Civic Engagement and Recent Immigrant Communities

Provides a step-by-step guide to developing strategies and planning efforts to strengthen immigrants' civic engagement , including suggested agendas, background materials, and discussion guides. Outlines considerations for planning and successful formats

Manila learning event background notes

Around the world, people are asking how we can make democracy work in new and better ways. We are frustrated by political systems in which voting is the only legitimate political act, concerned that many republics don’t have the strength or appeal to withstand authoritarian figures, and disillusioned by the inability of many countries to address the fundamental challenges of health, education and economic development. If we want to create democracies in which citizens have meaningful roles in shaping public decisions and solving public problems, we should be asking a number of questions about civic tech, including: • How can online tools best support new forms of democracy? • What are the examples of how this has happened? • What are some variables to consider in comparing these examples? • How can we learn from each other as we move forward? This background note has been developed to help democratic innovators explore these questions and examine how their work can provide answers.DFID, SIDA, USAID, Omidyar Networ

Creating Spaces for Change: Working Toward a "Story of Now" in Civic Engagement

A dialogue report among 40 organizations from across the country, all committed to civic engagement; what it means and its goals. This paper reviews that conversation and extends an invitation to both deliberative democracy and dialogue practitioners and to community organizers to continue it. In doing so, it invites civic engagement practitioners from diverse schools of thought to raise and tackle tough, important questions; to deepen their mutual understanding of other practices and approaches, and of the values underlying and unifying their work; and to propose ideas for working together more effectively, and with greater impact

The Economic Argument for Engagement: New Directions for Research

What is the economic argument for public engagement? Around the world, public officials and other leaders have devised new ways to engage citizens in decision-making and problem-solving – but typically they have focused on planning, budgeting, and schools rather than poverty, inequality, or other economic issues. Meanwhile, emerging evidence from Brazil and other parts of the Global South suggests that sustained patterns of engagement builds social capital, which in turn has an impact on a range of indicators, including economic inequality and the distribution of wealth. This article summarizes several disparate areas of research on the connections between engagement and inequality, and suggest new questions and directions for innovation

Higher Education Exchange: 2009

This annual publication serves as a forum for new ideas and dialogue between scholars and the larger public. Essays explore ways that students, administrators, and faculty can initiate and sustain an ongoing conversation about the public life they share.The Higher Education Exchange is founded on a thought articulated by Thomas Jefferson in 1820: "I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education."In the tradition of Jefferson, the Higher Education Exchange agrees that a central goal of higher education is to help make democracy possible by preparing citizens for public life. The Higher Education Exchange is part of a movement to strengthen higher education's democratic mission and foster a more democratic culture throughout American society.Working in this tradition, the Higher Education Exchange publishes interviews, case studies, analyses, news, and ideas about efforts within higher education to develop more democratic societies

Teaching Democracy in Public Administration: Trends and Future Prospects

Over the last century, the skills, ideas, and values upheld within the field of public administration (PA) have undergone several major shifts. We seem to be in the midst of another such transition, as PA schools react to new perspectives about the state of democracy and citizenship. Most of these arguments focus on the more participatory aspects of democracy, and emphasize the need for governments to work more directly and interactively with citizens. “Democratic governance” is one term used to describe this set of ideas. This article explores the relationship between PA and democratic governance through interviews with professors and other observers of the discipline. The picture that emerges is that of a field in flux, spurred both by theoretical claims and by the practical needs of administrators, being pushed from a narrow focus on management to a broader conception of governing

The Economic Argument for Engagement: New Directions for Research

What is the economic argument for public engagement? Around the world, public officials and other leaders have devised new ways to engage citizens in decision-making and problem-solving – but typically they have focused on planning, budgeting, and schools rather than poverty, inequality, or other economic issues. Meanwhile, emerging evidence from Brazil and other parts of the Global South suggests that sustained patterns of engagement builds social capital, which in turn has an impact on a range of indicators, including economic inequality and the distribution of wealth. This article summarizes several disparate areas of research on the connections between engagement and inequality, and suggest new questions and directions for innovation

Panel #1 - Improving Democratic Engagement: How Do You Create The Right Environment for Local Democracy?

Political differences are best resolved when people treat each other in a civil manner. Unfortunately, the public square has coarsened, with one result being that more and more people are exiting the system -- by not voting, and by declining to participate in public meetings and conversation. This panel will discuss ways local institutions (e.g., service clubs, business, family, religious communities, media and entertainment institutions) can strengthen civil society and foster democracy, especially in contexts where there is low voter turnout and disengagement with local government decision-making. Moderator: Fred Smoller, Associate Professor of Political Science, Chapman University. Tom Tait, Mayor of Anaheim. Rick Cole is the City Manager of the City of Santa Monica, California. Matt Leighninger is Vice President for Public Engagement, and Director of the Yankelovich Center for Public Judgment, at Public Agenda. Antonio Gonzalez is President of the William C. Velasquez Institute