Face-to-face versus Online Public Deliberation, Which One is Better?
It started from democracy. Benjamin Barber states that there can be no strong democratic legitimacy without ongoing talk. Democracy itself refers to the power of people. An old statement says ‘Vox Populi, Vox Dei’ means ‘The voice of the people is the voice of God’. Democracy works best when all voices can be heard therefore public engagement is needed in democratic governance.
The term deliberation is now commonly used within academia. Proponents of community deliberation argue that participation in deliberation forums, conventions, and panels has a positive impact on people’s attitudes and behaviour. Gastil (2000) summarizes the positive impacts of deliberation are more informed and reflective judgements, a greater sense of political efficacy, and an increase in the frequency of political action.
Deliberative public engagement is a distinctive approach to involving people in decision-making. It gives people time to think, consider and discuss an issue before come to opinion or view, different from common public engagement forms. According to National Consumer Council (NCC), deliberative public involvement gives policymakers much richer data about public attitudes and values, offers opportunities to explore more why people feel the way they do, and allows time to develop ideas, options and priorities with the public. For public participants, deliberative public involvement offers an opportunity to share and develop their views with each other and directly with experts and decision-makers.
When deliberative public engagement is needed?
National Consumer Council points out that deliberative public engagement is needed when:
· Policymakers or decision-makers want to listen and take into account public views, as a contribution to stronger decisions based on a deeper understanding of public values and their attitudes towards an issue.
· Decisions, policies to be taken involve complex problems, uncertainties or beliefs, values, conflicting understandings, experiences and behaviour or where the point of view might dominate.
· Decisions will require an exchange between different policy options, and working participants, together, can explore in detail the implications alternative to produce better information.
· Decision makers cannot make and implement a decision of its own but there must be support from other people.
There some conditions when deliberative public engagement is useful as Kettering Foundation reveals:
- Citizens are aware of the problem
- Citizens need to be helped to identify what is very valuable at stake
- Decisions have not been made
- For setting direction and policy at the early stages
- The issue is not too broad
Singapore, for example, organise a “Singapore Dialogue” which hold more than 640 dialogue sessions with citizens to find out their views on government policy. Some regimes known as authoritarian also open space for public engagement. The governments of Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Tanzania invite citizen groups and civil society organizations to discuss and negotiate policies related to government budgets. China also has a “National People’s Congress” to solicit public opinion about bills through workshops, hearings and opinion polls.
Face to face or online deliberation?
Information and communication technology shifts people to interact online in many ways. Deliberation is now popularly done online. Which one is better, deliberations in face-to-face groups or online groups? Are those two things substitutes?
According to Gastil, a studies review shows that face-to-face groups are more efficient, more cohesive, and better at handling complex problems that required qualitative judgements. Online groups are considered better for quantitative judgements and sometimes reduce the influence of individual participant’s social status.
In a face-to-face group, interaction is more intense because participants are able to directly discuss and respond one to another. The face-to-face group also provides wider space for multi-interaction (between more than two persons) and the process is usually faster because participants gather at the same time at a certain venue. In contrast to online groups where the process is relatively longer because the question-answer or argumentation is done through computer media where participants access it at different times.
The weakness of the face-to-face group is the potential for participant’s reluctance to issue opinions or defend their opinions because of the influence of other participant’s social status. The weakness of this face-to-face group is the strength of online groups, where the social status of participants tends not to be seen.
Other perspective is revealed by Kubicek after observing six consultation processes and seven collaboration processes and compares the advantages and disadvantages of face-to-face communication to online communication as follows.
Face-to-face:
- More quality and relevance contribution or at least equal to the online process
- Better to change own position and find a compromise
- Better for deliberating arguments and opinions of others
- Better for getting into contact with other participants and organizers
Online:
- Less cost for participants that brings more participants
- Less personal effort that brings more proposals/comments
- Better to change personal attitudes and opinions
- Better for getting support for own ideas from similar minded people or equal to the face-to-face process
We, in Indonesia, have just experienced a regrettable incident related to public deliberation on last September. The government and legislature have agreed to amend corruption and general criminal laws. The government claimed that they had conducted face-to-face deliberation process for over a year. Most of the places they held the meetings were at colleges and universities. The problem is, the public did not agree with the draft of the law and they did not feel engaged on the process. Thousands of students protested by demonstrations which ended in riots. At least two people were killed in the action.
I assume that this incident happened due to the lack of online deliberation. Students are millennials who most of them live on the internet even born in the internet era. If they claim not to know the government’s strong reasons for changing the law, it can be concluded that the socialization did not go well through the internet and the public voices in cyberspace were not listened.
Epilogue
Deliberative public engagement is an important stage in policymaking in modern and democratic governance. Face-to-face groups and online groups have their own advantages and disadvantages. Several aspects are brought better by face-to-face groups such as quality of contribution and deliberating arguments. On the other hand, online groups involve more participants and responses because it is more practical. Both these types of deliberation must be done together to get better results.
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Other references:
Chadwick, A. (2006). Internet politics; states, citizens, and new communication technologies. England: Oxford University Press.
Naming and Framing Difficult Issues to Make Sound Decisions. (2011). A Kettering Foundation Report.
