• Project Wikis

These are wikis dedicated to a particular IF Discussion Project about an area of emerging social and political concern. During the course of a project the project facilitator might set up a “private” wiki for each discussion panel for the sharing of that panel’s developmental thinking. Prior to the joint panel discussions, only the members of a given panel would be able to view and edit the project material. Once the project panels are ready to share their ideas as a joint panel, the wiki can be made publicly viewable–but with writing or posting privileges restricted to the project panelists. Currently the Towns and Cities Wiki (for the joint panel sessions of “Shaping our Towns and Cities” project) is set up this way. Once the project panelists are ready to turn over their material for public discussion, then the wiki can be set up as a fully “public” wiki where anyone online could view, edit, and add to the material. The Future of the Family Wiki is an example of such a public wiki. This wiki is open for the contributions of anyone who is interested in building upon the ideas that emerged from the project discussions. We ask only that contributors engage with this material in the same generosity of spirit that guided the creation of this material from the beginning. This means that people are invited to make revisions that help to clarify for expand upon the ideas present here. Anyone can add new policy ideas to the wiki as well. But, we ask that people not delete or undermine ideas with which they disagree. Our purpose is to expand the range of policy ideas people might think about–regardless of whether any of us approves of these ideas.

• Guide Wikis

These are wikis dedicated to offering guidance to anyone who might want to engage in some aspect of what the Interactivity Foundation does in any of its three focal areas (IF’s project discussions, the public discussions that are based on those project discussions, and the use of IF’s discussion approach in educational settings). Guide wikis offer the opportunity for users or practitioners to share the wisdom gained from their particular experiences by editing, revising, or generating new material to help others. The Student Guide Wiki, for example, focuses on offering guidance from a student perspective on our student-centered discussion process. It started with entries from Jack Byrd at IF, but is being edited and augmented by students who have worked through these lessons first-hand. We will likely develop a similar wiki from a faculty perspective as well. We are also planning to add an Academic Success Wiki, to share guidance about how to be a successful student more generally (in a way not limited to using IF’s collaborative discussion model). Such wikis can be a powerful tool to enable people to share their experiential know-how with others.

• Internal Development Wikis

As we continually expand and develop our own thinking as an organization about what we do and how we do it, we’ll undoubtedly develop any number of wikis on these various topics. These are likely going to be primarily of internal relevance to IF in the near term. But they may be of interest to those who are interested in exploring more of the thinking behind the Interactivity Foundation. Some of these wikis will show up as publicly viewable.

We hope these wikis will be a helpful way for you to interact with the ideas that shape the work we do and that emerge from the work we do.

–Jeff Prudhomme

When we think of policies in this way, we move policy discussion from province of technocrats to the everyday realm of democratic citizens. Of course, in an IF project we’re not talking about telling the sort of detailed stories you might find in a novel or even a short story. We’re talking about providing a basic storyline for the public actions that might be taken by our society in dealing with an area of public concern. That’s what we have in mind with calling these “conceptual” policies—we’re focusing on the basic storyline, not nuanced plot details. Such a storyline might tell essentially who would do what—and why—letting us know the motivations for the actions and the thinking or values behind them.

Setting out a basic storyline like this can help to make clear the orientation our society might take toward an area of concern. A story presents for our consideration a way of being, a way of orienting ourselves to possibilities. If we think of describing policy possibilities in this way, we might find it easier to leap into the task of imagining them. And once they’ve been generated, we might also find it easier to share them with others, if we approach them as essentially different stories our society might tell.

I heard an interview with former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor earlier this month. She talked about the importance of civic engagement in our democracy and her concern about the state of policy discussions in America. She was particularly concerned that people are not being taught how to think and evaluate policies. (And let’s face it, no one is born with it.) Indeed, we are not taught how to think about policy in our schools, our universities, or our increasingly polarized media. This poor civic knowledge and engagement weakens American democracy.

Jay Stern, the founder of the Interactivity Foundation, wanted to address this concern by facilitating and encouraging the development and thoughtful consideration of contrasting policy possibilities. We explore and develop a wide range of contrasting conceptual possibilities for public policy pertaining to our areas of concern in our sanctuary projects, and we then organize and facilitate discussions of them among the general public. The facilitators who conduct these discussions do not tell you what to think about policies pertaining to food, property, genetic technology, or work; which possibilities you should or should not support; or which congressman to call. They focus instead on the process of thinking carefully, critically, and seriously about the possibilities themselves. They focus, in other words, upon understanding the different concepts, principles, beliefs, values, interests, and goals that might motivate different policies; understanding how they relate to the possibilities themselves; exploring their possible implementations; and exploring their intended and unintended consequences (for more see Mark Notturno’s four part series on ‘How to Evaluate an IF Policy Possibility’). And they try to do this for each of the conceptual possibilities that we present in our reports.

But it is not an easy process. It is, first of all, very difficult to think conceptually. Most of us are focused upon the more practical everyday world and are unaccustomed to thinking about abstract concepts, principles, beliefs, values, interests, goals, and the reasoning behind them. And it is even more difficult to carefully and critically and seriously consider ideas that are fundamentally different from our own—especially because they just seem to be outright wrong.

But we do not try to show you that possibilities are either right or wrong in IF discussions. We do not try to change your mind. We simply provide a forum in which you can discuss—as opposed to debate—the different policy possibilities with your neighbors, and explore the possible ways of approaching important issues to our society.

To participate in a debate is to compete—to try to win an argument and defeat an opponent’s position. To participate in improvisation is to serve—to try to generate something new by sharing with others. Colbert talks about this in his recent Northwestern University commencement speech:

Now there are very few rules to improvisation, but one of the things that I was taught early on is that you are not the most important person in the scene. Everybody else is. And if they are the most important people in the scene, you will naturally pay attention to them and serve them. But the good news is that you’re in the scene too. So hopefully to them you’re the most important person, and they will serve you. No one is leading, you’re all following the follower, serving the servant. You cannot win improv.

And, I would add, you cannot “win” an Interactivity Foundation discussion. But if you participate as if your discussion partners are the most important persons in the room, you’ll pay more attention to the ideas they bring up and you’ll try to help flesh them out and develop them. And if everyone is serving each other like this, the result will be new ideas coming into the discussion, perhaps ideas that no one individual had fully foreseen.

Colbert says, “life is an improvisation. You have no idea what’s going to happen next and you are mostly just making things up as you go along.” Making things up may sound like something fake or childish, like you’re just playing. But play can be serious and the means of creation. It can mean making something new, generating something, bringing something to be that wasn’t there before. And that’s what we’re after in an Interactivity Foundation discussion. Like improv we’re interested in creating something new, rather than knocking something down, as in a debate.

So if you’re wondering about how to participate in, or even facilitate, an Interactivity Foundation discussion, think about how you can serve the others in the discussion. Think of each other as the most important persons in the room. By paying attention to each other, following and playing with each other in this way, you’ll be on the way to building something together, creating something new.

For the closing segment of Colbert’s speech (though the whole thing is worth watching), check here: Closing Segment of Colbert\’s Commencement Speech 2011

–Jeff Prudhomme

IF reports are not intended as mere conversation starters. They invite you to participate in an on-going discussion about their areas of concern and the policy possibilities for addressing it with the people who have developed our reports and with the people who have taken the time to read and discuss them. IF public discussions are a continuation of our panels’ discussions. The participants in our public discussions continue to interact with our panelists’ ideas and, in the process, bring in their own thoughts and experiences and insights as well.

The policy possibilities in our reports are not pre-digested for you. They do not tell you what to think and why to think it. They instead present many contrasting ways of thinking about policy and many different ideas with which you can interact. They invite you to probe deeper into the possibility and to try to understand what it actually means, why some people might want to adopt it, the different possible ways to implement it, and the different consequences—both intended and unintended—that might ensue from it.

Policy reports that present only one conceptual possibility are rather dull for me, no matter how many ways they suggest to implement it. I prefer to look at an area of concern from many different sides; to consider the many different interests, values, and goals that Americans have; along with the unintended consequences of the policy possibilities that they suggest. I know that reports that advocate certain possibilities will generate more enthusiasm from ideologically homogenous audiences who come to cheer for the policies they prefer. I also know that some people find it more challenging, unsettling, and less attractive to interact with ideas that differ from their own, especially if they regard them as morally evil. But this is precisely what the Interactivity Foundation tries to overcome in our public discussions. We encourage people to try to understand ideas that differ from their, and the people who propose them, by providing opportunities to interact with them. We do not advocate any of the policy possibilities in our reports to be adopted. We do not ask the participants in our discussions to change their minds or to agree with any of the possibilities. But we do encourage them to think about different policy possibilities, and to discuss them with others.

The exploration of consequences can also help a panel to uncover deeper conceptual connections among the various possibilities they’ve developed. Sometimes when a group is looking through the lens of a given policy approach, they realize that the world they’re describing basically matches what they described with a different possibility. The panelists might realize that what appeared to be two or three distinct policy approaches, actually amount to the same basic policy approach, embodying the same philosophy of action. What initially appeared to be two or three different policies could be rewritten as one, perhaps at a deeper conceptual level.

This very thing happened in recent project discussion. I won’t go into the topic, since it’s part of a current sanctuary discussion. But it was interesting for all of us to see the lights go on during the meeting. We had just worked through the consequences for one possibility and had started in on the next, when someone remarked, “these seem to be the same consequences as we were just discussing.” Someone else responded, “it seems like these policy ideas are basically getting at the same thing, so maybe there’s some way to combine them.” A half hour later there were similar observations about a third possibility. We ended up the session with a sense of how these three possibilities could be combined—and with a sense of how the new unified possibility could be presented in more conceptual terms.

–Jeff Prudhomme

In the Helping America Talk project on civic discourse, the panelists developed a couple of policy ideas that relied on the broad notion of incentives and disincentives. One policy idea relied on the supposition that the quality of public deliberation could be improved if the participants faced the prospect of gaining or losing something based on the quality of the ideas they brought forward. If the ideas they contributed to the public discussion turned out to be genuinely useful, then there ought to be the prospect of some kind of reward. The panelists brought up the notion of a financial reward, but they also talked about the importance of social recognition. They pointed out that reputation tracking systems (such as one finds in online social networks) could be one means of fostering this sort of accountable public thinking with the prospect of social acclaim as a reward for “being right” or thinking well, or a loss of social status as a penalty for “being wrong.”

At the time, more than a few of the panelists thought these ideas, especially of non-financial incentives, might not go over very well in subsequent citizen discussions. They worried that their fellow citizens might see this approach as unrealistic. But a recent public radio story, “Gamifying the system to create better behavior,” indicates their incentive ideas might have been on the right track. The story recounts how Sweden has set up a successful positive reinforcement program to encourage safe driving. They have speed cameras that catch speeding automobiles, but the non-speeders are also caught being good: for safe driving your tag number is put into a lottery to win a portion of the fines paid by the speeders.

This sort of “game playing” approach, or “gamification,” is intended to help people engage in civic space as active and thoughtful problem solvers, just as they’d engage in a game. The  incentives need not be primarily financial—and not even financial at all.  Gabe Zicherman, who has written on this gamification approach in marketing, uses the acronym “SAPS” to explain the hierarchy of incentives to which people respond:

SAPS stands for Status, Access, Power and Stuff. Zichermann says those are things people want in their lives as rewards — in that order. “It turns out,” he says, “that cash isn’t that good of a reward. Status is a fantastic motivator for getting people to do stuff.”

So the next time Interactivity Foundation discussion panelists start thinking of policies with incentives and disincentives, that’s a good time to remember the value of positive reinforcements rather than just negative ones. And it’s a good time to remember that it’s not all about the money. It turns out that money, or material reward, is likely not the most powerful motivator for civic behavior. It’s a good time to encourage panelists to think broadly about what might really motivate us as democratic citizens to act in certain ways.

–Jeff Prudhomme

The dangers of influence.  The Columbia Mission Management Team had members in positions of greater authority who exerted influence over the deliberations of others. In the actual working of their group, a person in a position of authority would express a strong position and then ask for others to respond. This preliminary expression of authority essentially closed off the exploration of alternative possibilities. Technically speaking, Interactivity Foundation discussion panels don’t have members with authority over others. However, some participants, perhaps by sheer force of personality or by speaking from knowledge on a given topic, can accrue authority within the group. This isn’t bad in and of itself. However, discussion panels need to be wary about the tendency of such expressions of authority to shut down or close off the group’s explorations.  It’s important for outspoken panelists to be sensitive about their behavior and how it can preemptively close off the discussions—and how this can lead a group to think poorly.

The need to embrace diversity and dissent. The Columbia Mission Management Team failed in part because they stressed the need for consensus. The group essentially started with a set conclusion—that even if there was a problem (from a missing panel during the launch), there was nothing that could be done about it (a mistaken assumption). This meant the Mission Management Team shut down contrasting points of view, since the main task was just to establish and reinforce consensus for this position. This stymied the ability of others in the group to come up contrasting possibilities of what could be done before Columbia tried to land (it broke up on re-entry). Our discussion panels similarly need to embrace dissent and divergent perspectives in order to open up their group exploration of useful and contrasting policy possibilities—regardless of whether these possibilities are perceived as a matter of popular consensus.  Further, the panels need to be careful to keep an open mind rather than starting with a preconceived limitation about what is or isn’t possible.

Of course, the life-and-death consequences of the Columbia disaster is a stark contrast to the low risk endeavor of an Interactivity Foundation sanctuary discussion project. It’s a good reminder, however, of what it takes for the groups in our projects to think well.

Exactly what makes a policy possibility worthwhile to discuss is another question. But there are some very old policy possibilities that are worth discussing. There are, indeed, many old ideas in other fields—such as history, philosophy, and mathematics—that are worth discussing over and over again. This is especially true in politics. And it also holds true for public policy possibilities. This is because public policy possibilities emanate from the values, beliefs, goals, and interests that people have. They may have been first proposed years ago. But people may not know about them or may have never considered them seriously. ‘Don’t involve yourself in expensive foreign wars’ is a policy idea that can be traced back to the ancient Greeks. But each generation has to rediscover it for themselves.

IF creates opportunities for people to engage in a thoughtful and civil exploration of governance concerns and policy possibilities that are sometimes as old as the hills, but are often fundamentally different from what our public discussion participants believe ought to be done. We value ideas and policy possibilities that address governance concerns that are ‘over the horizon’, that are more conceptual in nature and have a long-term perspective. But we also think that our current policies—or the ‘status quo’—are worth discussing. And we understand that what is status quo for one person may be uncharted territory for another—and that a major concern for one person may not even be worth discussing for another.

Many policy wonks in DC talk as if the only policy possibilities that worthwhile to discuss are those that advocate their own concerns, beliefs, values, goals, and interests. They are always quite ready to tell you what is and is not worthwhile to discuss. We aim to explore and developed a wide range of contrasting policy possibilities for public discussion. If one of our project panelists regards a certain governance concern or policy possibility as worthwhile to discuss that, from our perspective, makes it worthwhile to discuss.

I’m not quite sure whether this is a new and original idea, but I think it’s a good one even if it’s not.

I found a recent example of this in Atul Gawande’s account of different programs designed to slow the accelerating costs of healthcare. Gawande’s New Yorker article, ”The Hot Spotters: Can we lower medical costs by giving the neediest patients better care?,” recounts efforts to address the so-called “hot spots” of small numbers of very needy patients who generate a lion’s share of costs. In one case he describes, the health plan designers decided to increase co-pays for individuals as the way to reduce costs—reasoning that patients might slow their use of healthcare services if they had to bear a greater portion of the costs. This is a fairly common line of reasoning nowadays. It appeals to the notion of greater individual accountability for one’s own healthcare expenditures. If you have to pay a greater share of the costs, then you’ll think twice about whether you really need to go to the doctor. Makes sense, right? Yet in the case described by Gawande, costs continued to rise just as fast as before. It turns out that by shifting a greater cost burden to some of the most at-risk patients, especially retirees living on a fixed income, this led those patients to cut back on their medications and other services. By failing to keep up with more routine care or regular medication, the patients’ health degenerated and they ended up needing far more costly care.

The purpose of sharing a story like this with an IF panel is not to criticize a given policy approach. It’s to encourage the panelists to think about the different human situations that a policy might feed into. It’s to help them imagine how the policy might unfold differently for different groups of people, a reminder that we need to think beyond ourselves and how we might act. It’s to help us remember that consequences often unfold in ways we don’t intend. Often we have set beliefs about social realities or human behavior and we imagine things might simply evolve as we’d plan or predict. Having some examples of unexpected consequences, especially examples drawn from outside the topical area of a given project, can help to enrich panelists’ exploration of consequences.

–Jeff Prudhomme