We live in a global village and any country, region or company will not be insulated from a global turmoil. Many issues are complex and take years to achieve consensus. A fast and consensual decision-making is critical for a successful implementation of the policies and decisions of the central and local governments, or of any organisation. Consensual Debating was originally created to support participatory democracy, best exemplified by Citizens’ Assemblies. In 2022 we used Consensual Debating to support over one year our input to the Future of Europe Conference, the largest ever Citizens’ Assembly program in 27 EU countries. Now, using our proprietary methodology, we have expanded its application to any organisation, such as:
- A Citizens’ Senate (semi-permanent Citizens’ Assembly)
- Parliamentary Committees (pre-voting)
- Central and regional governments (local councils)
- Company Boards
- Science and technology organisations
- Social and cultural organisations
- Advanced debates – as a teaching tool at some secondary schools
The AI-assisted Consensual Debating is a complete service offered by Consensus AI, the subsidiary of Sustensis. It includes a random selection of participants (if needed), the preparation of the initial documentation and training, the selection of any experts, as agreed with the customer, the running of the debates and delivering the final report. The key features of Consensual Debating are:
- The debates can be organized as ‘in-person’, online, or hybrid.
- Very fast, consensual decision-making supported by the latest AI Assistant.
- It can be used for in-person debates for groups from tens to hundreds of participants.
- It can replace referenda by enabling on-line voting over a period of weeks or months by tens of thousands randomly selected participants from a national electoral register
- The supporting documentation can be prepared and distributed in a day or two instead in months.
- Participants can remain anonymous and debate indirectly with other participants.
- There are several rounds of anonymous voting, unlike in Focus groups or on YouGov website, where the participants can only vote on one motion or decision.
- In Consensus AI Participants can amend the recommended decision or propose their own, on which other participants can vote, which may lead to a significantly modified final decision.
- After each vote, or at the end of the voting round, the participants can see real-time graphs showing their voting preference relative to other participants
- The actual time for decision-making is cut from months to a few days or weekends
- The agreement on the final decision is made gradually until 60% majority is achieved
To experience what Consensual Debating is about, you can join ‘open projects’ on this website such as:
- Should London’s Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) be expanded?
- Should Identity cards be implemented in Britain?
There are other projects on the website, ready to be voted on.
Rapidly increasing AI capabilities will soon enable our service to be even more user friendly and cost-effective, greatly enhancing human expertise with the AI expertise.
Consensual Debating can be used for debating complex political, social, scientific or economic problems on digital platforms such as websites or Facebook. It allows even tens of thousands of participants to debate thousands of topics simultaneously and come to an agreement in a consensual way many times faster (in a few days rather than in months). It is supported by Sustensis subsidiary site – Consensus AI.
Consensual Debating may make any debate much more effective, especially if it is carried out for a longer period, like a legislative process. It is ideally suited for the debates organized by Citizens’ Assemblies, where randomly selected delegates debate important issues and deliver recommended policies, which then may become law. Citizens Assemblies, being a type of direct democracy, represent the most significant change in many decades in how democracy functions and in particular, how important decisions are made. In this respect such events like the CoFoE Conference, are a testing ground for a large scale dissemination of this model of citizens’ participation. For the very first time all the citizens of Europe can directly participate and impact in real time the future of Europe through Citizens’ Assemblies.
We have now applied that unique Framework to provide input for the Conference on the Future of Europe. Most of the entries in the Democracy topics there are aligned with about 90 structured topics on this website consolidated into 9 main topics: Consensual Debating, Values and Responsibilities, Consensual Presidential Democracy, Citizens Assemblies, Federalism, Constitution, Parliament, Elections and President. You can read more about how Consensual Debating works here.
Disclaimer
Euro Agora facilitates any debate on a pro bono basis as accurately as possible. However, we take no responsibility for the accuracy of the data, its processing, nor for any omissions and misinterpretation of information provided on this website.