It’s concerning to see people on either side of the
political spectrum come out against what AS was trying to accomplish...and what
they specifically were trying to accomplish was to facilitate a national
conversation about a difficult and complex subject. Despite claims by a range of organizations
that the deliberations were biased towards or against some particular aspect of
the discussion, either overtly or not, I would argue that AS went out of its
way to ensure the conversation reflected a range of political, social, economic
and cultural perspectives. I commend
them for the expansive advisory group that guided the process, with people from
all kinds of organizations and perspectives, and that shepherded the discussion
and process for many months beforehand.
As a researcher, the larger question to me is, how can we
understand the nature of this criticism? What might it mean for future deliberations?
In a forthcoming paper on a recent study I completed, one
finding I write about is that the lens we use to see participation has
everything to do with how we see, understand and enact participation. This means that if we consider the Right and
Left phenomena from a political science standpoint, there of course is a lot of
competition among people about an outcome or perceived outcome. In this way, they could see the AS event as a
way to threaten the status quo and criticizing funding, etc. is one potential
avenue to subtly or overtly seeking to discredit the overall effort and
diminish its potential influence. If either
side sees things it has historically embraced as potentially being negatively
affected as a result, this makes perfect sense.
However, if we use another kind of lens to look at the
phenomena, such as a sociological lens, we may identify something very
different going on. For example, these
criticisms may be a way for the groups on the Left and Right to coalesce around
something they care about and therefore self-define each distinctive group
itself...rather than allowing the AS event to define us all as one group
of people bound together in a democracy by this issue. By criticizing the AS event like this, they
draw more people towards their respective groups. (My paper talks about a variety of lenses, these
are just a few examples for this particular situation.) What AS did through the June 26 program is to
provide one way for considering this important challenge that simultaneously also
seeks to change the current dynamic in different ways. Looking at the phenomena using different
lenses can help us find a variety of explanations for what’s going on and
propose some reasons for understanding why it’s occurring.
In terms of the potential influence on future deliberations,
I would argue that we can’t allow the potential for criticism of varying kinds
to keep us from doing this important work. Yes, it’s very painful to hear, particularly
when people spin “untruths,” to be charitable about it. This is where having a community of people who
believe in democratic principles is so valuable, to keep us grounded in what’s
really important, no matter what others say.
I have been very heartened to see so many statements of support for what
AS sought to accomplish through the OBOE event, and am glad to add my voice to
it. June 26 was a great step forward for
us; if future events “rock the boat,” so be it.
The fact that people can even say these things – and that we can shoulder
those comments – are themselves signs of a strong democracy. I look forward to participating in and
speaking up in support of future deliberations, sponsored by AS and other
groups, that reflect the spirit and practice of democratic principles.
