirements analysis and its challenges.

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Ralph Perrine is author of 12 Drawings That Will Change Your Life and other works.