2024 is a historic year for elections with over 50 countries across the globe going to the polls. What does this year of elections mean for democracy?
Listen to the full episode below or click here:
SFX: We are gonna talk about the polls because the polls are interesting. Countries that are home to 4 billion people, half the world, are set to cast ballots in elections this calendar year. A sense of both continuity and change at the same time.
[00:00:13] Barack Obama: Do not boo. Vote.
[00:00:18] Adrian Brown: Hello and welcome to Reimagining Government.
My name is Adrian Brown. 2024 is a historic year for elections with over 50 countries across the globe, going to the polls. Elections shape our political landscape and are an opportunity for citizens to have their say on how they'd like to see their country run. But what does this year of elections mean for democracy?
Are there better ways for citizens to have their say? In this very special election year episode of Reimagining Government, I'm joined by Programme Manager for Europe at Centre for Public Impact, Beatriz Cano Buchholz . Welcome to the show Bea. Why don't you share a little bit about the work you're doing?
[00:00:59] Beatriz Cano Buchholz: Yeah. Hello [00:01:00] Adrian, and thank you so much for having me today. Some words about myself. I am fascinated by ways in which, uh, governments can reimagine their role and adopt new practices to really empower residents to solve challenges. At CPI, I've led several projects across the globe that actually focus on strengthening civic participation, where we've worked with local governments, um, international organisations and philanthropies to support governments to better engage citizens in their work and take a more systemic approach to, uh, solve challenges.
[00:01:34] Adrian Brown: You've got fantastic experience there, Bea, and it's great to have you joining me for this episode. And today's episode will run a little bit differently to normal as in preparation for this discussion, I took part in a round table with two special guests.
[00:01:49] Omezzine Khelifa: My name is Omezzine Khelifa. I am Tunisian French. I was involved as an activist in the Tunisian Revolution back in 2010, and after the dictator [00:02:00] fled Tunisia, I took part in the transition as a politician took part in the first free and fair elections.
[00:02:07] Jon Alexander: So my name's Jon Alexander. I co-founded a consultancy business called The New Citizen Project. Much of what we do is kind of designing participatory democracy processes and these kinds of things. Uh, I wrote a book called Citizens: why the key to fixing everything is all of us and, uh, do all sorts of work from researching how to engage politicians more with participatory democracy approaches to organising talks and convenings on the future of democracy.
[00:02:35] Adrian Brown: So two fantastic guests there. Bea, have you come across these speakers before?
[00:02:38] Beatriz Cano Buchholz: Yeah, so I had actually come across Jon Alexander's book entitled Citizens, um, where he invites institutions to treat people more like citizens as opposed to consumers, which I had found fascinating, really. Um, and I'm also really thrilled about having Omezzine Khelifa joining us today.
I think, uh, her trajectory as a woman activist during the Arab Springs in[00:03:00] Tunisia, but also later as a politician is, is deeply inspiring. So I'm really excited to hear what, uh, both these speakers have, have to say
[00:03:08] Adrian Brown: To kick things off, we asked ourselves what this year of elections meant for societies across the globe.
But before we get into that. What are your thoughts on this year Bea? What do you think is important about this year of elections?
[00:03:19] Beatriz Cano Buchholz: I would say that this year is particularly important for three main reasons. Um, and you've touched on the first run, Adrian earlier, but it has to do with really the, the scale of the, of the elections this year.Around half of the world's population, uh, lives in countries holding national elections this year, and that means that around 2 billion voters will be invited to, to vote. The second reason is that we have had and will have elections in major countries or regions, countries like India, Mexico, the UK, Russia, Taiwan, uh, but also the, uh, highly anticipated, uh, elections coming up in the US in November, which is [00:04:00] seen as a, as a critical moment for, you know, both the direction of the countries domestic and foreign policy, uh, but also any re repercussions that these could have on, uh, the globe really.
And lastly, I think we're also expecting elections to see an increased use of technology, including AI and voter engagement, which raises some, um, important questions about cybersecurity and election integrity, which we are all looking at carefully.
[00:04:30] Adrian Brown: Thanks, Bea so those are great framing thoughts. Let's head to the round table to hear what our guests, uh, thought.
[00:04:37] Jon Alexander: I mean, obviously it's a key year for humanity, right? Nearly half the population of the world I think it is going to the polling booths.The critical thing I want to get across really is the idea that, that if democracy is only about elections, then we are on our way into serious trouble.
In a way, the year of elections sort of began October last year in in, in [00:05:00] Argentina and Poland,
[00:05:02] SFX: announces election winner in Polish
[00:05:09] News Reporter: Now where supporters of the right wing outsider, Javier Milei, have been celebrating his victory, Mr. Milei known as El Loco or the madman won with 55.7% of the vote.
[00:05:22] Jon Alexander: You look across the world, you can see a pretty clear picture that we're getting to a point where people are becoming really frustrated and worn out with what, what I would call consumer democracy, where people's only agency is to choose between the fixed set of options that someone else has designed.
And where that ends up is you are always choosing the kind of least worst option. I think the significance of this year is that we are reaching the point in the challenges we face as humanity, where the existing systems and structures, the sort of default systems and structures simply can't solve the challenges we face.
You can't solve crises of [00:06:00] loneliness and mental health from within a sort of a set of systems and structures that are based on the underlying idea that people are independent, isolated individuals, because the underlying story is the source of the crisis. You can't solve crises of inequality based within and between nations from within a sort of set of systems and structures that are rooted in the idea that competition between, and like trying to rise above will provide the best answers because the underlying story is also the root of the crisis. And you can't solve critically an ecological crisis from within a set of systems and structures that are rooted in an idea that we are separate from nature.
That the, that the purpose of government actually is to provide ever increasing material standards of living because the, that underlying story that gives rise to the systems and structures is also the thing that causes the crisis.
[00:06:53] Omezzine Khelifa: Jon, you're talking about this big change that we are all feeling, that we are all seeing that we at some point, we are all part of, [00:07:00] where we see that the system as it is the structures, the institution that have been built don't serve the needs of the people and the needs of the planet right now. This consumer story where we are all faced with this choice between politicians and we pick and choose as if it was a product in, in, in a supermarket. We need to transition. And I like the, the framework that you using with the citizen story, right?
Where we are, like not a minority of people are part of this change or see this change happening and the need for this change to happen. Most of us feel part of it, feel agency, and want to be creating this, this solution. Crafting the conversation, not just being there to choose between elections. Who's gonna be the one who's gonna lead us for the next four to five years?
I'm, I'm wondering, you know, it's the chicken and the egg, right? Who is the political leader? Who's gonna come and allow for the space for us, [00:08:00] random, normal citizens to come and put in place systems like participatory systems for us to be part of the conversation, but also the decision making and support one another.
Or is it not a politician? If we're disappointed with the ones who's gonna be elected, those who are going to perpetrate the system. So needs to be like a mass of us, a critical mass of us citizens, pushing, making, putting, pressure, creating those patients. And this is obviously happening all around the world.
We know that for decades these initiatives have been happening, but not big enough to make a, a, a massive change at the scale of a, of a country, and that lasts after elections when the leader leaves office.
[00:08:44] Adrian Brown: I think one of the points that really both speakers were making there was that democracy is more than elections.
We have to think beyond elections. What did you think about, about that point?
[00:08:55] Beatriz Cano Buchholz: I think, you know, there is a strong desire for co-creation, uh, coming both from [00:09:00] governments and from people who want to be part of the solution. And we know, um, that there are new methods and new ways that, um, governments are exploring to actually be able to invite, uh, citizens to, um, co-develop solutions together with communities as opposed to for communities.
And actually one example that comes to mind that we haveseen at CPI is the Urban Imaginaries programme that we've, uh, co-designed and implemented together with the United Nations Development Programme in five countries across the Caucasus region last year. And what we did in that program is that we actually built a programme to take around 40 government officials across what we call the journey of change and support them to solve a challenge of their choice together with residents and local actors such as, uh, universities, NGOs, and local businesses.
The challenges they actually came to the program with run from, [00:10:00] how can we make our local park more inclusive for people with disabilities to how can we encourage residents to reduce their consumption of energy and adopt LED lighting.
Um, and I remember how throughout the programme, we spent about two years working with these cities. Um, government officials were just amazed by the creativity of citizens and their understanding of the challenge. Um, many times governments came back to us and said, actually, we thought that was a challenge, but it turned out it wasn't.
Um, and I think there was, throughout the program, a really strong appetite from citizens to work with the city for solving problems and even volunteer, um, outside of their, of their working hour to do so.
[00:10:46] Adrian Brown: Yeah, I remember some of the examples from the Urban Imaginaries programme, and you, and you're right, that that reservoir of energy and enthusiasm from citizens, they want to get involved and they want, they want to play a greater [00:11:00] role than, uh, than just voting once every four years or so.
So let, well, let's take a step back. And we moved on to looking at what an electoral cycle is and the mindset behind that in traditional forms of election cycles that we're familiar with. So election cycles create this sort of clock speed of government, I suppose. They, the, the seasons of government are affected by, uh, the electoral cycles.
And so you naturally have this moment where a lot of promises are made and then a new government arrives and there's a sense that they have to kind of quote unquote, get on with delivery, get on with policymaking implementing. I'm speaking from experience now really in the UK, but I think this is true elsewhere.
Halfway through the, the term, there becomes a realisation that sort of time's running out a little bit. And, and then they focus on trying to sort of show, show some wins, show some, some data that's pointing in the right direction. Show some, uh, new, more police on the streets or [00:12:00] teachers in classrooms or whatever it is that they've promised, so that by the time they get towards the end of the electoral cycle, they've got data to point to, whether that's economic data or public service delivery, or other things to show, look, we achieve what we said we would achieve at the beginning.
It's worth reflecting on what is the underlying mindset t hat that way of working is based on. There's a wonderful book by James C. Scott called Seeing Like a State. And in this book, what, what he, what Scott argues is that government has this built-in mindset, which he calls high modernism. And when he's talking about high modernism, he's talking about a very core belief that with technology and science and management techniques and strong leadership, we can kind of identify problems, make sensible decisions, and then sort of solve them. So it's this strong belief that we can deliver on these promises in that sort of rational deterministic, quite hierarchical, top-down way. Some problems in the [00:13:00] world are like that, right? I think, you know, if we say, I've identified that I need to build a bridge that's sort of hierarchical deterministic way works.
But most of the problems actually that we face as societies now are not like that at all. They're unbounded. They are interconnected. They are hard to describe. They, they, there've got multiple perspectives involved. There are multiple players involved. These are complex challenges and when faced with complexity, this sort of high modernism mindset really fails and fails spectacularly because it, it doesn't just not work. I think it gives us a false sense that we can actually control and manage our way out of these problems, sort of solve them. You can't solve a complex problem like this. It's about how we create systems that are strength and connections between people building those bridges rather than saying we can solve it all and you know, mark our scorecard at the end of the electoral cycle. If we were doing something which was much more along [00:14:00] the lines of about politicians asking questions, not saying I've got all the answers, but saying I think I've got some good questions. I think I've got a convening ability, given my positionality in the system that allows me to bring together different parties in new and creative ways.
I think I've got an ability, given my position as a position to create spaces for discussion and for ideas exchange that perhaps are hard to do without, without someone acting as a steward in that, in that way. That is a completely different way of operating. And I think when you overlay electoral cycles onto that, the rhythms would be, would be very different and the behaviours would be very different within it.
In summary, I suppose, you know, electoral cycles are inevitable whilst we have elections. But let's think, let's ask ourselves what are the sort of mindsets and then the ways of working that are sort of reinforcing those electoral cycles, uh, that that may not be helpful, and how can we break out of those so that we're not becoming, yeah, this sort of continuous cycling back of kind of promising and then failing and [00:15:00] people being disappointed.
And then repeat, rinse and repeat and rinse and repeat, which is where we are today, simply because, you know, the way we're working is not really aligned to the nature of the problems that we're trying to address.
[00:15:14] Keir Starmer: The labor government, I lead will be mission driven. The long-term problems we face require long-term solutions.Five national missions to bring purpose and pride back to Britain.
Jon Alexander: One of the things I'm excited about in the UK right now is the, this language of mission-led government that, that, that I don't particularly love. But I think the opportunity that, the idea of articulating a number of specific missions that, that the new Labour dministration has potentially, if you could bring kind of learning cycles into the structure and the governance of those missions and bring people, like citizens into those sort of, those learning cycles, you could, and you could take them out of the electoral cycle [00:16:00] and say, actually we're gonna create a learning cycle for this work. So let's say it's like, improve the outcomes in our health system. If you were to sort of say, okay, let's create a standing citizen's assembly as part of the governance structure of, of that mission, uh, let's have it meeting every year to review how we're doing and how we're, and, and, and like, are we really going in the right direction?
Then actually you might be able to course correct and sort of and deepen the framing of that mission with public legitimacy in such a way as you could really do something as Adrian's saying sort of within the electoral cycle. Because we have to start from where we are, could start to sort of see the different kind of cycle could start to take advantage of the idea of cycles, but, but kind of complexify and like enriching it and, and bring people into it in such a way that could actually expand how we think about what an election is as well.
It's sort of rather than being a kind of a moment for us to choose whether to buy the product [00:17:00] again or choose the choose the other one because we think this one's been a bit rubbish, to be a deeper moment of reflection and learning within a broader process that's going on all the time.
I think that's a really interesting sort of evolution point for our democracies.
[00:17:14] Adrian Brown: So Bea really interested to get your thoughts on what we just discussed there. There was a lot in it, but yeah. What are your reflections?
[00:17:21] Beatriz Cano Buchholz: I found the point around electoral cycles really interesting and I think as you've both said, the way our institutions are set up today encourages, politicians, but I think also citizens to take a quite narrow and shortsighted view of the impact of our decisions. Um, and I think everywhere we are increasingly hearing voices, asking governments to actually decouple certain subjects from the political cycles, um, such as environmental policies, but also education.
[00:17:53] Adrian Brown: And I know that some people listening will say, well, that sounds somewhat idealistic. Is it actually possible to decouple things like [00:18:00] education from political cycles Bea? Have you seen any examples where a country or or a, a government has achieved that?
[00:18:06] Beatriz Cano Buchholz: Yeah, so actually one, one example that comes to mind is a case study that, um, I've worked on preparing a couple of years ago with Toby Low, um, on the Finnish National Education Agency. Um, and what the Finnish National Education Agency, um, was keen to do was to actually take a new approach to develop their educational programme and separate that from the political, uh, cycle, um, and explore how they could set up a platform to invite everyone in the society.
And by everyone, I mean, um, you know, citizens, but also the key actors, uh, to actually build together the curriculum of, of the future. Um, and how they did that was actually by setting up what they called experimental labs across the country, where national and regional government officials were invited to actually collaborate with school [00:19:00] directors, teachers, parents, and children themselves to actually build the educational curriculum of the future and reflect together on what are the, the skills that we want our children to have? What are the values that we want our society to actually, to promote, um, et cetera? And what they did with these experimental labs was also setting up learning cycles across the labs. And across the institutions and individuals across that big system, um, to actually invite people to reflect on, um, what they were learning throughout this experience and collectively align on the future of the educational programme.
Um, which also helped actually, uh, to strengthen trust between the government and people in, in the country really.
[00:19:45] Adrian Brown: Yeah. Thanks Bea. Thanks for sharing that. And I'm sure we can put a link to that case study the Finn uh, education case study in the, in the show notes if people wanna follow up on it. Of course, we had Olli Pekka Heinonen, who was one of the [00:20:00] architects of that policy on this very podcast right back in episode one.
So if you want to scroll back in your podcast feed, you'll find, uh, Olli Pekka on that episode. So as the conversation moved on, we recognised that we've already seen many examples of more progressive forms of electoral mechanisms around the world, and we decided to explore a few of those next to highlight how progressive countries are approaching elections a little bit differently.
I am British originally, but I live in Sweden. I've lived in Sweden for the last few years, and in Sweden there's a tradition where all the political parties gather together during the first week of July on an island called Gotland, which is in the Baltic Sea off the coast of Sweden, and the main town there called Visby.
It's called Almedalsveckan, Almedal’sWeek, which is named after where it takes place. And it's kind of like a political festival, [00:21:00] so it sounds quite an unlikely uh, uh, setup. But parties are there, business is there, civil society is there. It's open to the public and it's broadcast on the national television station as well.
And it's actually a space not for point scoring or setting out a political stall against your opponents. It's a space where Swedish society, I suppose, comes together for a week and says, what's important? What are our differences? What are our commonalities? What are our challenges? What are our opportunities as a society?
And let's talk about it, and let's talk about it not in a adversarial point, scoring way, but let's talk about it in a collaborative, productive, more participatory way. And that then sets the scene, I think for a higher quality political dialogue, the other 51 weeks of, of the year.[00:22:00]
I would encourage any, anyone listening to this who is not, who's interested in these kinds of forms of democracy to look at this, this Swedish example, because I find it quite inspiring that it actually exists and seems to, you know, be a useful space, uh, at least in Sweden.
[00:22:19] Jon Alxanderer: I didn't know about that Swedish way of working.
There's in, it made me think in Finland. I mean, classically, let's not, let's not spend our entire time talking about the Nordics, right, cause that always gets depressing. The sort of haven of sanity that's gonna carry on while everything else falls apart is too, too often the way. But there is, there is a really fascinating project in Finland, September or October last year, uh, called what do we think Finland?
Using the online deliberative platform Polis as a, as a way of just, just genuinely going, like, how are we doing? The way Polis works is, is what's called a Wiki survey. And so that, what that means is anyone can add statements to the survey so that, that there will be things like, I think we're [00:23:00] doing pretty well actually, and then you can click, do you resonate with that or not resonate with that?
And because the only thing people can do is click, whether they resonate or not, you start to then be able to see kind of groupings emerge. So Finland has this conversation, uh, that they're now intending apparently to do every year. That sort of a kind of annual check-in for a month of like, how are we doing what, what's, what's arising?
Where people are active participants in that, and where there's an incentive on finding bridging, ways to bridge across difference rather than simply to sort of go the role that our, our social and broadcast media too often play, which is to sort of ham up the divisions. It's actually a space that tries to find consensus.
Some of the sorts of things that they, they have done in Taiwan using Polis for, for specific conversations, in order to develop policy in contested areas, there's a platform where if you get 5,000 signatures, it automatically triggers one of these kind of conversations. So there [00:24:00] is a, what are called citizen initiatives, a way for difficult issues to kind of be raised by a decent number of the population that then make it something like, we're gonna, we're gonna look at this together. Those kinds of dynamics, those sort of citizen initiative, uh, dynamics are, are starting to be adopted in more places around the world. I think there, there are a couple of cities in Poland, I think, where if there are, if you get to a thousand or 2000 signatures on something that it triggers a, a different dynamic, which a different mechanic, which is citizen assembly. So a randomly selected representative of the sample of the population coming together to deliberate on, on an issue. That then bridges me onto Ireland, where, where actually citizen assemblies are now a sort of a, a structured part of the kind of constitutional process in Ireland. So when, and if there is a need to sort of revise the, the constitution of the country or look at something that might sort of change the rules of that place, there is a process in place where there would be a citizen's assembly and then a referendum.
I can also talk about Malawi. There are, there is a system of, [00:25:00] of citizens juries actually where, which are now part of, so for a long time in Malawi there's been a, a system where mps have a, kind of, have a little pot of money that can be spent in their constituency. There's now a system of citizens juries emerging, where as an oversight function within that, where a randomly selected group of the citizens of that constituency have a, have a kind of oversight role in that. All of which I'm kind of rattling off really just to say like, we have some of these mechanics and tools and ways of working, but it, it's so interesting to me that that feels so far from the surface conversation of 2024.
[00:25:40] Adrian Brown: So again, Bea, there's a lot in those, in that clip. Uh, and we perhaps did fall into the trap of, uh, talking too much about Scandinavia already. But, uh, what do, what were your reflections on what was just discussed there?
[00:25:52] Beatriz Cano Buchholz: Yeah, I think that was a fairly optimistic message, really. And I've heard additional examples from, you know, Poland, Taiwan, Malawi, and I [00:26:00] think all these are just great examples that showcase how, as Jon said, there are ways to give a stronger voice to citizens that have been tested and are actually operating across different, uh, geographies.
Um, and I think what would be amazing to see is actually a platform to support the exchange of learnings across all these pioneers and governments that are undertaking these innovative approaches. I'm imagining, you know, a learning cycle where they could learn together as they test out these new methods and collectively advance our general knowledge on what are the alternative ways to empower citizens that actually work out there.
[00:26:40] Adrian Brown: Well, these examples come some way, I guess, to offering a better approach to elections. But what else can be done and are elections even needed in a modern model of governance? We'll be right back.
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[00:27:36] Omezzine Khelifa: The image of political leadership because of many bad political leaders who have used their position of power to do harm, that that's the image we have today. So it's very difficult for activist politicians, for politicians who are therefore the right reasons to be visible. To be trusted and [00:28:00] even to do anything frankly, the system of media, uh, how it is today is first is bad news, makes news, right?
If you do a good participatory system in your town and you're succeeded to solve some complex issue that have been there for decades and that people are satisfied, I don't know if that would make national news. It is a whole system. When we, when we think about it, this idea that we can come together, identify our common values, and find the solution for the question that the politician is asked, and maybe even the politician is there to identify what is the priority of the collective.
To help the collective identify what they should be doing next and to lead that conversation and then to be there to help in the implementation, to lead the implementation once he or she, um, helped craft the ideas that would came, come from the conversations from the processes. We [00:29:00] can talk a lot about amazing examples like Taiwan's example, like Xi's example, like Portugal example, where we have the first national participatory budget at the country level that was implemented by the minister, former minister of culture, Graca Fonseca but, but they're still too few, so I understand why.
These are not happening everywhere. Why these solutions are, why not politicians are not embracing these new tools that why they're not having this activist mindset. And like, come together with, uh, activists who prefer to stay outside of the party politics system. And citizens who just wanna be voters and participate are not doing this massively.
Two weeks ago, uh, here in Palermo, a friend of mine who is a journalist and activist, he did this new multimedia monologue, he calls it, it's, it's a story [00:30:00] basically like a modern story, right? You have one hour and a half, like a movie of, of, of. And images and videos where he speaks to you and then shows something and then comes and give, give back, give some figures.
And there is a whole story about, uh, people who migrated from Europe and how Europe was built through migrants and the policies from a hundred years ago, up until now. And then conversations are sparked. He's been going into little villages where people don't have to pay. You know, they found a production company that is raising funds from, uh, progressive philanthropists to go to these town villages.
And they have this story where someone's telling you, but modern storytelling. And some old people came to him and said, they never saw the story like that. I never thought about migration like that because they've been fed with other things. But once someone goes to their little village and comes and speaks and they have a little, I don't know, it's ev it's [00:31:00] not even a, you know, a cycle of conversation, one conversation that is genuine with someone who's an expert and they sit, he sits down, he goes down from his pedestal and then sits and talk to them.
And he, he doesn't wanna become a politician, but we need this kind of people, politicians like that, who go and talk to people. But I see the change because I, I attended some, some events like that, it's really like life changing. The people, people understand when they see other people's stories, they wanna be involved, they change, it changes their hearts, their minds, and, and, and they take, uh, information differently.
And then they may be open to politician who have a different discourse because we need these people also to not just stay out or vote for the most, the extremist politicians, but we need them to support the ones who, uh, have the right values.
[00:31:57] Adrian Brown: On Omezzine's point, uh, around trust and [00:32:00] education and, and the role that they play in building bridges between citizens and government Bea is, is this how we move to focus away from those political figures who, who pretend to know all the answers, uh, towards those who are more honest and willing to work with citizens to find the right solutions for their country?
[00:32:18] Beatriz Cano Buchholz: Yeah, absolutely. And I would add that on top of education we also need strong accountability and, and transparency mechanisms. And also one thing that comes to mind is we've seen how through our programmes using experimentation and the use of design methods to support government officials to co-develop a solution with the citizen, can also help government officials themself, uh, reimagine their role and move away from a mentality where they see themselves as the expert and are actually expected to have all the answers to that of what we call more of a system steward mentality, where they would come to us and say, well, actually I realied [00:33:00] I don't have the answers and I don't need to have them.
What I need to do is actually facilitate a space where we can all collectively find the solution to the problem. And I found that switch really interesting as well.
[00:33:12] Adrian Brown: Yeah. Well, let's get back to the discussion where next week tackled what all this means for leaders.
[00:33:18] Jon Alexander: Another little bit of that Taiwan story is, uh, the way, the way the Taiwanese responded to Covid, that it started with the President saying, pretty much saying, we don't know how to deal with this situation.
This, this is, this could be the biggest challenge we've ever faced. And what we do know is that we'll deal with it best if we get everyone involved, and here is how we are going to start getting you involved. We're gonna set up a hotline where anyone can ring in with ideas for how the country's response can be better.
We're gonna set challenge prizes to help create apps that can track face mask availability and these sorts of things. What that speaks to is, so we talked a bit about like what's the role of politicians in general, what's the role, what might the role of citizens [00:34:00] be? But, but I think this speaks to like what the role of leaders is.
Cause there is a specific challenge to leaders in this. I think there is a real opportunity for those who are elected in these, in this round of cycles to actually step into a different mode of leadership that is more like that, that, that says- you have, maybe you've elected me thinking that I'm here to provide the answer.
However, I now have a mandate, and what I need to be honest with you about at this stage is that there are no easy answers to the challenges we face. And that what that means is we all have a role to play. One of the things I did in the research for my book Citizens was I, I went a little way into the QAnon conspiracy theory world, and the gateway into that world is you are needed here.
Like we face huge challenges. Here's your first task. That's what, that's what's drawing people in the sense that they can contribute the sense that they can be a value. It's not that there, there's an offer of a kind of a, uh, an immediately better economic situation. That's not who human beings are.[00:35:00]
There's, there's a, there's an, there's an invitation to be, be useful, to be, to be a contributor, to be part of something big in this time. And I think there's this weird irony of this, or like weird, like horror of this moment in human history where never have there been a bigger set of challenges to face and yet never has so little been asked of us as individuals.
The leader who flips that I think could actually also be very, very popular.
[00:35:26] Omezzine Khelifa: And, and, and it's the, the kind of leadership you're talking about is not this old power, old structure, patriarchal person who knows everything and we are as citizens, the infants who, who don't know, right. But actually it's growing up as people, as citizens, like understanding that we have this power.
[00:35:51] Jon Alexander: I think I've seen you speak Omezzine about the energy as well, that you felt, and so many people felt in that moment of kind of opening up [00:36:00] or or possibility in Tunisia, like the idea that there was something you could all be part of.
[00:36:06] Omezzine Khelifa: Yeah, that's a window that the revolution offers. It's like this incredible moment of history when you see something happening that you never thought would happen.
Uh, when I was a teenager, I remember we were talking about having a democracy in Tunisia, and my friend who was in Marxist said: it needs to happen when in blood, and I said No! And it stayed that like right there. But then the revolution happens, it's that moment where you have a calling. Do you follow it or not?
So what I did is that I changed my life as a engineer working in finance to involve in this revolution and, and, and be part of the, the new democracy. But I mean, what is your revolution moment? Right. We felt it in Tunisia. It's really about feeling. It's not about rational, uh, thing. We can't bet on that though.
You know, history where these events are [00:37:00] just, just come and wash out, uh, and, and you wanna be part of that tide. That's what moved us as Tunisians at the time that hope some people had fear. So fear also helped, like fear that if we don't do anything, I had personally, I personally had fear if I don't do anything now, I will beat myself up for the rest of my life if something goes wrong.
So there is also this feeling like, okay, it's, it's now. Or never. Yes. And these are big decisions, uh, but actually the history is on your side to do something now.
[00:37:44] Adrian Brown: So let me pull out a couple of quotes from from that section. So Jon said at one point ‘people want to be bigger’ and, and then Omezzine said, uh, a little later on,’ what is your revolution moment?’ and both are pointing towards this, [00:38:00] uh, belief that people want to get involved, people want to rise up, maybe people want to be engaged there.
Is that, is that true in your experience? Do you, does that resonate for you?
[00:38:12] Beatriz Cano Buchholz: Yeah, absolutely. And I think, you know, people are eager to contribute and have a say in shaping their city or society in general. Um, but I think what, what these, you know, riots, protests, or the increased use of violence and of hate speech online, we are seeing what these things are showing us is that how frustrated people are really, because they feel that their voice is not being heard.
So they have to actually go for a stronger way of, of being heard, really. Um, we have also seen some impressive examples of, you know, citizens movements. In the last years. And the one that comes to mind is the climate movement from young people that was led by Greta Thunberg. And I think what matters and what will make a difference for citizens is whether their [00:39:00] action will make a difference.
Um, which is not always, um, unfortunately, uh, true.
[00:39:06] Adrian Brown: Yeah, and I should say that we recorded the, uh, conversation with Jon and Omezzine before the riots happened in the UK. But I was also thinking now as we're listening back to the conversation about how the frustration and the, um, the sense from certain groups in the UK that they just hadn't been listened to and hadn't had a way of expressing themselves.
And that sort of coming to the fore and just being ignited in this, in this terrible couple of weeks in the, in the UK through violence on the streets is an example of you know, people, people want to, they want to be part of the conversation. If they feel that their, those voices are, are not, are not there, then of course they're going to be frustrated.
And that's, uh, and that's not in any way to condone sort of rioting, but it, it is an expression of a desire to, to want to be heard. [00:40:00] Uh, and unless we can find ways in society of, of creating a space where people with very different views can come together and, and express them and able to have a.conversation about them, you know, inevitably we will see these, these terrible moments reoccurring and, and, and, and that's, that's obviously a, a real challenge.
But let's move on to the final part of the, the discussion. Now, we, we, we, we touched on the elephant in the room, which is elections aren't perfect. Do we actually need them?
That's a bit controversial, but let's, let's see what, what the panel thought of that.
[00:40:34] Omezzine Khelifa: Jon and I interviewed many politicians around the globe before we published two reports with the Apolitical Foundation, talking about participatory democracy and the role of politicians in leading this, uh, type of change in the world.
I mean, a lot of politicians came from the global South and they reminded us of the importance of having free and fair elections first before talking about the evolution or the revolution we wanna [00:41:00] see. And I think in longstanding democracies we complain about elections and the results, but they are one of the main pillars that we need to preserve and make sure that they're always there, that people have the right to vote, that everyone has a right to vote even if we're not satisfied of how, how elections work, we need to have them and they need to be free and fair, and we need to make sure that everyone can go out to vote the day of the voting system and. And on that we build. But saying that okay, maybe democracy doesn't work all in on. No. Come I, I was born in a dictatorship and it was part of a transition to democracy for 12 years, and now we are back into an authoritarian mode.
So I'm, I'm telling you, dictatorship, authoritarian regimes, one man rule. This is not the solution.
[00:41:51] Jon Alexander: And I think there are those who would argue that that elections are not only, not enough that, but they're actually a, a problem. But I'd agree with OMezzine, I think in [00:42:00] this moment in time, elections are necessary but not sufficient.
I talk about three stories of the individual in society, subject, consumer, and citizen. The subject story people have stuff done to them and the consumer story people have stuff done for them. And in the citizen story people do stuff together with and through organisations. I, I think of this as a moment when consumer democracy, where people have stuff done for them, where their only agency is to choose between a fixed set of options isn't up to facing the challenge of our time.
But what I don't want to do is go back to the subject story and therefore to my mind that that thinking about it as a, as a sort of paradigm of citizen democracy where people are involved in an ongoing basis and shaping the democracy is a better way to think about it than, than simply about like what the key mechanics are.
Because a citizen democracy can have elections in it. But you wouldn't allow the sort of tendency to a kind of an occasional moment of choice to shape the whole of what democracy is. It becomes one feature of it, and [00:43:00] within those electoral cycles, then there's much more dynamic ongoing participation.
And that I think would then change the character of how elections functioned. If we had an ongoing participatory democracy, if we had annual participatory budgets at, in most cities, if we had citizen assemblies as part of the governance structure of a, of national missions of, you can start to imagine that actually, people's role in democracy as citizens, we wouldn't just vote. We would vote and we would also participate and contribute our ideas and energy and resources in many different ways, and therefore, that would change what the vote was because we would orient to the moment of voting. As active participants who felt like they had a stake in the ongoing process rather than as essentially as consumers going, well, I didn't like what we have for the last five years, so I'm gonna try something else for this five years.
We cannot in the world today afford to take the concept of elections for [00:44:00] granted, and yet we also, we also need more.
[00:44:18] Adrian Brown: So we've covered a huge amount of ground here over the, over the course of this episode. And, and thanks to, to Jon andOmezzine for sharing such rich and insightful, uh, thoughts. Bea, I don't envy you in asking this question, but what are your sort of reflections at the end of all of this? What, what do you leave this conversation with?
[00:44:40] Beatriz Cano Buchholz: Yeah, I tried as much as, um, possible to summarise what I heard. Um, but as you said, it has been a very rich conversation. Um, nevertheless, I think, so three points stood out for me and number one is the need to rethink the role of citizens and move towards a more active participation. Um, I really loved the [00:45:00] analogy, uh, that Jon is using around shifting from consumers to actually full citizens.
Um, number two is that I think it's, you know, we've heard it is possible to see democracy beyond elections. It is possible, but also very much needed. Um, there are new ways of engaging citizens in governments that are being used across the globe. Um, participatory budgets, citizen assemblies, but also co-creation methods.
And more. Um, and last but not least, I think Omezzine Khelife reminded us of the need to really preserve elections. And yes, they're not perfect, but they are under threat. Um, and we need to constantly remind ourselves, um, about how important they are. And, and that is, it is our role to preserve them.
[00:45:48] Adrian Brown: Thank you Bea.
A great summary and three excellent points to conclude this conversation. And that concludes this episode of Reimagining Government. Thank you so much, uh, to my co-host for this [00:46:00] episode, Beatriz Cano Buchholz, uh, you've been aa great, uh, co-navigator of, of that conversation with, uh, Jon and Omezzine. Thank you so much.
[00:46:09] Beatriz Cano Buchholz: It's been a pleasure, Adrian. Thank you so much for having me.
[00:46:11] Adrian Brown: Now, if you are a public servant or a policymaker, we want to hear from you what. Does this year of elections mean to you? You can call into the show through our answer machine. Head over to speakpipe.com/reimagining government and leave us a message.
And please be aware that we may play these out on the show. If you'd prefer to write to us, you can email in the traditional way comms@centreforpublicimpact.org to let us know what topics we should cover in future episodes. And finally, please remember to leave us a review on your favorite podcast platform and let us know what your thoughts are on this series.
Until next time, I've been Adrian Brown. Thanks for listening. Goodbye.
2024 is a historic year for elections with over 50 countries across the globe going to the polls. What does this year of elections mean for democracy?
