The Australian Experience of World Wide Views on Global Warming: The First Global Deliberation Process

Abstract

World Wide Views on Global Warming was the first ever global-scale citizen deliberation process, held on 25-26 September 2009 and involving approximately 4,000 citizens in 38 countries. WWViews sought to provide citizens with a voice in the 2009 UN Climate Summit in Copenhagen (COP15) by engaging them in a deliberative process about global political positions on climate change. The process produced clear, comparable results across all participating countries that were given to COP15 negotiators. The Danish Government agencies, the Danish Board of Technology and the Danish Cultural Institute, initiated the global process. Organisers in each participating country ran events using the same standardised process. The University of Technology Sydney, the organisers of the Australian WWViews event, paid special attention to several elements of the process to maximise participation and impact within the local context.This paper outlines the standardised global process used for this deliberative event and describes and reflects upon the tailored approaches developed for Australia. It examines in detail the objectives, processes and outcomes of recruiting and supporting participants and recruiting, training and coordinating facilitators, communications and dissemination of results and specific features of the Australian event. It includes the organisers’ reflections on success factors, challenges and surprises, as well as feedback from facilitators and participants. This paper concludes with a number of critical questions arising from the Australian experience of World Wide Views on Global Warming that are pertinent for practitioners designing other deliberative forums and particularly anyone concerned about future prospects for global deliberative democracy.

Keywords

• climate change
• global
• public participation