Paper Type
Prototype Paper
Description
Tools for participatory decision-making in the public sector have gained attention for a while, where, in particular, wikis have been put forward as an open-ended negotiation between different worldviews and discourses. It might seem that these are the ultimate Habermasian deliberative tools engaging the participants in the collaborative processes of developing consensus. However, in actual fact, neither the processes nor the tools are sophisticated enough. Tools often lack the necessary structure to support more complex reasoning, and if they do they are too complicated to use to enable broad participation. Furthermore, participants mostly lack legitimacy du to unequal representation, as there is a rather limited group that has the means and the motivation to participate. Therefore, in this paper we present a prototype where we have implemented tools for decision support and a statistical tool in a standard, easy-to-use application. The voting feature and pro/con argumentation is integrated in the discussion forum, as an extra formatting feature. The statistical tool, in an adequate context, can be used for understanding how the decisions are taken and how representative the opinion/decision is for the relevant population. It can also be used as a reflective tool, i.e., for making users aware of power qustions in the group of users. What this show is how a standard interface can be improved with integrated tools for structured discussions and representation analysis, without sacrificing usability.
DELIBERATION AND REPRESENTATION IN PARTICIPATORY TOOLS FOR THE PUBLIC SECTOR
Tools for participatory decision-making in the public sector have gained attention for a while, where, in particular, wikis have been put forward as an open-ended negotiation between different worldviews and discourses. It might seem that these are the ultimate Habermasian deliberative tools engaging the participants in the collaborative processes of developing consensus. However, in actual fact, neither the processes nor the tools are sophisticated enough. Tools often lack the necessary structure to support more complex reasoning, and if they do they are too complicated to use to enable broad participation. Furthermore, participants mostly lack legitimacy du to unequal representation, as there is a rather limited group that has the means and the motivation to participate. Therefore, in this paper we present a prototype where we have implemented tools for decision support and a statistical tool in a standard, easy-to-use application. The voting feature and pro/con argumentation is integrated in the discussion forum, as an extra formatting feature. The statistical tool, in an adequate context, can be used for understanding how the decisions are taken and how representative the opinion/decision is for the relevant population. It can also be used as a reflective tool, i.e., for making users aware of power qustions in the group of users. What this show is how a standard interface can be improved with integrated tools for structured discussions and representation analysis, without sacrificing usability.